SPEAKER_01 0:09

Hey everyone, welcome to the Music is our Hero Podcast, hosted by Grammy Award winners Radio. This is the spot where we celebrate creativity, share stories, and lift each other up in the art. Each episode will dive into conversations that inspire and power and spark new ideas. Because art isn't just about what we think. It's about the community we build together. So gravity, get comfy, and let's grow in creativity side by side. The music is our Euro podcast for creativity, community, and inspiration. Call to delight.

SPEAKER_03 0:43

Here I am today in uh where am I at? Westchester. Westchester. Westchester PA with it's not Brian. It's Byron. Byron. Byron, that's right. I have to get that spelling right.

SPEAKER_02 0:55

Yeah, the last name's even even harder. It's uh greater X. It's pretty much phonetic uh with how it's spelled, but people always try to make it a little, you know, greater U.

SPEAKER_03 1:06

I just saw the word great. Yeah. And then my brain it changed the R and the Y.

SPEAKER_02 1:10

Right on. There we go. It probably happens often. It happens often, yes. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:13

All right, cool. So I'm at Hop Fidelity. Uh just Hop Fidelity, it's called, right? Not record. Sorry, Hop Fidelity, which is a record store. Also, um, there's a little bar for craft beers here. Uh, they do shows here and all these different things. So we're gonna sit down with um Bri Byron. Yeah. Byron, I'm gonna get it. I'm gonna get it. Um and just talk about like all this stuff. So why don't we just start there and tell us uh who you are, and I kind of just explain what Hop Fidelity is.

SPEAKER_02 1:43

But yeah, so uh my name's Byron. Um I own Hop Fidelity, which is uh primarily a record store. Uh that is the meat and potatoes of the business, but we do have uh uh a small bar uh where we partner with some local craft brews, uh our breweries, and uh yeah, in an attempt to just create a nice experience for folks. Um, you know, having the alcohol here uh keeps people hanging around, you know. If they maybe just came in to look for a record uh and they don't find it or whatever, they might leave. But if they can stay and have a brew, then that's cool. They'll peruse a little bit longer. Yeah, there's a little bit of a business plan involved in all of it, but yeah, for the most part, it's just two of my favorite things. Uh, I'm a vinyl guy and I really like beer. And so just put the two together, and that's that's amazing.

SPEAKER_03 2:35

Living the dream, right? Living the dream. So, what made you decide to open this?

SPEAKER_02 2:41

So, this um I I've owned a record store since uh 2005. Uh, my first shop was up in uh Brattleboro, Vermont, uh, which was a partnership with my my father. Um, that's what kind of got me into the business. Uh, I had been living in Connecticut and uh, you know, was doing an insurance thing, uh, which was fine, but it was one of those things that I knew if I did it for another five years, I'd probably be doing it for the rest of my life. And um, I had a little money and uh I wanted to get out of Dodge. And so we partnered up and moved up there and opened a store called In the Moment Records in 2005. Um my dad left the business I bought him out probably three years later, and we were there until 2018. Wow. Um, yep, sold the business, uh, moved out there.

SPEAKER_03 3:29

There's a lot of changes in that time too with records from 2005, 2008.

SPEAKER_02 3:34

It went from um, yeah, people looking at me like I had three heads. Yeah. Uh when they would walk into the shop of like, well, what are you doing, man? Uh, to how did you know staying strong? Right. That was tough. And it was, you know, it was this, you know, situations like I didn't know. It just seemed like a cool thing to do at a time that you know, I was kind of doing this corporate thing. And uh, and I just wanted to get away from that. So, you know, if you if you if you go the direct opposite of working in insurance, uh record store fits the bill. Yeah. And Brattleboro at the time was a it was a really cool uh little community in southern Vermont. Uh, it had a great art scene going on. Um, it was kind of hopping. And um, and it I'd never I'd never lived in a town like that before. Um, I moved right downtown, so I didn't have to drive anywhere. I could just walk. So, you know, like I could go to the bars with with people and maybe drink a little bit too much and not have to worry about driving and just stagger home. And so I was I was having a lot of fun. It was it was a nice, it was a nice difference uh between, you know, my my outside of Hartford, Connecticut kind of experience that I'd been living. So um, and then you know, you're in Vermont and uh and I probably would have stayed a lot longer, but my wife got a really good job uh at a place called Vanguard down here. Um and so we made the decision to move. Um, and uh we did that in 2018. Uh took two years to get this place opened. Uh, we had the absolute awesome luck of opening on February 29th, 2020. So we had to close our doors about two weeks later due to the pandemic. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 5:14

So that's oh, you were one of those businesses. Yeah. So it took you about two years, and when you finally did the pandemic hit.

SPEAKER_02 5:20

The pandemic hit, and so we were too new to get any type of government assistance. Like I couldn't get any of the PPE or whatever that stuff was that other businesses got. Yeah. Um, so we just had to kind of go into survival mode. Um, and uh, but having two kids uh that were in grade school, uh it worked out all right because I I could be home with them and make sure that they're doing what they needed to do online and all that sort of stuff. Um, and uh, you know, did some online things, paid the bills. Uh, but the first couple years after that were not easy. Um even when the uh you know the the the people could go back outside, they were venturing out to their um, you know, their favorite businesses and nobody knew who we were. So we did we didn't have this built-up clientele that had been you know counting down to be like, okay, all right, they're open again. I can go back. We didn't have that. Um so it took a little while uh to build some clientele, but we're doing all right now. So yeah, wow. Um where'd the name come from? Um so you know it did it's a play on high fidelity. Yeah. Um and uh when I had my old shop in Vermont um for Record Store Day one year, I uh partnered with a local brewery and we uh we brewed a beer specifically for Record Store Day. And um the guys, the the two brewers there, the I think this brewery at the time had maybe one beer that they brewed consistently and the rest were one-offs. So they were pretty much just out of ideas for naming beers because they were constantly having to do it. So they asked me if I had any ideas. And uh for some reason, Hop Fidelity.

SPEAKER_03 6:59

So do you have a Hop Fidelity beer here? That you no, no, we don't.

SPEAKER_02 7:02

So that was what yeah, though I mean we we do have you know our own brand, which which is brewed for us by Love City.

SPEAKER_03 7:07

Rip that bathroom out and just make a small little brewery.

SPEAKER_02 7:10

Right, yeah, technically, we do have a small little brewery in the basement of this place, but um, but we're nobody would ever let us brew beer down there for human consumption.

SPEAKER_03 7:18

It is who's consuming it? Nobody, oh we're not brewing any. We're not brewing it.

SPEAKER_02 7:23

No, we we we hire Love City to do that. Yeah, it's uh it's a typical this business. Um this building's probably 200 years old. Oh wow close to it. So the basement looks it, um, the health department and the powers that be would never let any type of food stuff be produced down there. And I knew that that was never the game plan. The game plan was always to contract brew. We just had to pass muster with the PLCB, um, which you know requires that there is some semblance of brewing equipment on site. Yeah. Um, but yeah, it's not yeah, it's it's not much for sure.

SPEAKER_03 7:57

And I love that you partner with Love City, who's a local brewery in Philly. Yeah, they're great guys. Yeah, and um so you said you don't know the people from the the gem. You know that no, you don't I don't know. Okay, so they're very like it's a very similar um uh thing, and with them, they also it's with Sly Fox though. Okay, they like they they do that, and it's some kind of piggyback uh there's a thing going on so you don't have to have a liquor license or whatever.

SPEAKER_02 8:22

Exactly, because that is not an easy thing to achieve in this state.

SPEAKER_03 8:25

Yeah, so they have to sell all the they're on Sly Fox's thing, and then they gotta sell all local though, like even liquor. So I love that. I love that, I love that concept, and I love that music and the you know food and drinks and stuff are kind of combining like that. I think that's great. Um, so yeah, so you started in 2005 with your first with your with your dad, you said, right? So starting a business is scary to begin with. So how scary was it?

SPEAKER_02 8:56

You know, ignorance being bliss, it wasn't scary because I had no clue at all what I was doing or um, you know, any inclination as to like how this should be run. It was like I had some money in my pocket, I fled Connecticut, moved to Vermont, opened a record store, you know, live in the dream kind of thing. And um and didn't have I had zero expectations. I I did not know the business. Um my father did, he had had some experience in it. I did not know the area. I'd been to Brattleboro maybe one or two times prior to that. Uh all the things you probably should do when you open a business, we did not do, other than you know, dot our i's and cross our T's with, you know, getting a business license and all of that. But I mean, there's things that go into it. You need to know your demographic, you need to know um who lives in this area, will they support you? Um, all sorts of different things that go into picking a spot. Uh, we didn't, we just really didn't do much of that. Just, hey, this place looks cool. And there was already a record store there. Yeah, so it wasn't like they they, you know, we saw this, you know, gap in the community where we're like, oh, we can fill this. Right, right, right. Um, and um, you know, we had moderate success. I was able to sell the business um when it when uh when we left, which was nice. Um, but it wasn't wildly successful. But if you're in a small town in Vermont, there is, you know, there's not a glass ceiling, there's a cast iron ceiling. Yeah. Where you know, you're pulling from a very small local population. Um, if you get some tourism, that's great, but you're very dependent on it. And that doesn't always happen. Right. It's getting inconsistent. So uh we did pretty well, but you know, coming down here, this is a whole different animal. I mean, in the greater Philadelphia area, I don't know, what is there, like six million people or something like that. So there's a much larger demographic to pull from. Uh Westchester is reasonably affluent, so there are folks here, they have money to spend on records. Yeah. Which is, you know, it's a luxury. I mean, not that it's luxurious, it's just that if you're broke, you're probably not gonna, you know, forego eating to buy vinyl. Although I probably know some people that do. They're like, no, I gotta get some records, you know, it's gonna be ramen this week. Yeah, we'll be good. We'll be good. Yeah, but uh, but for the most part, people around here are reasonably affluent. And so that, you know, they do have a little bit of money to spend on records, which is great because they're not getting any cheaper, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_03 11:22

Yeah, of course they're not. Was there any time that you were like, this isn't gonna work?

SPEAKER_02 11:27

Um, I mean, there's been multiple times when you know you take a hard look at stuff and you're just like, geez, there's an easier way to make some money than this. There really is.

SPEAKER_03 11:36

Every day of my life.

SPEAKER_02 11:37

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_03 11:37

Every day of my life. It's gotta be a better way. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 11:41

You know, not a better way, but a more an easier way, more money way. The more money way, right. So I think people that do what we do, it is a labor of love, you know, to a degree. Um, and if you can get something out of it financially, then that that's great. Um, but you know, my wife has a corporate gig, uh, and I'd be, you know, lying bold-faced if I didn't say that helps to float the whole thing where where my family is not dependent upon my income uh to pay the mortgage. Yeah. Um, because we would be living a very different life if that if that was the case for sure. So um, so yeah, there's a lot of times when you just you look at stuff, you take a hard look at it, and you're like, boy, geez. Um, but it's also with a lot of things like this, it built, you know, uh, you can't expect success or what you perceive as success right off the bat. Um, and and if you do, if you're thinking, okay, I gotta be doing X by six months in, you might be disappointed and discouraged and um have to give it up or want to give it up. You know, you really need to think longer term. And that's you know, we have slowly but surely been building a really great community here. Yeah. Um, of regulars that come in all the time. Uh, word is spread. I mean, my advertising budget is next to nothing, but you know, we get new and new people in all the time. They hear about this place. As long as you're not using AI flyers. We are not. I've done it.

SPEAKER_03 13:01

Because you will, everybody will abort you.

SPEAKER_02 13:04

I didn't know. I did a couple last Christmas um just because I was like, all right, I need a lot of.

SPEAKER_03 13:08

That's when it kind of first started, it was like a year ago. Yeah, but it just got bad.

SPEAKER_02 13:11

My locals are like, what are you doing? Don't do it.

SPEAKER_03 13:14

I'm like, fair enough, fair enough. It's that first design. You're like, oh, this is nice, but then when there's you see five billion other.

SPEAKER_02 13:20

Oh, yeah, I get it. You know, it it's hard to employ, like we do have um some of the designs that that have been done uh for events here. One of them, the DJ event we do once a month. Um, you know, a living, breathing human being that is a graphic designer has done the event flyers for that, um, which is great. Yeah, that's it. But again, you know, she's a friend and she gives us a bro deal. And um, you know, if you if you go and pay a market rate for some of that stuff, especially something like that, that doesn't it there's there's no income from it, um, you know, which is a thing we like to do. Right. Um it becomes hard to justify. So I get why people do it because it's I get it.

SPEAKER_03 13:59

Well, and then people that do it, I get it that because they're not in the arts.

SPEAKER_02 14:03

Well, that's true too, you know, and and and I I don't like AI uh uh pretty much across the board. However, I get it, and I know it's gonna be a part of all of our lives, but I I really what I really don't like is when it's it's being used in place of anything creative, yeah. Because AI itself is not creative, it just pulls from whatever um and gives you what it what you think you want, uh, but um we need artists, yeah. We don't need computers making like I go on YouTube a lot to like preview music because some stuff's obscure and it's just not streaming, yeah. And I'm like, oh, you know, I end up with this record and I'm you know pricing it up and and uh and I want to listen to it, and so I have to go to YouTube to do that. And sometimes it'll show me stuff like hey, would you like uh would you like to listen to an hour of Iranian, you know, um cafe jazz? And I'm like, Yeah, I do. I didn't even know that existed, man. All right, let's hear this. And then I I I click on it. Yeah, and I I click on it, and then it's like this is generated by AI. And then it's like, yeah, okay, there is no such thing as Iranian cafe jazz. Yeah. But somebody just cued some stuff up. And and I'm like, oh, it's like I'm gutted. Like, oh, really? And I've had actually people reach out to me and send me though those links and be like, hey, do you do you have anything like this on vinyl? No, because this music doesn't exist. Like this was created by a computer. Um and uh and no, of course it it's not ever gonna be on vinyl.

SPEAKER_03 15:29

Um as far as with this whole with this whole record uh thing, what what's a moment that you are most proud of if you look back?

SPEAKER_02 15:37

Oh, I mean, there's been there's been numerous. Um uh I mean honestly, pretty much anytime somebody, and I have regulars that do this, and I'm not trying to toot my own horn, but would say, like, hey man, you've built something really cool here. Like, this is my favorite spot. Like, you know, if I if I wasn't coming here a lot, I I probably wouldn't be out of the house nearly as much. But this is my this is my habit of it. It became like a little hangout. It has for, you know, and and we build on that, and we we have a core group of um of regulars, and every now and then somebody will wander in and hang out on a Friday, you know, when the bar is pretty busy. Um, and it'll become apparent that oh, this person's gonna fit in just fine here. Yeah, and they do, and they become part of the core group. And uh, and these folks they go to shows together, they go to events together. We have a tech stream of, you know, the regulars, it's called the hoppiest of the hoppers. Yeah. And they communicate with each other um outside of this venue. Um, people have made friends that have become near and dear to them, you know, through Hop Fidelity. So that's so cool. It is. I would say that's it, that's the thing that that I'm probably most proud of is that, and it's not like I set out, like I said, okay, this is gonna be all about community. It's like, all right, I got a record store, I want to serve beer, let's figure out how to make that happen. And the rest of it was just kind of organic. Yeah. Um, and you know, if you treat people well, um and you know, you you want to create an environment where everybody's day gets a little better when they step foot through your door. Um, and if you can do that, then then um those things will happen. Then you're all on their own. You know, you don't have to like try. It'll people are people. If they're having a good time and they're they're they get to hang out with all the people wise. Yeah, they get to hang out with some folks that they they can have a cool conversation with. Um wild world, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_03 17:34

Exactly. Can all be ourselves.

SPEAKER_02 17:36

We're a little bit of an anti-bar in that regard where you know, we have people that come in and they're like, everybody's so nice here. You know, it's like you go to other bars and nobody talks to you. Yeah, but here's like everybody's engaging and super nice, and we wear our geekiness on our sleeve, you know, there's nerdy stuff all over the place here. Um, so you know, people come in that are into that sort of stuff, whether it be music, art, you know, RPG, video games, whatever. Um, it all of that gets talked about here. Uh, we have you know a standing conversation about who's watching what. Is it any good? What's it about, kind of thing. Yeah. Um, and we get turned on to different shows, and it's like, damn, you were right, man. This this is pretty fantastic. So it there's a lot of that that goes on, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 18:19

And um, so in a world where like music is instant, like you can get it wherever you go. Um, why do you feel that it's important that there's still record stores?

SPEAKER_02 18:28

I mean, physical media, I think, is gonna become even more popular as we move forward, as all of these, you know, um, subscription-based businesses are gonna be vying for content. So, you know, you think, all right, I've got Spotify, I can listen to anything I want to on Spotify. Well, no, you can't. They're gonna have access to certain stuff, Apple Music's gonna have access to certain stuff. So if you want to listen to anything at any given time, you may find all of a sudden that you know, one one of I don't know what's a good example, but like some you know, Bruce Springsteen album or whatever, maybe now you don't have that because somebody else bid more money for it. And it happens with streaming as well. I wouldn't be surprised if DVDs start blowing up just because that's crazy.

SPEAKER_03 19:13

And you know, and and I I I love it because it makes me so angry that like the subscriptions and I get it, I get it why the subscription started because people were stealing software and they're doing this, yeah. They want complete control over the product. I get it, but it's really annoying. Like, like like there's uh DAW Pro Tools, like, and you used to just be able to buy it. Yeah, you buy a copy. I'm talking about like software for like it for your like Photoshop, like anything. Like you buy a copy, you have that copy, you own it, and you own that copy until you decide this isn't working for me anymore. Now, this whole world, like, oh, $200 a year, like no, I would have never done that in the past. Right. And that's happened more and more. And Sony What do you have at the end of the day with subscriptions?

SPEAKER_02 19:58

Nothing. Nothing. You don't you don't own any of it. And even if you do own it, like if you bought it, they'll take it away from you. Sony just like, yeah, they could do whatever they want. There was a bunch of movies. I guess if you were using Sony's PlayStation platform and you actually bought the movie, whatever the deal was between Sony and whoever was distributing this stuff must have ended. And Sony's just taking them away from you. And you bought them. It wasn't like you rented them or streamed them, you bought these. And I think that's gonna happen more and more because I love that. One of the streaming services is just gonna roll up with a you know garbage or or a dump truck full of cash and be like, no, we want this content. And we also part of the deal is you no longer whoever had it before can't have it. And so even if people bought it, you're gonna have to take that away from them. Because now, if they got away, if they want to watch it, they're gonna have to subscribe to me. And I think that's gonna continue to happen more and more. Um, oh my god. Because I mean, I'm sure there'll be legal challenges, but those guys, they've got all the money. Who's suing Sony and winning? You know what I mean? It's like they'll just tie that stuff up forever. Yeah. Um, and you know, their new PlayStation is no more physical media. The new one that comes out, it's all downloads. So you can't buy a physical copy of a game even if you want to. And that's gonna keep happening. So I there I think I think there are. Nintendo's gonna come back. I still have my original Nintendo. I'm on the fence of buying a Switch 2 right now.

SPEAKER_03 21:16

I have the original from like 1989. Oh, Jesus whatever it is. I'll have to we'll have to have a Nintendo.

SPEAKER_02 21:22

Oh, dude, I we we we've done that before. Yeah, where people will bring in the game.

SPEAKER_03 21:25

Nintendo's seven bags I got the I got the original Zelda cartridge.

SPEAKER_02 21:29

Zelda's my thing. That's well, I will buy a Switch 2 um because they're redoing Ocarina of Time for the Switch 2.

SPEAKER_03 21:38

Um, so what can what's something that a record store can do that like an algorithm cannot?

SPEAKER_02 21:43

Uh I mean, provide an experience. Right. Is is the is the first and foremost. You know, I I have a lot of customers that um they don't even want me to order something for them. Uh they gotta find it in the wild. You know, that that's their thing. Uh so they'll ask if I have a record and I don't, and I'm like, Oh, I can get it. You know, and they're like, no, if it was here, I'd buy it. I just kind of like find my stuff in the wild. Um, I mean, not to get too geeky about it, but I mean, we are hunter-gatherers by design. We've been doing that a lot longer than we've been doing this. And so there is a certain satisfaction in going out and actually finding that thing you're looking for that's built into us. Um, that you know, is you can't measure it, but it's there. Yeah. Um, and so we provide an experience for folks. We also provide some knowledge. However, the algorithms are getting very good at that as well. You know, if you say, hey, I'm into Grover Washington Jr. and Herbie Hancock, turn me on to some other jazz artist, and the algorithm is probably gonna tell you the same thing I'm gonna tell you because it's got a lot of information that it that it can go for. I do like that. Yeah, and uh, but yeah, I mean the algorithm can't provide an experience. A website can provide a bad experience. Yeah, some provide a better one, but I mean, are you having a good time ever on a website? No, no, but you can here, you can grab a beer, hang out, we'll chat, you can look through the records, and I mean, records are such a great format for browsing. They're 12 by 12, there's cover art. Um, you know, I had I had a guy buy, or you know, he had a stack of records and he was buying stuff, and there was one record in there that I was like, this is an oddball considering what he's buying. And I was like, dude, great record, good choice. And I got the impression he had no idea what that record was, he just bought it on the cover art. And judging from the other stuff he had, I was like, he's in for a surprise. Yeah. He listens to this record. That's so fun. It is nothing like the other ones, and hopefully he'll dig it, you know, and that's part of what it's all about. Um and and we do our best to turn people on to other things. Um, but the big thing is experience. Yeah. Do you want to shop and have fun? Then you can find places like this. If you just want to shop online, um, you know, it's not going to be the same.

SPEAKER_03 23:53

Yeah. Yeah. Do you find that people come to buy records? It's like more of a nostalgic thing, or I guess the younger generation you're saying is a lot who who's buying the records a lot.

SPEAKER_02 24:03

It it um so the the the biggest people that are buying, and just probably because they're you know, they have resources, they've got jobs, is is probably somewhere around like the mid-20 to like early 40s demographic. Um there are kids that love this stuff, yeah. If they had money, they'd be buying a ton of it. They just don't have any money because they don't have jobs or whatever. Poor kids. Yeah. Uh which which heads is like the CDs are now blowing up because the kids want physical media, and you know, we sell our CDs for like three dollars a piece. So CDs are kind of where records were 25 years ago, they're widely available and they're dirt cheap. And you can still go to Goodwill or your parents' closet or whatever and probably dig a CD player out. Um, and that's kind of where records were 25 years ago. Yeah, it's just like they were if you could find a place that had them, they were a buck or two a piece. You could be pulling Zeppelin, you know, Pink Floyd records for a few bucks. Um, and you probably back then could go into mom and dad's closet and find their old record player and hook it up. So CDs are coming around in that regard. Um, but yeah, it's it's also and we have guys that are uh you know a bit older, and my demographic are leaving a little bit older, but a lot of times once you get to that demographic, these are folks that never got out. So while they are buying records, they're there's not you know a ton that they're looking for because they've still got their old collections. Yeah, so maybe they're looking for an upgrade copy of something. And I guess the short answer is like everybody, but just some people have you know the ability to buy more than others, yeah. Because they're they're not getting they're not getting any less expensive, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_03 25:38

Yeah, yeah. So um if if these kind of things left, what would that do to the culture?

SPEAKER_02 25:49

That's a that's a big question. Um yeah, um, nothing good, I guess, would be the immediate answer. Um I mean I I I do think we need this kind of stuff. I think what people surround themselves with in their homes or whatever is is an indication of who they are. You know, if you walk into somebody's house or apartment or whatever, and um, you know, there's a bookcase full of books, physical books, and there's uh a record player and there's a shelf of records and all of that, um you know, depending upon who you are, you might say, This is probably a pretty interesting person, you know. Um whereas if you walk in and it's a sterile environment and and all of their media is stored on their phone or something like that, which hey, as long as you're as long as you are consuming art, I guess it really doesn't matter how you're doing it so much, as long as you're reading, as long as you're listening to music. Um but I do think there needs to be physical representations of this. Um excuse me. If that goes away, and this digital device you have is how you perceive all of these things, something inherently will be lost from that. Yeah. Um the community. Um I mean, it's like a community as well, and then not to mention, I mean, streaming music sounds like crap. Yeah, you can get certainly download good digital stuff, you know, that's for sure. But like streaming is is not great. Um and and sound, you know, sound does matter. You know, there were people that say, Oh, I don't like this kind of music, and then maybe they listen to it on a really good sound system and they're like, Whoa, this sounds amazing. Yeah, like I I've just never really listened to this properly. I mean, classical is probably a an example of that. I mean, nobody really listens to classical music anymore, but man, if you get a really good classical recording on a great stereo, just the sonic qualities of it alone might pique your interest of like, wow, this is powerful stuff. Yeah. Um, so yeah.

SPEAKER_03 27:55

Yeah. Um, what's the hardest part of finding quality used records?

SPEAKER_02 28:01

Yeah, that's uh that's a whole thing. Um, so first I'll say like that is my favorite part of the business. So finding the record finding the record. It's a treasure hunt. You know, if I wasn't doing this, I'd probably be digging holes in the ground somewhere. Yeah, looking for shiny stuff in the little illustration of you as the gatherer. Yeah, exactly. So um, so that the hunt's fun because you know you know you never know what you're gonna find. Um, it's getting progressively harder and harder to find quality used vinyl just simply because um there's just much less of it out there than there was 20 years ago, and there's way more people looking for it. Um, so when I first started doing this, I mean I never wanted to see a copy, a copy of Zeppelin 4 ever again. Uh just like this freaking record. You know, it's do you listen to every record? No, I wish I could. I wish I could. We clean and grade every record, but I wish I could play grade or just listen to them, but I there's not enough time in the day. Um, like you know, for example, yesterday I I clean graded and put on discogs probably about a hundred records that are gonna be out in the bin today. And yeah, I couldn't do that. So, but there are ones that I'm like, I don't know this record. So um first thing I do is I, you know, I go to Apple Music and I'm like, oh, they don't have it. And then I go to YouTube and somebody's somebody's put it up on YouTube um and listen to it, you know, because if somebody asks, I want to be able to at least speak to what it is a little bit. But um, but yeah, that so it's it's getting harder. Um, I mean, if you own a record store, people will bring you records. They may not be the records you want, um, but they will bring them to you. Um ever like have to dispose of records. Oh, every day. I I just there a special way. No, unfortunately, they just go in the garbage. And it's PVC, it does not biodegrade. So we we do try to recycle as much as we can. Like I make notebooks out of record covers. So sometimes the cover looks pretty nice, but the record is trash. So, and it's gotta be it's gotta be a recognizable record. You can't just do it out of like Montevani records or something, it's gotta be the Beatles or the Stones or something like that. But they do sell. Um, I also make coasters out of stuff. If I could find a way to cut PVC um that wasn't terrible for the environment or would kill me, um, I I I save a lot of uh actual records because if you cut the the center label out, it's a perfect size for a coaster. Oh, right. And so if you've got Beatles records or whatever, the labels are usually still in pretty good shape. Um, and and what people do is they use a laser cutter for that, but it's it's you can't, you're not supposed to burn that stuff. Yeah, it releases a lot of really gnarly things that um that yeah is not good for the world. Yeah. So I've I've been stockpiling, I've probably got about a thousand of these records that I'm just like, I don't know what to do with them, but I don't want to throw them away because I know if I could if I can figure out a way to cut that center label out that isn't terrible, um, people will buy these. Um but yeah, we're we're still working on that one. Um, it's cool. But yeah, so I I, you know, if if you're willing to go out and look around, you'll find your haunts, you'll find your places that, like, okay, I'm out in the middle of nowhere, but this antique mall has a guy that's selling records, and he, for whatever reason, doesn't really value this particular artist or genre of music very much. So the records are cheap, and I can do better with them here. So, you know, you find places that you can visit once every few months, give them a chance to restock and you can pull some stuff. But most of it is buying people's personal collections. Um, but that has become, like I said, fewer and far between. Um, not simply because I think the records are drying up, but there's, you know, in uh Westchester alone, there's three shops that are actively buying collections. Um, and that's you know, if you're in Philly, there's probably a ton. So it just, you know, who knows if you're gonna be the one they call. Yeah. So so yeah, it's getting a little bit more difficult, but it's important. I mean, that's that's what makes a business run. New vinyl, the markup sucks. Um, it's used records that make the business run. Um, and you know, any record store is probably any given day just as good as what their inventory is. Yeah. You know, you you land a great collection, um, and you're gonna have a couple big months after that because people are gonna show up and they're gonna buy it. Um and when it's slow, you know, your numbers are gonna reflect that as well. Because it's like, all right, I don't I haven't gotten anything great in here in a while. You fill the bins up with new stuff, and people do buy that for sure. Um, but you know, they always know they can get that whenever they want. Yeah. When that when the used stuff shows up, vintage stuff that is of interest and maybe hard to find, yeah, people will come out and spend money on that immediately because they don't know when they're gonna see that again. Right, right, right, right.

SPEAKER_03 32:48

Okay. Um, so you're building a little community here, uh, slowly but surely. You do so you have the bar, you sell the records, of course, and then you also have DJs, bands, things like that happen. Yep, with all that.

SPEAKER_02 33:03

So the DJs uh is every second Saturday. It's a thing we call the junction, and it's it's a group of local guys um that do this. Uh it's it's kind of spearheaded by a buddy of mine, Sean, who was a professional DJ out in uh Seattle for quite some time. And he moved back, he's from this area, he moved back here to go to school and uh finish his education. And you know, he doesn't really have time to be a DJ anymore, but he very much is still a part of him. Um, and so you know, he asked me at this point, it's probably like five years ago, like if he could DJ sets here on a somewhat regular occurrence. And that is morphed into this thing we call the junction. And I think right at this point, depending upon whether or not I DJ, um, I think there's five guys that are part of that right at the moment. Um, I can be a sixth uh if I get my act together and actually pull together a set of stuff. Uh and then the Thursday preceding that, we do something called the pre-junction. It's a much shorter set. We do it Thursday evenings. Each DJ gets about a half an hour, and that one's themed. So that one we we pick a genre or a subgenre or whatever, and then we all have to try to play music within those constraints. The last one was soundtracks, um, which is can can be a tough one. I mean, there don't get me wrong, there's a lot of music that appears on soundtracks um that fits nicely into it. But like, you know, if you're trying to pull um stuff from sci-fi or horror movies, sometimes that gets a little more difficult. There, I mean, there's tons of stuff, you know, that from the 70s black exploitation films that have got a lot of funky jazzy music that fits really well into that. Uh, but if you want to move beyond that, it does become a little more difficult to fill out a soundtrack set that also is maybe something people aren't gonna want to listen to, yeah, or are gonna want to, I'm sorry, that are gonna want to listen to. Because like if you're playing some incidental music from, say, some action film or sci-fi film, it's like, is anybody gonna care about that? I don't know. It's yes, it's just some weird synthie stuff, you know, but maybe they do. I don't know. So we do that. Um the live music is purely happenstance, however, it happens organically. Uh, we have no infrastructure for it. So as long as bands are like, yeah, we've got stuff, we'll bring our own PA or our own amps or whatever, um, then we're game for it. I mean, we we definitely um try to only have bands that do their own music. There's there's opportunities, yeah, for folks. Yeah. If you're a cover band or a cover artist, uh, you know what I mean.

SPEAKER_03 35:35

And though I guess it could be cool though, some covers.

SPEAKER_02 35:38

We we I mean, we have had that before, but those bands, they have a wider pool of places to play to pull from because most of the restaurants, excuse me, bars, they're not a lot of them are not interested in original music. They want bands that are gonna play music that their customer base knows and is comfortable with and all of that. So I like to be a place where it's like, yeah, if you write your own stuff, we'll have you in because yeah, I know you're probably not gonna be able to gig or book a gig anywhere else in town doing your original music.

SPEAKER_03 36:11

Um when you do those shows, do they is do they is there any kind of cover? Do the bands get paid at all, or it's just they're gotta be playing.

SPEAKER_02 36:19

Yeah, I wish we had a budget for it. So that's like the first thing I tell them is like, hey, so we don't have a budget for this. Drinks are free. Right, and you don't want to push people away from buying your records. Drinks are free, yeah. Uh well that because of like the whole community aspect, it's like if we have a ban on a free.

SPEAKER_03 36:35

They probably put do they put a tip jar out at least? Oh, for sure.

SPEAKER_02 36:37

And I've I've had guys come out of here with a couple hundred dollars out of a tip jar. Yeah, and they sell merch. Yeah, you know, um that's cool. So, but with with the whole community thing, is like you you you run this fine line of like, okay, I'm gonna you like to hang out here on Friday and Saturday nights. This is your spot to go where you're gonna have a few beers, hang out with people that you become friends of. When are you guys open? Uh on Friday and Saturday until 10. Okay. Yeah. Um, but then if I have a band in and I'm charging a cover to pay the band, then all of a sudden I'm alienating that group of people that have supported me all these days. Yeah, you can't do it. Because they're like, I don't I don't want to pay. And sometimes it's such a small amount of money, but sometimes people are just there's this mental block of like, I don't know this band, I don't know this music, I'm not there for them. This is my Friday night place. And so I would probably get a little backlash from that of like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Dude, I wanted to come hang out on Friday, but she had a band. Number one, it's gonna be loud. Um, so it it's infrequent, but because of that, we get not always, but usually a reasonable turnout. It doesn't take a lot of people to make this place feel kind of full. Yeah, we got 20 people in here, it feels pretty hopping. Yeah, um, and on a Friday or Saturday night, sometimes just with our regulars, we'll have that in here, regardless if the band is is is creating a draw or not. Um, so yeah, sadly, I wish there was a way to pay bands. Um, I've been part of the bit, it's uh it's tough. I know. And most bands are like, dude, dude, we get it. You know, it's like we don't get paid to play anywhere. Yeah, we're just trying to get our music out there. Yeah. And if they do have, if if they have the where like with Sam uh from Applied Knowledge, um if they've pressed on a vinyl, I'll buy you know three, four copies of the record and have them in the bins. Yeah, it's just like okay, like we don't really have a budget to pay you, but I will buy your records, which is inherently paying you, and I'll have them here so that if people that wanted to see the show couldn't come and missed it, well, they can come and buy the record. Yeah. Um, so we do that, but yeah, I wish there was more of a budget. Um it's just par for the course, I guess. Yeah. When when you're doing that.

SPEAKER_03 38:40

So no, yeah, no, and you don't want to turn people away. So it makes sense. Yeah. Um, and you never, you know, who knows? Maybe one day one of these bands you never you never know where life is going.

SPEAKER_02 38:52

So I'm I'm amazed at like the quality of music and musicianship that some of these bands have. Yeah. You know, where it's just like, man, if you were doing this in the 80s when there were actually, you know, venues that were actively booking, and and that's what people did on Friday and Saturday nights, is they went to these venues. It's like you guys probably would have done pretty good. But unfortunately, yeah, you know, it's we're at where we're at, and those things don't exist anymore. And it it prevents the creation of like a local scene around, you know, the are there ever going to be any more CBGBs or, you know, Rat Skellers in Boston or anything like that. Where, you know, I'm they they booked, you know, what would become big bands, but I'm sure there were a lot of bands that played at those places that nobody's heard of since, you know, but they were local to the scene. They would open for one of those acts, and there were always people there to see them. Yeah. And just nothing happened for them. So we don't know about them unless you're like really studying that sort of thing and looking back at it. But where does somebody play in Westchester? You know, and even probably a lot of the places in Philly, you know, does that exist? It's it's all known quantities, yeah. Name brands, you know. Uh, even some of the smaller venues that you know that they book those kind of folks. Uh, and then you the bigger venues are all owned by you know the powers that be and all of that sort of stuff.

SPEAKER_03 40:15

So I mean, Philly is has become a lot of DIY. I talked to this one band, this one um lead uh the the female um what was the band name? Um Night Fury. That was a great interview. The thing is that that she told me was, you know, there's only a few indie venues, yeah, and there's hundreds of bands.

SPEAKER_04 40:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 40:37

So there's some really cool things happening. There's this new venue called Nostalgia uh in like Kensington Fishtown area, and it's actually people from that scene that are musicians that got a row home and they turned it into a venue that doesn't have a bar. Like it, yeah, it's a whole thing going on. So it's super cool. So even what you're doing here, you never know if it could develop into um you know.

SPEAKER_02 41:00

I mean more. You don't you don't know if I were to do this again, and and there is a possibility of that, you know, the finances being a big part of it. But you know, my license for for the brewery allows me three locations. Um, so you know, the idea would be to use that license to uh to its fullest capacity. Um so I'd love to open another Hot Fidelity somewhere, and and um if that were ever to happen, the live music thing would become uh hopefully much more of a part of it. You know, when I I got this space, it's 800 square feet. We've packed it to the gills with you know, inventory, the bar, try to have a few tables so people can sit and enjoy themselves. We really don't have, you know, I can't put a stage in here. Even if I were to buy a PA and like have it here, it's like, where do I put the speakers? And there's not, I mean, even the DJ stuff we have to store against the back wall. It doesn't look great, but there's just no place to put it. Yeah. So if I were to do it again, that would factor a lot more into it. And and I'd have to give a lot of hard thought into like, okay, so if we're gonna do this, how do we pay bands? How do we get um, you know, maybe a few bands that have some, you know, some draw in here, and how does that work? Because I I know nothing about that part of the business.

SPEAKER_03 42:16

Yeah, I've I don't know anything about booking. Um, yeah. It kind of reminds me, but I mean a little bit different, is you ever hear of Milk Boy? Yes, yeah. So yeah, Milk Boy started in Ardmore, uh Ardmore, a coffee shop, um, studio, and then expanded into like a place on South Street and then I think one other now. Yeah, they have a one on Chestnut and then the one on South Street. Yep. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:37

I've been to the one on South Street like before the world blew up on the pandemic because I almost signed a lease on South Street for this place when I was looking around at like where I was going to put the business. Um, my wife and I, you know, moving from northern New England, small town, I mean, we just fell in love with Philly when we moved down here. Like we didn't live, um, you know, Boston was the closest major city, and that was a two, two and a half hour drive. And so being this close to a big city with with what the opportunities that come with that, you know, the museums, the parks, all the stuff that's going on, we just fell in love and and we knew we couldn't live in the city. So um I was like, well, if I put my business there, that'll tie us to Philly um in a in a really good way. Like I'll have to be in the city a lot. Um, and the land, I don't I think the landlord just didn't know what to think of my business. Like they just a record store with a bar, like, what is this? And so they they balked initially, and thankfully they did because during that time when it looked like that was gonna be the spot, I was making that drive to Philly like four times a week. And I was like, I don't know if I can do this every day, man. 76 sucks.

SPEAKER_03 43:45

Like, you gotta put your value your life a little bit. Oh God, it was so frustrating. No, too much, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:50

And then, you know, hindsight 2020 like, if I had had a spot in Philly and the pandemic happened, that would have been the end of it. This being so close to where I live. And easy, like when there's no traffic, I can make it to Westchester in 15 minutes. Um, so to you know, to come here and pack up orders that we were selling online was a very easy thing to do. Um, if I'd had that hour drive into Philly or longer to do that, I think I would have just been like, you know what, this isn't gonna work. And I would have just folded and had to regroup or some of the all the time, like in the car.

SPEAKER_03 44:22

Yeah. So my car, like, and this year, I got it last year. And so this year when it became January 1st, I made it so I didn't reset the mile thing or anything, whatever. And it's like the hour, it's like how long the car has been on is like it. I don't know what the point of that is, except to say, F my life. I've been in this car. It's at almost like 280 hours. You know what I mean? I'm like, this is over 10 days. Yeah, yeah. But by the end of the car, by the end of the year, I'm gonna be in my car for a month of that year. I'm like, this is not okay with my life. It's but a lot of it's now for this podcast. So I am okay. Yeah, the meaning, you know, the ends justify the means. Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 44:59

Oh yeah, when you have kids and then you just become an unpaid Uber driver, man. It's crazy.

SPEAKER_03 45:03

Uh yeah, I don't have I don't have any of that, but yeah, so it gets crazy. So yeah, if you got to go back and forth and you live, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 45:09

Yeah, so you know, in hindsight, I'm glad it didn't happen. But yeah, I've been to Milk Boy, and I remember when I when I went there, this thinking like I remember I went upstairs where they where they hold the the where the bands are, and I'm like, How the hell do they do this? Like, yeah, there's no room up here. But I I guess the end the end is like you make it work. You know, if I didn't have all these records in the middle of this place, then this would be big enough to do something more along those lines, but I don't, you know, so yeah, I've got all this inventory, you know, it's basically standing room only when people are here. Um, and you know, somebody always spills beer in one of the bins. Yeah, it sounds like it's just like ah, man. Oh man, no. But it's worth it, you know, especially like when when somebody plays and there's a good crowd here and everybody's digging it. I mean, there's for everybody involved, there can't be a better feeling. Like we had a band play here last Halloween, and I couldn't be here because I was trick-or-treating with my kids, but um, they reach out to me afterwards and like, this was the best show we've done. Like, we had such good crowd interaction, like people were into us. Um, because I think that happens a lot where these bands they go and they play venues at bars or whatever, and they're just there. Nobody's there to see they're there to drink, and it's got to be so disheartening. Yeah, you're there doing your thing that you've put a lot of effort into, and nobody's even paying attention. Yeah, so yeah, it was awesome, you know. And and the people that were here, we had a costume party, they were like, this was great, the band was great, and there's no better feeling than that. It's like everybody had a good time, everybody got something they needed out of it. Um, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Um, so anyway, if I do it again, uh, if I were to open another shop, I would try to incorporate the live music part of it into it more, try to get a bigger space. It's hard in some of these towns, though. If it's not or you just get another space. Well, that's what I would have to do. Yeah, no, my my license is tied here. I can't move this place, yeah. Um, because uh I'd have to give up my license. The way they set it up is is so arcane. It's not mine, it's basically the buildings. Um, I I technically am the purveyor of it, but if I were to move out of here, I can't take it with me. Oh my god. Start the process all over again. Yeah, it's it's not that's crazy. Yeah. So I'm this place is not going anywhere. Um, it would have to be in a different like Ardmore. I would love to open a shop in Ardmore. As far as I know, right now there is no record store in Ardmore. I think Ardmore needs a record store. Um, and uh, you know, it's just a matter of like how far is Ardmore from here? Um, I mean, if I just do Route 30, it'll probably take me almost 45 minutes because it's traffic's terrible. I mean, it's not that far as the crow flies, maybe 20 miles. Yeah. But you know, it just it takes forever to get anywhere around here. Yeah. I'm still so used to New England where it's like, oh yeah, it's 15 miles away, it's gonna be 15 minutes. Yeah. Now, you know, I I live 10 miles from here and I the route I travel, it's gonna be 25 to 30 minutes to get here. So I'm just going to work and back I'm in the car an hour a day. Yeah. To go 20 miles. It's nuts.

SPEAKER_03 48:06

Right, right, right, right. Um, so have you ever been there, like when someone's been searching for something and they found the record they wanted and they couldn't believe they found it. Yeah, that's awesome.

SPEAKER_02 48:17

And that that's yeah, and sometimes it's something where it's like, yeah, I knew somebody was gonna come in and they were gonna be totally like blown away when they found this thing. Because I know people are looking for it, but sometimes it's something so esoteric and just like I saw what was the record? I think it was a copy of I could be wrong on this, but I think it was a copy of uh Iron Butterfly's Inagata Davida, uh which um or the the the the album that that's on, and and there's so many different pressings and versions of that, it was super popular. But there was one in particular that I guess had some maybe one of the songs was mixed a little differently. It was whatever, it was a reissue. I I didn't even know that that was the case with that record. And uh the guy that found it was so happy and brought it up, and he's like, I have been looking for this particular version of this record for so so long. Um, because there are guys there are people out there that get super geeky with it. Where was it pressed? Um, I guess some of the Grateful Dead records, the earlier copies had a different mix in some of the reissues that came out later on, and so there's people that are looking for these particular versions of these records, and you know it's a it's a popular record, so you're not really thinking anybody's gonna lose their shit because oh, sorry, can I swear? That's right. Okay, good. Uh because they found it, but then they tell you why, because this that this particular pressing has something different about it, or somebody somewhere made the realization that if you can get this record pressed at this facility, it is gonna be the best sounding copy of that record you can get. Oh, wow, yeah, because they just knocked it out of the park when they when they made that record, and um, so there are people that get real geeky about that. Like, where was the pressing plant? What's it say in the runouts, which stampers were used? And just for them, yeah, I love that for them. The sad thing is a lot of times when I get asked those questions, it's like it's like, oh no, I don't have the one you're looking for. Yeah, sorry. Wow, that's yeah, it does. And I have I have experienced that. There, there was one time when um I had two different copies of Sergeant Peppers, and um one of them was super clean. I I just picked it up, it was an original copy, and uh, so I played it because I hadn't listened to the record in a little while and I I like the Beatles and um played great, loved it. And then I had another copy that I would grade, you know, what you would call like VG. So not terrible, but a few things. It's like I just want to play grade this and make sure it sounds nice, and none of these marks are gonna create like an annoying tick for a minute or whatever. And the minute the music started, that copy blew the other one away. Oh, so yeah, and I was just like, ah, and so you know, then you look in the dead wax and it's like, okay, this one was this one was pressed in Scranton, this one was pressed over here somewhere. Obviously, this place that pressed the record, but you know, for whatever reason, just made a better sounding copy that they're all working off the same masters for the most part, you know. Yeah, every time they're so but somebody has to cut those lacquers, somebody has to do a bunch of different stuff, and sometimes that engineer that's doing that um knocks it out of the park. And that's part of the beauty for me of like analog is there's so much human interaction that has to happen with those analog recordings where you get into a certain area where everything's recorded digitally, and yes, you know, the person that's the engineer, they need to know what they're doing and all of that. But that master, that digital master that's gonna be used to make whatever, um, is pretty much the same, you know. And um, but I mean, even then, you know, if it goes to six or seven different pressing plants, somebody's gonna take that source material and just do a better job cutting the lacquer and all of that that goes into it to manufacture the stampers that are then gonna make a better sounding record. Yeah. Um, and yeah, to me, that's you know, if you stream it, it doesn't matter. Yeah, it doesn't matter at all if you stream it. Right. It's all gonna be the same. Um, and arguably if you buy the CD, same. It's just gonna be the same. But with the physicality of of vinyl, um, there's a lot of hands involved to make that finished product. And some places inherently, whether they just do it better all the time or on that particular day, somebody was feeling his oats, man, and he just really knocked it out of the park. And that becomes the copy to have. That becomes the issue that you want. And there's there's people that make a business out of that. They call them hot stampers, and they'll charge multitudes for um for a copy of a of a certain copy of a record that normally gets 15, 20 bucks. But they're like, oh no, we've we've does we've found out which ones are gonna be the best sounding ones, and that's what we sell, and you're gonna have to pay 75. Yeah. And it's like, you could go find this on your own, but some people just don't have the time for that. Yeah. You know, they're looking for that curation. They're like, no, I make good money. I've got a hundred thousand dollar sound system, I want the best sounding copies of these records, and I'm willing to pay you extra for the work that you do to make sure that I'm getting that. Got it. So, yeah. I love that.

SPEAKER_03 53:09

That's like when I found out about tapers, which was another uh podcast I did with this guy, Rich Stoller. It's a whole community of people. So hot stampers is a whole nother thing going on.

SPEAKER_02 53:18

I mean, the audiophile crowd can get super crazy with stuff, and there's labels that just you know, that they they they cater to them. They they arguably will make the best sounding copies of these records, even if it's something vintage. They go back, they get the original analog tapes, they take extreme care in remastering all of that. Sometimes they'll take a you know a single disc record and they'll make two because I'll cut it at 45 RPMs, which ups the fidelity, but you burn through sides faster, so they can't put as much music on there. Um, but it'll make a better sounding record. But you pay for that privilege. You know, those records can go for 50, 60, 70 bucks retail. Um but boy, they they do sound good. But they sound good. They sound really good, you know.

SPEAKER_03 54:00

So yeah. What's one record from your personal, like a record you'll never sell? Do you have one? Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 54:07

And I um I mean I have a number of them, but probably um my my you know, the biggest, you know, jewel in the crown of my record collection is uh I have a white label promo of Metallica's Master of Puppets. Okay. Um Metallica was a big band for me. Like when I discovered, you know, my own music back in the day in the 80s, it was heavy metal. And so Metallica was a the first four albums um were a big deal for me. Bands like Anthrax, Iron Maiden, Megadeth, Slayer. Um, so that album has always been a favorite of mine. You know, it's a it's a desert island record for me. Um, and yeah, to own a white label promo, um, which if if to to to qualify, like what the what that is basically is uh back in the day, the industry would would press copies that were specifically going to go to radio stations. Okay. And a lot of times uh there would be some sort of badging that was done to designate them as such. And for a long time, what that was was just a plain old white label with black text. So they wouldn't have the design of the company, whatever label it was. Uh, and it would say somewhere on there, you know, radio promo only, not for sale, something along those lines. So you can only think with a band like Metallica and Master Puppets, how many radio stations were going to be playing this record? Uh, not that many, probably. So, how many radio promos did they create from this? You're also pretty much absolutely guaranteed that those are the first ones off the stap the stampers, because those are going to go to the radio stations to try to create buzz for a little while before the stock copies hit the shelf. So you're getting uh arguably the closest pressings to the masters because they're the very first ones stamped. And you know, a record like that that is now becoming insanely popular, where there's just millions and millions and millions of copies available through originals up to current reissues. Um maybe there's a couple hundred of these white label promos out there in the world. So it's worth a lot, it's worth a reasonable amount of money. Yeah. Um, so that's a big one for me. Um, I because that that like again, just the the record itself, I love. I own probably four different versions of that record. Yeah, I'll never play the white label promo. You know, no, why? Why take the chance of like you know bumping the needle or something? So I've got a I've got just a regular old stock copy original of it. I've got, you know, Warner Brothers did a reissue series of the Metallica stuff probably like 15 years ago where they did um two discs at 45 RPMs on that version of it. Like I said, those first four Metallica records were were a real big deal for me. I learned to play guitar, to play those records. Yeah, I was I was real like those guys could do no wrong until the black album, and then I was like, oh no, where are we going? And then after the black album, I was like, oh no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you're killing me. It's not happening. Oh yeah, it was it was a bummer. Um, but whatever. They're we're one of the biggest bands in the world for a while. And and um, I think the only issue I have, like, I don't care if bands change their format. Um, what what does irk me a bit is when they do it purposefully to have a wider audience. Yeah. When you're doing something different than what you've always done or what you're known for, just because you want to be more popular sometimes. I mean, I get it. Everybody wants to make money and be rich or whatever. At that point, they were selling enough records where it's like, I don't really think you need to go this route. You guys will be okay. Yeah. But now they're insanely wealthy. So they did what they did. And I don't think it was because they were like, nah, you know what, we're getting a little older, and this is just really the music we like. It's like, well, that black album really blew up. Yeah, maybe we tone it down even a little bit more and get a wider audience, and they did, you know, again, they became huge. Um, but I don't like it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 57:54

So they lose people on the way though.

SPEAKER_02 57:56

I think they lose a lot of the guys that got them to where they were at, yeah. Which could which is kind of sad. But you know, bands do that all the time. Um, but I don't mind it when they just get weirder, yeah. Or they just decide, you know, I don't know like Radiohead or Arctic Monkeys did with their recent record, is like, yeah, we're just really not gonna focus on guitars anymore. Yeah. Arguably that's not gonna make you more popular, that's probably gonna make you less popular. Um, so I'm just like, okay, that's an artistic decision. You guys are doing this because this is artistically the way you want to go, not because you're hoping to, and both of those bands sell plenty enough records, but not because you're like you're looking for this new audience. This is just the music you want to make right now. Yeah, that I have a lot of respect for. But when you're doing it to just sell more records, yeah, then I'm gonna do it. And I but I get it. We, you know, yeah, money makes the world go round, unfortunately. So yeah, but I yeah. You know, how many aging metal heads was Metallica gonna be able to live off of in the decades to come.

SPEAKER_03 58:52

Right, right, right. Um, all right. Well, I'm gonna have to wrap it up soon. Okay, right on. So um is there anything that we didn't what so what so your website, which you said isn't needs to be updated. Is there a better place to direct people for you? Yeah, Instagram uhfidelity.com, right?

SPEAKER_02 59:09

But that's yeah, there's that. But that's like it's it's there. You the basics are there. Um I'm responsible for that, and I'm terrible at it. So uh so it it's like, yes, we're here, here's our hours. That's about the best you can expect from that. Uh we do most of our posting on Instagram. Okay. We do a little thing every now and then where or you try to do it every day where we'll post a couple records for sale. I mean, everything's for sale. Yeah. But it's like, here's this record, here's the price. If you want it, type sold into the comments. And sometimes it just feeds our local customer base. Yeah, but other times we have to ship it. Somebody that follows us from who knows where. Yeah. And they're like, this is a lot more fun than just going on discogs or Amazon to buy a record. Uh Facebook has determined, excuse me, that we are um not worthy of them, um, which stemmed from uh an incident about a year and a half ago where um the AI, in all of its wisdom, decided that we were impersonating Hot Fidelity. Oh. And so they took our site down. And there was a way for me to challenge that, which I did, and they said, Oh no, we made a mistake. Here's your web, here's your page again. And about a year on that date, uh, the AI decided again that uh we were um impersonating ourselves. And this time there was no way to challenge it. Like I couldn't, there was no button to say, hey, I think you got this wrong. So I reached out to them in any way that you possibly can with Facebook, and that goes nowhere because there's no human beings running that ship any longer. Um, it got to the point, like I actually reached out to the attorney general to say, hey, these guys canceled my Facebook page for no reason. But I'm sure they're so swamped with that, because um, you know, Facebook being, for lack of a better terms, and I don't want to defame them anyway, the cesspool that they are, they are trying to actively get rid of some bad actors, and there's a lot of follow up from that. Yeah, uh, the AI is not ready to do the job I think that they're asking it to do, right? And it is just wholesale canceling accounts left and right with no recourse. So sadly, Instagram is it, which is the same company. It's fine. Yeah, it's the same company. If they really had an issue with anything I was doing or posting, it's fine. Yeah. Um, so that's a good place to go. And I do promise I'll get that website in order at some point. And we are gonna create a Facebook. I'm sorry, not a Facebook, a uh YouTube page after all that. After all that, uh a YouTube page where we'll post um live stuff that we've recorded with permission, of course. Yeah, that's cool. Um, and just some other things that are going on. I got somebody that's gonna help me out with that. Um, because I'm kind of a Luddite, and um that'll be a new thing to look forward to as well. All right, but other than that, yeah, just come see us. Yeah, you know, you can't.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:50

I'm brainstorming ideas right now because I do a lot of different things. So I'm always I'm brainstorming different different ideas.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:56

The potential's unlimited. It's just a matter of like, do you have the resources and the time to get it done? Yeah, I'm sure somebody in your position understands that. Like, nope. Yeah, I don't have the time to get that done. Right, right. The core aspects of what I do take priority, and there's only so much time in in the day. And um, so yeah, we've always focused mostly on you being in the shop and trying to provide you with a good experience, you know. So you can have a drink, you can come in, chat with us, um, browse, and um, and that'll always be the focus. The other stuff is kind of and silvery, and we'll we'll do our best. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:34

Um, all right. So um I'm gonna ask you the last question. Yeah, right on. Which you probably forgotten it. So go. So you've forgotten it. Well, it's how is music your hero?

SPEAKER_02 1:02:48

So I will say music is my hero of all the arts, um, whether it be, you know, uh illustration, painting, sculpture, uh, TV, movies, uh, theater. Music is the only one that for me personally can elicit a uh a very emotional response. Um, music can make me angry because I just don't like it, and it makes me mad that this music exists in the world and that people do like it because I can be a snob like that sometimes. Uh it can make me feel energetic, it can make me feel sad, it can just make me happy. You know, I'm sure anybody that actually listens to music, other than as, you know, it's just I got it on the car while I'm driving because, or you know, while I'm at home typing away or whatever, that actually listens to music a little bit beyond that has that artist, that band, those songs that are your happy songs. It just when it's on, it's hard to be in a bad mood. Yeah. And I mean, that's amazing. Yeah, you know, that that that that can do that, that there's somebody out there that you've never met maybe is dead now, um, that created something that can have that reaction for you. You know, um, and it's not like they did it purposely for you, they were just doing what they were doing for them. Um, but it's it can be universal. You know, so many people can have the same reaction to this. Um, so that's yeah, you know, that I guess would be the best answer I've got for that. Cool.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:18

I like that. Yeah, it's uh exactly that. Yeah, all the emotions and and whatever.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:25

And you can change your day, you know. I mean, there's people that'll say, oh man, your your album saved my life. Yeah, and it's crazy, you know. So yeah, and and and I don't doubt it, you know, like you went through a rough patch, and this music got you through that. Yeah, you didn't watch The Simpsons.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:39

And that's great to be the music creator that back. For sure. Like, could you imagine that?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:43

Like if you can create something that has that big of an I mean, I can't. Um, feels so good that you can put something out in the world that came from you that is having this effect on a lot of other people. Yeah, that that's amazing. Yeah, um, and and so yeah, it's it's it's yeah, it's incredible that that exists.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:04

So all right, cool. Well, thank you so much for taking the time to sit down and and chat, and um, you know, maybe we'll cross paths again. I'm sure we will. I'm sure we will. I'm sure we will. All right, cool. Thank you. Thank you. Yep.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:17

Until next time, keep creating, keep connecting, and keep building together. Remember, we're in this together, so let's keep each other shine, alive.