It’s almost Record Store Day and April 21st cannot come any sooner. Luckily for those in and around New Brunswick, Vintage Vinyl is a participating record store. It’s only a short drive away, located off of Route 1 in Fords by Menlo Park Mall.
Vintage Vinyl will be releasing a variety of albums, being either special edition, limited run, or a first release. Of these three categories of albums, there is a long list of artists. To name of few, there will be Arcade Fire, Awolnation, Evanescence, Descendents, David Bowie, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Police, The Ramones, and The Rolling Stones. To see the full list of Record Store Day releases visit their website.
Spina Records is another local record store, located on Easton Ave in New Brunswick. Although they will be unofficially participating in Record Store Day. Instead of carrying the same albums as Vintage Vinyl they are putting discounts on many of the albums they already have in stock. This is along with free refreshments for all customers.
What makes Record Store Day so special is that it created a day for all music lovers to come together and celebrate the art of music. When it first began in 2007 Metallica was there to meet fans, with Ozzy Osbourne and Iggy Pop doing the same in following years, as explained in the history of Record Store Day.
All record stores involved are independently owned, not allowing big companies to have control over them in any way. This is so you can get quality music from both small and large record labels. Because “60% or more of the Record Store Day Official Release List comes from independent labels and distributors,” as said on their website.
Both CDs and vinyl records will be sold but each store has complete control over what they choose to stock. If you’re going to Vintage Vinyl here is what they will have available but if you can’t make it here is the list of participating record stores.
With Record Store Day approaching all we can do is patiently wait for the one day of the year that these albums will be available, with exception to the first releases, but I just hope I can get my hands on Descendents’ “Who We Are” vinyl before they’re all gone.