Curious Persistence of Poetry Shops

[William Brownstein]

Kevin,

I know how much you love the mom and pop bookstores, which has been lost over the last few years. I can relate to that feeling with the classic record stores I used to love spending hours in during the 70's and 80's. Even the chain outlets were fun like Tower Records and The Virgin Mega Store in Times Square. Now they are gone as well. The last place where I can still enjoy browsing hard copies of music and video is Barnes & Noble. It's been a few years and I understand they have cut back on lots of merchandise because of download purchases and now streaming. Sure there is still Wal-Mart, Target and even Best Buy. I went into Best Buy a few weeks ago and purchased a cd for the first time in ages. I was surprised on small the volume of merchandise was but I did manage to find a great cd of Three Dog Night hits. Every song on that collection was a great song and a hit.

Given the choice, I still rather go into Barnes & Noble, but I'm not so sure if the volume of cd's is there anymore like it was around 8 years ago when I went there frequently.

Anyway, I thought you might like this article and had you in mind reading it a few moments ago.
Curious Persistence of Poetry Shops http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-curious-persistence-of-poetry-shops via newyorker

[kevin]

Post by William Brownstein
Kevin,
I know how much you love the mom and pop bookstores, which has been lost over the last few years. I can relate to that feeling with the classic record stores I used to love spending hours in during the 70's and 80's. Even the chain outlets were fun like Tower Records and The Virgin Mega Store in Times Square. Now they are gone as well. The last place where I can still enjoy browsing hard copies of music and video is Barnes & Noble. It's been a few years and I understand they have cut back on lots of merchandise because of download purchases and now streaming. Sure there is still Wal-Mart, Target and even Best Buy. I went into Best Buy a few weeks ago and purchased a cd for the first time in ages. I was surprised on small the volume of merchandise was but I did manage to find a great cd of Three Dog Night hits. Every song on that collection was a great song and a hit.
Given the choice, I still rather go into Barnes & Noble, but I'm not so sure if the volume of cd's is there anymore like it was around 8 years ago when I went there frequently.
Anyway, I thought you might like this article and had you in mind reading it a few moments ago.
Curious Persistence of Poetry Shops http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-curious-persistence-of-poetry-shops via newyorker

Nice story - I've noticed the trend in DC within the past few years. I'm really surprised that it is finding a home in the greater NYC area. Thanks for putting this up.

[kevin]

Post by kevin

Post by William Brownstein
Kevin,
I know how much you love the mom and pop bookstores, which has been lost over the last few years. I can relate to that feeling with the classic record stores I used to love spending hours in during the 70's and 80's. Even the chain outlets were fun like Tower Records and The Virgin Mega Store in Times Square. Now they are gone as well. The last place where I can still enjoy browsing hard copies of music and video is Barnes & Noble. It's been a few years and I understand they have cut back on lots of merchandise because of download purchases and now streaming. Sure there is still Wal-Mart, Target and even Best Buy. I went into Best Buy a few weeks ago and purchased a cd for the first time in ages. I was surprised on small the volume of merchandise was but I did manage to find a great cd of Three Dog Night hits. Every song on that collection was a great song and a hit.
Given the choice, I still rather go into Barnes & Noble, but I'm not so sure if the volume of cd's is there anymore like it was around 8 years ago when I went there frequently.
Anyway, I thought you might like this article and had you in mind reading it a few moments ago.
Curious Persistence of Poetry Shops http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-curious-persistence-of-poetry-shops via newyorker

Nice story - I've noticed the trend in DC within the past few years. I'm really surprised that it is finding a home in the greater NYC area. Thanks for putting this up.

I like Barnes and Noble as well - that and Boarders were favorite hang outs for me, but they have all disappeared in my area, thanks mainly to Amazon - which I do use quite a bit The only chain in my area is Books A Million, which is okay, but nothing at all like Boarders and Barnes and Noble.

I bought ton of music over the years from both Boarders and B&N simply because of the listening station that allowed a long demo of a lot of stuff I never would have considered. I'm just not getting that from the few stores that are left in my area. I have bought CD's and downloads on line, but it is usually something I'm familiar with or an artist I may have seen on tv - Colbert or Fallon. It does make me nostalgic for the old days - but then again, a lot of things do these days.

[William Brownstein]

That's it ... Border's! Couldn't think of the name. I miss them too. Nice Classical, Jazz and Showtunes sections. And yes, same with the listening stations. I learned about one of my favorite singers from this at B&N, who I didn't know beforehand. Cuban singer Omara Portuondo and The Buena Vista Social Club. Most of the older Cuban musicians from this group are gone now, but Omara is still going strong. Ry Cooder produced that project.