The death of music as a physical commodity is now starting to sink in for this cowtown.
This week Streetside Records in Westport announced it was closing
Of course, the next bit of news in this saga was the inevitable and not so serious effort to save the record store via a Facebook fan page and call to action.
This bit of nostalgia and sentimentality is nice but doesn’t really make any sense.
Hard as it might be: Kansas City needs to let this music landmark die!!!
The reasons are nearly limitless and have a lot to do with the free market capitalism Conservative Reactionary Teabaggers like to espouse but not practice.
So allow me to list my top 3 reasons to let the place die:
1. Collecting Vinyl Records is a niche hobby that won’t support such prime Midtown real estate. There just aren’t that many fans of vinyl to keep the place open. If there was we wouldn’t be at this point right now.
2. People are done paying for music – Don’t throw iTunes at me. ITunes represents just a tiny fraction of people STILL stealing music online. It’s quaint and makes 30 and 40 somethings feel like their meager middle management salary actually means something, but the people who really want music aren’t paying for it anymore.
3. Streetside was never really that great – Pardon me but a surly, tattooed and pierced d-bag making fun of my Top 40 selections was never my favorite part of buying music in the meatspace.
For these reasons and so many more, it’s better to let the market deal with the Westport building. Ultimately, they’ll find a use for it and I’m sure some rich developer will get a tax break for repurposing this bit of history.
Don’t shed a tear….
Just the way of the world. Everythings going online. Soon there will be no brick and mortar stores left.
Just spaces where you can go and buy items and then head online to actually order htme at 3am in
your house (or in tonys case…your basement).
And as for things that are going down the drain…lets include tonys column. Absolutely worthless drivel by
a guy who has more negativity than anyone on earth. does nothing make you smile tony…except maybe the
porn you upload online. so for tony theres no more need to go to porn theatres…he has the millions of downloads
he need s to entertain himself.
Your becoming as irrlevant as the newspapers you yank….so tony…the clock is ticking…maybe go to welding
school or maybe become a nurses assistant at avila…but your time as a writer is way past over….
anonymous…
jojo is better than real jojo…lol….jojo when you go to the mall to buy your black leather jacket be sure to pick Tony up a Matt Cassel jersey and Royals cap.
Happy Holidays ….ya’ll——bschloz
2 out of 3 ain’t bad …
…people are NOT done paying for music. I buy everything via Amazon … iTunes? …no, not from Steve Jobs is Satan (but that is another story for another day) … …
Yeah, deadbeat 20somethings, still living at home, are still stealing it . They’ve never paid for anything in their entire pathetic, miserably loser lives, so why start now. … …
Vinyl collecting is a nice, quaint hobby. And we’ll always have eBay. But to LISTEN to music? … thank God for digital.
MarkX
Are there paragraphs?
Testing, the quick brown illegal immigant fox jumped over the Rio.
Let the word go forth to all nations, that a new generation of bloggers, hardened by Glaze’s girlfriends….
To those of you, whose cares have been our concern, fuck off…testing testing testing…
testing yet still….
midtown needs a cabellas!
1. What do vinyl records have to do with it? That store is mostly CDs, and one of the few, if not the only, retail stores that stocks new and back catalog stuff, and stuff thats harder to find and on smaller labels. Maybe they can put in a Target, would give you another place to pick up the latest Taylor Swift and Kesha.
2. Paying vs stealing – Some people are paying, some people aren’t. What do you care if there’s a business there to cater to the people who don’t mind paying?
3. As opposed to a surly d-bag making fun of everything else. Makes it sound like Tony can dish it but not take it, hmmm…