In 1897, Humorist Mark Twain told a reporter from the New York Journal, “The report of my death was an exaggeration.” A century later in the 1990s, the music industry effectively declared the same fate for vinyl; both 45 rpm singles and 33 rpm LPs. It would appear that pronouncement was also greatly exaggerated. Rick Wilkerson of Irvington Vinyl (9 Johnson Ave.) believes that not only is vinyl alive and well, it is growing stronger ever day. If last week’s Black Friday Record Store Day was any indicator, vinyl is back with a vengeance.
Irvington Vinyl was packed with people busily flipping through racks and stacks of hot wax. Located inside of the popular Bookmamas bookstore, Wilkerson’s record shop is flourishing. Of course, as you might expect, Baby Boomers stoking nostalgic fires of music memory are a staple of Rick’s demographic. But, contrary to what you might think, Rick states that the youth market is driving the business. According to Bookmama’s Kathleen Angelone, the union between the bookstore and record shop has worked out “beautifully for both of us and I’m enjoying it.”
Wait. Haven’t we all seen, read or heard the news reports lamenting the sad state of affairs in the music industry lately? Isn’t it true that subscription services, downstreaming and unchecked pirating are cutting into artist’s profits and hastening the demise of many old time record labels? Well, yes, in 2014, according to Nielsen SoundScan, overall album sales dropped by 8.4 percent, to 289.41 million units, and CD sales were down 14 percent. For the first time since iTunes launched in 2003, digital downloads also declined by one percentage point in 2013.
Only two facets of the music industry have experienced growth during that same period: digital streaming services (like Spotify, Pandora, Rdio) grew 32 percent to a record 118 billion total streams. And the other increase? Vinyl records. Sales of vinyl LPs shot up 33 percent, to 6.1 million albums, the highest level since SoundScan started counting in 1991. According to the world’s largest statistics portal, Statista, vinyl sales have jumped 250 percent since 2002, while overall music sales have dropped by 50 percent during that same time period. Nostalgia isn’t as big a factor as you might think. While the No. 1 LP in 2010 was the Beatles’ Abbey Road, last year’s top-selling vinyl record was an LP by Daft Punk, a French electronic music duo born 4 years after the Beatles broke up.
Before you head down to the basement and dust off those old LPs and picture discs to jump start the turntable, keep in mind that while vinyl’s rebirth is impressive, the 6.1 million sales of new LPs represent only about 2 percent of total album sales, versus 57 percent for CDs and 41 percent for digital albums. Daft Punk’s top-selling LP sold about 49,000 copies which amounts to a hard day’s night worth of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” (65 million), Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon” (45 million), AC/DC’s “Back in Black” (40 million) or Fleetwood Mac’s “Rumours” (40 million).
However, that 6.1 million number does not include the number of vinyl sales on the secondary market. And The Irv’s secondary market is Rick Wilkerson’s Irvington Vinyl. Wilkerson has called Indianapolis home since 1988. He opened his first record store, known as Missing Link Records, on Indy’s Southside in 1993 then moved to Broad Ripple in 1994 before relocating to Irvington in 2009. In 2012 he opened a collectibles store known as Irvington Vintage where Rick says, “To be honest, records were only an afterthought.” Wilkerson’s vinyl customer base grew and the wax soon outgrew the space. In June of 2014, he joined forces with Kathleen and her well established Bookmamas bookstore to create Irvington Vinyl.
“I started out with an inventory of 1,000 titles and it took off,” Rick says. Today, Irvington Vinyl boasts an inventory of 15,000 records with another 10,000 titles maintained off site. The 61-year-old Wilkerson, who doesn’t look a day over 40, is a true Renaissance man who teaches marketing at Franklin University of Ohio by day, maintains his record shop in his off hours and promotes his own record label, Time Change Records, in his spare time. Rick’s label specializes in early Indiana punk bands and Hoosier New Wave music. I visited the store a week after Rick sponsored a benefit concert, so as you have deduced, Wilkerson is a busy man.
I asked Rick how he is able to stock and maintain his vast selection of vintage vinyl. He replies that he acquires much of his inventory from folks who bring their albums to him at the store or at one of the many local record shows he regularly sets up at. His most popular, and consequently most sought after, categories are classic rock, local releases, soul and jazz titles. While he does occasionally maintain a “want list” for customers, Rick states that his customer base consists chiefly of regular walk-in clientele. Rick knows his loyal customers by name which makes it easy for him to keep their “wish lists” ever present in his mind. But just in case he doesn’t have the title of your desire in stock, Rick does take special orders for both old titles and new releases.
Rick states that the turntables and equipment required to play old vinyl is surprisingly easy to find and affordable. He believes that some of the appeal of vinyl is the natural, true and crisp sound it allows. “Digital recordings are often too clean and make the music sound overproduced and mechanical,” he states. For my part, I readily recognize that Irvingtonians are special people who, as a whole, typically shun establishment norms. It is easy for me to postulate that digital productions lack the warmth of vinyl records and Eastsiders relish the idea of owning a beautifully packaged artifact in it’s original intended form. Of course, the rejection of the sprawling, multi-tentacled reach of the established digital world has an appeal as well.
As a devotee of all things history, I asked “What about the old 78 rpm records? Are they valuable?” Rick smiled politely and shook his head from side-to-side saying, “Not so much. That is unless you’re talking about some of the old Delta Blues recordings. Which are very rare and were issued in small numbers to begin with.” I found Rick’s answer interesting considering the object that drew me towards writing this article in the first place.
It is one record in Rick’s store that you won’t find a price tag on. An item that is not for sale at any price. It is an old 78 rpm record that rests in a frame on the wall near the cash register. The old wax record is not the story here but rather the nondescript manila sleeve that surrounds it. The sleeve features a stamp reading: “Bromley’s Music School and Shop. 11 Johnson Ave. Pianos, Instruments, Records, Sheet Music.” with the phone number of “IRVINGTON 9862″. Why is this important? Well, once upon a time nearly a century ago, the shop we now know as Bookmamas and the adjoining shop were two separate addresses. Bookmamas was, as it remains, 9 Johnson Avenue. The shop next door we now know as Irvington Vinyl was Bromley’s music store located at 11 Johnson Avenue. A music store that sold vinyl records. Funny how things come full circle, ain’t it?
Al Hunter is the author of the “Haunted Indianapolis” and co-author of the “Haunted Irvington” and “Indiana National Road” book series. His newest book is “Bumps in the Night. Stories from the Weekly View.” Contact Al directly at Huntvault@aol.com or become a friend on Facebook.
