Record Store Date: If All Records Are Gold | Arts & Entertainment

For the record: People (still) love their record.

When WaxTrucks closed on April 19 last year, people were already meandering around the iconic brick building at the corner of 14th Avenue and Washington Street. They were perfectly prepared to spend an entire snowy night on the merciless sidewalk.

By the time the shop reopened at 8am, the first line had been waiting for 15 hours.

“People are always surprised to hear that vinyl is better than its post-Napes era,” said Delaney Schoenfeld, director of marketing at Wax Tracks. “It’s very impressive to me that so many young people started buying and collecting vinyl.”

Have they ever been? According to a report published by the American Recording Industry Association, New Vinyl continued its revival for nearly two years in 2024, continuing its sales of $1.4 billion. And that doesn’t include second-hand sales.

Returning to Saturday in its 17th year, Record Store Day began in 2008 as a way to celebrate not only physical media such as vinyl and CDs, but also the community they love by making them.

Organizers describe Record Store Day as an opportunity for music fans to gather and celebrate the special role they play in the Record Store’s unique culture and community.

And from a business standpoint, record store days are a significant infusion of revenue. For many of the 32 participating independent brick and mortar businesses in Wax Trax, Twist & Shout, and Colorado, Record Store Day is the best selling day of the year. Twist & Shout owner Patrick Brown says pedestrians on record store days could be up to 10 times more than other Saturdays. “It’s like packing two weeks of normal business in a day,” he said.

At Wax Trax, now 47, “Record Store Day is more than our biggest sales day,” Schoenfeldt said. “This is a way to focus our attention on independent record stores. We are the oldest record stores in the state and the fact that we have been able to work hard and be resilient is due to our loyal community.”

For consumers, lures are exclusive products. Over 300 artists, from Bad River to Taylor Swift, have created special vinyl and CD releases in a limited amount.

On Saturday, product prizes will include unique products such as Charli XCX, Laufey, The Grateful Dead, Gracie Abrams, Prince and MJ Lenderman.

Schoenfeldt? “I’m really excited about Joey Valens and Bray,” she said. JVB is a few rappers from the college rappers of Schoenfeldt in Pennsylvania, known as the “modern Beastie Boys.” They created a special Record Store Day Compilation of 12 favorite songs, including four tracks making their vinyl debut (one on the cover of Charli XCX’s “365”).

Brown’s Jam is K. Frimon and his Cuban Sfiesta. The inventive 1976 Ghanaian album is considered one of the best “high life” albums ever made. Not only is the original album extremely rare, but this album comes with blue vinyl with heavyweight sleeves.

Swift’s exclusive record store day offering is a 7-inch white vinyl remix of the song “Fortnight” from “The Trootured Poets Department.” The new 2 lp version of the “Wicked” soundtrack is pushed against exclusive cover art, special posters and bonus tracks (“Ozdust Duet”) on plants and pink glitter vinyl.

Quantity varies by store. The previously unreleased Post Malone’s tribute to Nirvana, taken from the 2020 livestream, has split a total of 17,000 copies of an estimated 1,400 participating stores nationwide, committed to yellow vinyl. At the other end of the spectrum, Blackstone Cherry has selected B-sides, covers, live tracks, and previously unreleased songs (Tina Turner’s “What’s Love Got with it?

The hidden gems are everywhere for Saturday’s filming. But for the money of Denver music blogger and superfan Billy Thiem, “The best thing about Record Store Day is hitting both humans and vinyl. In an increasingly isolated online world, seeing old faces and exchanging stories and discoveries is unparalleled,” he said.

“It’s like a huge happy hour for all music and humanity, and there’s no hangover.”

Brown calls Record Store Day the antithesis, for example, Black Friday – at least in terms of atmosphere and consumer frenzy. He limits the body in the store to 250 at a time with Twist & Shout and when they are ready to pay, waiting can take them up to an hour. But it’s cold, Brown said. People don’t get impatient. He calls strangers attacking random conversations and sharing their enthusiasm for their purchases and their favourite musical acts, thus developing a “stimulating sense of camaraderie” instead.

Wax Trax will be open at 2pm, offering free donut bites thanks to Jelly Cafe at 7am. Starting at 2pm, Denver’s high energy Denver hip pop artist Rex Winnfield will debut new music from the upcoming EP, followed by the experimental New Wave Denver Band Pink Lady Monster.

For non-eared birds, the Waxtrax bakery location opens at 10am and offers its own transportation incentives, including neon browns for hip hop performers who run all vinyl DJ sets at 1pm

Both Wax Trax stores will plunder the recently redesigned all-in-one Victrola Revolution Go Turntables (using collector’s case).

Although there are no record stores that feature all 300 artists’ products, Schoenfeldt said:

For Brown, thriving Record Store Day reflects the thriving Record Store industry, and it’s all the best news.

“Business is staying healthy,” he said. “We had to make some adjustments here and there, but now we’re dialing something pretty good. I’m here as long as I’m kicking.”

Record Store Day promises to kick nationwide on Saturdays.

“That’s confusion,” said Johnny Rodriguez of Wax Tracks. “But that’s a cool mess.”