By Michael Benjamin
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wrvo/local-wrvo-964072.mp3
Pulaski, NY – Gene Webb opened the Disc Connection record store in Pulaski in 1985.
"There had not been a store in Pulaski since 1975," he says, "and that business closed and I had the opportunity to open the store here. I had worked in Syracuse part-time at a record store there for three years, and I was also working at another business, and I decided to leave that business and open the store up here because there hadn't been one."
He says it took a while for people to know the store was there, but after that he says the Disc Connection became a booming, bustling place for a while.
"Of course, you know," says Webb, "that was back before all the downloading and Napster and now everybody else has got iPods and they go to iTunes and they don't come in and physically buy the CD anymore. There's still people that want that, so they do come in and buy it, but a lot of the young people don't come in. And because of that, we've lost probably 30-percent of our business."
Such is the fate of the record store industry in recent years.
"You've lost all the casual customer," says Bryan Burkert, owner of the Sound Garden record stores in Baltimore and Syracuse, "and if you don't have a really strong store with a large draw that is from a pretty big range, it's tough."
Burkert is one of a group of enthusiasts that started a movement for Record Store Day in2007.
This year, Record Store Day was April 16th.
For Record Store Days, a number of artists release exclusive material or perform in-store concerts to help bring attention - and, more importantly, customers - to independent record stores.
Burkert says the idea for Record Store Day was spawned at a national meeting of independent record store owners a few years ago, and has since grown beyond his wildest expectations.
"It's changed the story of record stores in general," he says. "I mean, at the time before it, everybody was basically saying record stores were going to close; and now there's always the preface about indie record stores doing well."
Manager of the Syracuse Sound Garden, Ron Cicoria says despite tough time, his store is doing alright.
So, what's the difference between a successful store like Sound Garden and Gene Webb's Disc Connection, which Gene says in danger of going under if business doesn't pick up soon?
Cicoria cites the size and variety of the Sound Garden's music selection as one reason it's doing better than the Disc Connection.
"It's impossible to come in here and not find something you want," he says. "It's literally impossible. I never see somebody walk in, stroll around for a little bit and walk out."
That could be the difference. In this digital age, you can find pretty much any album you want for free on the internet if you look hard enough.
Despite hard times for the record store industry in recent years, Cicoria says what keeps record stores going is that intangible record store vibe.
"People still like to get out of the house," he says. "I mean, are you going to stay in the house all the time? You know, some things you've got to get out and do."
Gene Webb says the Disc Connection used to have that vibe as well.
"Yeah a lot of people would come in and [are] always talking stories and concerts and things, and trivia about this group or that group or this artist or that artist," Webb says. "It sort of reminds you of a record store you might see in a movie. It's not like the chain stores where everything is all glossy and shiny. That's not the feel. This is sort of like a New York City-type store."
But that was then, now the store, like so many in the U.S., has fallen on tough times. Sound Garden franchise owner Burkert says stores in positions like the Disc Connection's find themselves in something of a catch-22.
"It's really tough - once you're in the hole - to get out of the hole in this industry," he says, "because in order to get out of the hole, you actually have to have enough capital to widen your selection dramatically; and it doesn't do you any good to widen your selection dramatically unless you have a large enough customer base that's going to come in and buy it. So, it's almost like the chicken before the egg."
As far as selection goes, Gene has a vast selection of albums in all formats - from vinyl to 8-tracks to cassettes to CDs - but unlike at the Sound Garden, you'd be hard-pressed to walk into the store with a specific album in mind and walk out with it in hand. When I was there, he only had one Beatles' album, and it was one of the albums Capitol Records released in the American market to cash in on the Beatlemania craze of the mid- 60s.
Gene says if you let him know what you want, he can place and order and have it for you in a few days; but these days anyone with an internet connection and a credit card can do the same thing on sites like Amazon or eBay.
So, Gene says he's just going to try harder to get his store's name out there in Central New York.
"I think if people had known [about the store], I wouldn't probably have been in this situation. It's kind of hard to believe after 25 years people don't know, with word of mouth and some of the advertising I have done, but there's plenty of people in this county that just don't know I'm here."
[Editor's note: since the writing of this story, Gene Webb has been informed that he will be evicted from the building where the Disc Connection has been located for 25 years.]