"Brian Gaff" wrote in message
m...

I think HMV still hangs on in a few shopping centres and the like, some
specialist shops exist in places like Greenwich and Brighton, but Virgin
sold up to a company nobody ever heard of, lasted a couple of years and
then went belly up.

Yup, I remember it being on the news. As I said there was one in the town
near me, I've no idea who has that site now or what they sell. I only ever
went in, once, to buy a carbon fibre record brush which, to be fair, they
did have. But I really disliked that shop: blaring pop music, 'moody'
lighting and screens everywhere with 'pop videos' on them.

Thinking about it I know of plenty of shops that sell a few CDs, but none
that I would call a "record shop". The "New Age" shop sells CDs of "New Age"
music, along with the clothes, incense burners and books on the Occult.
National Trust shops sell CDs of music recorded on National Trust
properties. Craft fairs often have a stall selling CDs by local musicians
and at the end of concerts there is often a stall selling CDs by the same
performers. Come to think of it, though, the only places I know where vinyl
records are sold are the charity shops selling second-hand records. When I'm
in such shops I usually flick through them to see if there is anything
interesting. There rarely is (except, possibly, to a Val Doonican fan!).

Along with the supermarkets and the significant growth of on-line sales,
both of physical CDs and downloads all that makes running a specialist
record shop pretty difficult these days I'd have thought except in the big
cities.

David.