Bob Schwartz

Today is Record Store Day.

Record Store Day was conceived in 2007 at a gathering of independent record store owners and employees as a way to celebrate and spread the word about the unique culture surrounding nearly 1400 independently-owned record stores in the US and thousands of similar stores internationally. The first Record Store Day took place on April 19, 2008. Today, Record Store Day is celebrated at independently-owned brick-and-mortar record stores around the world.

For many years I posted about Record Store Day, but not recently.

I should feature it every year.

I would not be who I am without the hours spent in record stores, chain stores and independents. If you go to a concert, you are surrounded by people who love particular artists or particular types of music. In all those record stores, big or small, you are surrounded by people who love music.

The record stores of my youngest years included two different record buying experiences.

One was in the next town. The stores on the avenue began with a Woolworth’s on the north side and a tiny record store on the south side. The Woolworth’s was where I bought albums, the other was where I bought singles.

The other experience was the cavernous Sam Goody’s store at our local mall. Sam Goody’s still has mall stores, though these are mere storefronts. I am talking about huge. It wasn’t a store. It was a world of records. It wasn’t about what I had heard on the radio. It was about whatever was playing and whatever I could hear, what these dozens of other people knew about and were listening to. That was the formative lesson internalized. Music was legion and, in the words of the much later George Michael album title, I learned to listen without prejudice.

Back to Record Store Day 2026. Visit a record store today, talk to other music freaks, buy something. I hear that following the resurgence of vinyl, CDs are coming back too.

Music is good for us. Different kinds of music are good for us. Another back in the day music reference is to David Crosby. The first track on his If I Could Only Remember My Name album says “Everybody’s saying that music is love.” It is.

© 2026 Bob Schwartz