Local record stores celebrated Record Store Day on April 13.

The annual consumer event saw the release of a wide variety of rare and unreleased albums, singles and compilations to celebrate the culture of independent record stores. The wide range of releases, about 550 records in total according to the BBC, offer a little bit of something for everyone.

“I got Fela Kuti and Roy Ayers’ ‘Music Of Many Colours,’” MU freshman Jocelyn Luffel said. “I’ve gone to Record Store Day [for] several years and Hitt Records is honestly better than the place I had back home.”

Hitt Records celebrated the day with snacks and various live music performances. However, store co-owner Taylor Bacon has a few problems with the annual holiday.

“I think Record Store Day is a total sham, but people demand that we have it, so we participate,” Bacon said. “It’s just manufactured garbage repackaged to be collectable. The people behind it choose really stupid albums to reissue. The records will clear out in the first hour and a half. We take the cost.”

Though Bacon personally dislikes Record Store Day, he still enjoys serving the local community’s demands.

“The good side of it is that it’s really fun to interact with the city and our fans and friends who support the shop,” Bacon said. “We try not to have it be just about the releases…that’s over in the first hour and a half, and the rest of the day is just a party.”

While Bacon would rather have Record Store Day be just another afternoon, other local record sellers have a more positive view of the annual event.

“It is pretty good for the downtown community,” Steve Brink, a team leader at Slacker CD’s and Games, said. “It’s definitely one of our biggest days. We had a guy come by here and he bought $800 worth of all kinds of stuff.”

Record Store Day coincides with a recently renewed interest in older music mediums, as both vinyl records and cassettes sales saw double digit growth in 2018, according to BuzzAngle Music’s End-Year Report.

Specific releases of note include original test pressings of Bob Dylan’s “Blood on the Tracks,” a reissue of Captain Beefheart’s avant garde epic “Trout Mask Replica” and a Prince cassette previously only released to attendees of Versace’s 1995 Paris Fashion Week Collection.

Though most of the releases are quickly sold on Record Store Day, the few that are unsold are still for sale at local record stores, and many resellers put up releases for sale on websites like eBay and Amazon.

_Edited by Janae McKenzie | jmckenzie@themaneater.com_