Other Music: The Documentary

New York City's greatest record store, Other Music, closed a few years ago in 2016. It was a place I frequented constantly. Not just when I lived there but when I would travel there every month to record AT&T radio scripts I'd written as well as when I'd go up there for post-production.

Other Music was a short walk from my hotel haunt The Soho Grand where I basically lived between 2006 and 2008. Even when I wasn't looking for new music, I got a sense of satisfaction when I'd pass by the Orange and Blue sign hanging from outside the store.

But Limewire and Napster and Megaupload and all the piracy sites destroyed the concept of paying for albums and streaming sites and legitimate Mp3 sights devalued it for those who still wanted to pay. How could a small business compete in a world where Tower Records and Virgin megastores all crumbled?

The short answer is, it couldn't.

But Other Music as a documentary is a testament to the people who believed in music a little too much and found a beautiful strange community of misfits who all had their particular interests and somehow found common ground even if the people who shopped there didn't share the same interests.

Where I grew up in Pittsburgh, there was Record-Rama, the greatest record store ever (R.I.P.) We also had Eide's which is still around and a record store in Bloomfield, not to mention one whose name escapes me that was down the street from my Alma Mater, University of Pittsburgh. We had tons of great stores, and going to a Camelot (Camel Snot) or big box store was unthinkable.

And online community is just not the same as a real community. An algorithm is no substitute for a personal recommendation.

Here's hoping this quarantine will teach us something about real connections.

By the way if you want to watch the Other Music documentary, they are having virtual screenings. It was just released today, April 17th. Totally worth it because some of the proceeds go to keep some independent record stores going. And lord knows during this time, they need it more than ever.