There are 50 left in Catalonia, most of them in Barcelona, but no one wants them to disappear and the return of new recordings on vinyl has given them a second life. These are the record stores, which have just received an award for their simple presence.
According to data from Promusicae, sales on physical media in Spain remain at similar levels over the last five years, although increasing. From 2022 to 2023, sales increased by almost 10% thanks to the vinyl format. In fact, vinyl format sales already bring in more money than CD sales. However, physical sales only represent 13% of the total. He streaming She’s the queen of mambo.
The 54 record stores that survive in Catalonia won the Fonogram prize awarded by the Fonogram conference of the Association of Music Producers and Publishers of Catalonia, which was held a few days ago at the Born Cultural Center in Barcelona. It is a space for meeting and debate between industry professionals from this autonomous community in which current achievements are valued and challenges for the future are discussed.
Resistance against digital
According to Xavier Marcé, cultural advisor to Barcelona City Hall, record stores “are spaces of resistance to the hegemony of digital commerce”. The prize for this edition consisted of a limited edition drawing printed on paper created by designer, DJ, collector and record publisher Txarly Brown. It was taken over by the founding members of three of the oldest stores in Barcelona: Carlos García, of Surco Discos; Carles Pascual, from Discos Revolver and Dan, from Disco 100.
The three received a full-size reproduction of the drawing, but a reduced-size copy will also be sent to the rest of the stores in Catalonia, of which only eight correspond to the provinces of Lleida (1), Girona (2) and Tarragona (5). For the Minister of Culture of the Generalitat, in addition to being “resistant”, a term in which she agrees with her counterpart from the Barcelona City Hall, they are “authentic prescribers of music for their clients, in addition to form spaces of culture”. and the community.
But behind the recognitions and big words, reality shows a path that is not at all a bed of roses. If the Spanish music trade reached 250 million euros in 2023, in the case of Catalonia, only 5% of this amount corresponded to sales of music on physical media, a far cry from the 80s and 90s of the last century , a time when the sale of CDs and vinyl represented practically all music sales.
It is well known that with the arrival of new technologies, there has also been a void of digital commercial proposals for which stores have paid dearly, because in the absence of legal platforms, the public has overwhelmingly opted for what we call them “pirates”. As Carlos García, founder of Surco, tells us, “between P2P and top manta, they almost finished us off”.
Surco resisted, like many other proposals – not all, since the notorious fall of Discos Castelló, which was the most emblematic company in Barcelona – which were based on austerity and openness to the market of collectors and the opportunity. As the oldest existing store, it was born in 1974 in the gate of a building that formerly housed small businesses.
Surco resisted, like many other proposals, based on austerity and openness to the collectors and second-hand market.
“At the beginning, even though we sold a lot, we had to import international records because non-Spanish record companies didn’t have distribution here,” he explains. But in the 1980s everything changed, the market opened up to Spain and, with the growing supply, demand from the public, especially young people, exploded. “There was a time when records were the obligatory gift at Christmas or for birthdays,” recalls the merchant.
It was an audience that was looking for everything. García comments: “There were people who came looking for specific albums or styles, but many bought the album that was recommended to them by 40 Principales and similar stations. » For reasons of space, they moved in 1981 to a place “ten numbers away”, in the same area, in the heart of the Gràcia district. There, they continue to resist and prescribe music to music lovers, curious and nostalgic for the crackle of the needle on the acetate. “It’s done for the love of music because, of course, we’re not going to get rich,” explains the founder of Surco.
Selling Catalan rumba in Japan
Sales continued at a breakneck pace – although they gradually moved from vinyl to CD – until the turn of the century, when the digital tsunami split the business in two. “We continued by adapting, with fewer sales but with an increasingly specialized audience, who were looking for very specific styles or artists, especially on CD, but also on vinyl,” adds García, who declares that he is not against digital commerce. : “Young people come who have heard things they like on Spotify and ask you for them on vinyl.”
In this regard, the creator of the Fongrama Prize, Txarly Brown, renowned DJ who frequently performs at city festivals, including Sónar, and author of the musical and recording project Achilifunk, believes that there is an increase in consumption of vinyl, but “as a collector’s item and fetishistic merchandising, but also with a view to the future value that these pressed editions launched by multinationals may have. Promusicae knows that in 2023 more than two million new vinyl records have been sold, whereas ten years previously only 140,000 had been sold, to which must be added the incalculable and opaque second-hand activity.
“I buy bargain Catalan rumba here for a few euros myself, which I then send in boxes to Japan at a much higher price,” explains Brown. In any case, he sees a glimmer of hope in the attitude of these new consumers, even if it is contrary to the attitude of multinationals who, according to him, are committed to printing works that have never seen the day on vinyl. .
In line with Brown, Carlos García specifies that “the sale of vinyl by independent record companies enjoys good health despite the profound changes of the last 25 years”. But he explains that the new interest of multinationals in the acetate disc market “has collapsed the pressing plants, harming independent labels, which have less financial strength”.
Indeed, if we return to Promusicae data, 82% of the best-selling new vinyls (top 100) were put into circulation by the three major multinationals: Universal, Warner and Sony.
Revolver, 35 years in the heart of Raval
However, Carles Pascual, founder of Revolver Records, does not think the same thing: “The new editions published by the ‘multis’ attract a lot of young people and new audiences, who also know what they are looking for. “Actually,” he explains, “there are lines here that go around the block on Record Store Day, which we celebrate on the third Saturday in April.” This is an initiative to offer records at reduced prices for a day, of which Pascual is the promoter in Spain.
“We started in the early 90s in Tallers, 13 [en la parte noble del Raval] and in 1998 we opened this store, the Green Revolver,” he says to differentiate it from the first store, Discos Revolver, which he calls “the Red Revolver” and which operates as a separate business from Revolver Records. “Since then, we have gone through all the crises, but we have resisted,” says Pascual.
He recognizes that Revolver Records was born in a particularly complicated, almost suicidal, era, but even if sales have declined significantly, they have not disappeared, particularly in CDs, “even if we never stopped selling vinyls” . They survived with a smaller but more loyal audience: “Before, a bunch of kids came here who all bought the same album and the day an important album came out, there was a lot of waiting here, because it was the only way to do it. to listen to it.
Impacto, the king of second-hand goods in Ciutat Vella
“Now it’s different,” he continues, “but it’s an audience that gives you more satisfaction, because they talk to you, they talk to you, we see that they love music as much as we do. ” Revolver also has an online business arm, a page from which they sell titles to everyone. “It’s working quite well, it’s even growing,” he emphasizes. He also credits the used and collectible record trade with helping them overcome obstacles.
However, it is Antonio Baró, founder of Discos Impacto – at 61 Tallers Street, in the heart of the Ciutat Vella district – who best characterizes the commitment to second hand. If you know how to look, you will find real gems among its shelves, almost never at low prices, but sometimes, especially in sections like classical music or jazz, for a few euros.
“We started in Hospital Street in 1981 and then moved to Tallers, 13, where Revolver is today. [el rojo]“, explains Baró. Finally, I arrived here in the 90s and I’m still here with the second hand.” It wasn’t always like that, at the beginning Impacto combined first and second hand, but he “quickly got tired of the second hand houses. records” and the “conditions” that they imposed on them, very different from those of department stores like El Corte Inglés or Fnac.
Baró therefore quickly opted for second-hand and collectible records. “It’s going well for me like that,” explains this powerfully spoken septuagenarian, then assures: “If I had continued with a new album a long time ago, it would have had to be closed.”
Ultra-local, the Poble Nou bet
One of the newest businesses is located in Poble Nou, near the legendary Razzmatazz hall, formerly Zeleste. “We opened there 12 years ago because it was a space with several rehearsal rooms, even if today there are none left,” explains Raül Chamorro, founder with his partner Carme Baqués of Ultra -local.
Ultra-Local mainly supports the independent label sector, for which it assures that there is a market: “A mixture of people from the neighborhood and others who, for example, come to see a concert at Razzmatazz and pass by, come to the store . . here”. He admits that he doesn’t pay much attention to online commerce at the moment. “We only have one page on Discogs,” he says, referring to the international cataloging and cataloging platform. sale of records between individuals.
He explains that he previously worked at an electronic scale company, but left to do what he found rewarding. “At the beginning, I devoted the afternoons to it, but since 2019, all day,” he explains. Chamorro agrees with the rest of the protagonists of this report that it is a professional profession, but not at all lucrative: “It’s the price you pay to do what you love” .
