End of the line for Sheffield vinyl record shop
YOU get the message it's the vinyl countdown for second hand music shop Spin City after almost a quarter of a century just by looking in the window.
A row of LP covers jostle for attention: Ringo Starr's Goodnight Vienna, Brenda Lee's Bye Bye Blues and Cream's Goodbye.
Not got it yet?
Then how about singles such as Gladys Knight's End of the Road, the O'Jay's Going, Going, Gone, or Gonzalez with Pack It Up?
Spin City, on Westfield Terrace, Sheffield, is closing down by the end of the month – a victim of the iPod, the council's anti-'A board' policy and fashion.
Pauline and Andy Plaxton have realised that, while they may still be fans of vinyl, a new generation has spung up who will "never know the thrill of picking up a record."
Pauline, behind the counter of the shop that boasts some 25,000 records – roughly three to one in favour of seven-inch singles (remember them?) – cramming every inch of wall and shelf space, sighs.
"We have loved every minute of it and I'm sad to be going but it's a decision we have had to make."
When Spin City opened up – Andy reckons the '90s TV series nicked its title off them – it was as a stall on Castle Market, a job for Pauline while raising two children.
Back then the Plaxtons had a garage full of vinyl (they probably will have again) and there was a ready market for second-hand records.
People wanted them for their own sake, to fill their home juke boxes or for a special occasion like a wedding.
"Now they just download them from the internet," says Andy, who remarks that everyone can remember their first record.
For him it was Stevie Wonder's For Once in My Life. Pauline admits bashfully it was something by Cliff Richard – but then it was bought for her.
Luckily she got over it and now likes Motown, like Andy. "Anything from the Sixties and Seventies. Very eclectic," he shouts from the storeroom where he is making a cup of tea.
They moved the stall to the shop seven years ago.
"If someone walks in here, they have got the same things in common with us," says Andy, coming back with the tea.
They've made a lot of friends.
Is there still a place for vinyl records? Post your comments below.
Shops like theirs seem to be falling over like ninepins.
It's not helped that they're tucked away and the council won't let them have an 'A board' to advertise. Or that charity shops have record collections – not that they're complaining.
In the shop is a token rack of CDs, which look to be going the same way as vinyl.
"Just a token gesture, really," says Andy.
The Diary pulls out singles at random – Adam Faith's Who Am I, Billy Fury's Like I've Never Been Gone and something by the Osmonds. Andy worries about their street cred and offers a Dusty Springfield record instead.
To get rid of their records they are having a sale. Everything must go.
But while you can take the vinyl out of the shop it's difficult to take the vinyl out of the Plaxtons.
"If someone comes in here on our last day and they have some vinyl I would like for my collection, I shall still buy it," says Andy.
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