Well...the digital revolution in music has one more victim:
It is the age of search engines, file sharing and illegal music downloads that its owners say has led to the imminent downfall of Colony Records, a bastion of New York City's intimate music store culture.Owners of the store, on the corner of 49th Street and Broadway, confirmed Thursday that, after 64 years of business, it would shut down in the near future -- possibly within the next few months -- because of a dip in profits over the last few years caused by the shift in the music industry toward digital sales.
"Plenty of people come through these doors, but they buy less," said Richard Turk, one of the owners. "Increased expenses and diminished sales have gotten us to a point where it's not feasible to continue without a heavy struggle. We've had heavy struggles in the past, but the digital age has changed everything."
It's sad, indeed, as we'll never get these types of stories again once they close their doors:
The tenor Robert White said Colony had been a destination for performers in a pinch. It was where he found the sheet music that RCA reproduced on the cover of his first album, a collection of turn-of-the-century ballads that he had already recorded."The music we had was boring-looking," he recalled, "and Tom Shepard at RCA said, 'We'd really like to get something that evokes the era. Don't you have any other songs that we could copy for the cover?' I went directly to Colony and told my problem to the man at the counter, and he said, 'Wait a minute, I think I know just what you need.' He gave me "I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen,' an ancient copy of it with the crease where it had been bent over for years, and he said, 'Tell RCA to take this one.'"
Ahhhh...another legendary music venue bites the dust. So sad...
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Tags: Colony Records, digital downloads, digital music, sheet music
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