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Bob Dylan signed a deal to offer a previously-unreleased collection, Live at the Gaslight 1962, exclusively at Starbucks for 18 months beginning in August. This might have had some reason to rankle back in the days when there were locally-owned record stores in every town, maybe. Where they exist, they tend to cater to specific tastes (and this has been the case for a very long time), instead of cross-pollination like in the 1960s and 70s.
Starbucks is a better coffee shop than any of the major US record chains have ever been at being record stores, with the possible exception of Tower. Starbucks is becoming better at selling records than any of the major US record stores. (A quarter of all sales of the Ray Charles disc Genius Loves Company were made at Starbucks.) I don’t say this as a defense of all things corporate or as a particular admirer of Starbucks, because those record stores are corporations, too. They just don’t care about quality, which is largely why they’re becoming extinct.
In this part of the world, we’re down to two chains that still charge close to US$20 for most discs, when you can find them. Given the choice, I find Starbucks far more comfortable.
