THE "SPECIAL STACK OF RECORDS"

While driving through my hometown of Tucson AZ, I passed what used to be the record shop I frequented as a teen to hang out and buy records. Lots of memories came back to me of taking the city bus after school and trying to show off whatever new scratch pattern I was practicing and talking music with some of the older DJs there. But for some reason the thing I thought of most this particular time was always seeing that "special stack" of records that were set aside. The special stack always had the hot new AV8's, Rawkus records, new albums/singles, and scratch records. They were set aside for homies of theirs, radio DJS, or djs that gained the respect of the other DJs that worked there. they would let you look through them and purchase them before they were picked through and then finally put out on the shelves for everyone else, but only if they thought you were worthy. I remembered when I was finally allowed to see that "Special Stack", it was something that as a 16 yr old kid you worked toward, you had to show your loyalty, rock shows, and gain respect before you were allowed to be part of what seemed like an elite group, THE SPECIAL STACK.
The record store was like a barber shop, or more even like beauty shop is to women, thats what it was like for Djs in my hometown. If you wanted to know who anyone was in the local DJ scene you went to the record shop, wanted to know who had beef with who, who ripped the club last weekend, who should stick to their day job, you went to the record shop. Now with digital record pools and electronic access to music record stores are closing everywhere. I was hurt greatly when the historic FAT BEATS stores in NYC and LA closed. that camaraderie and feeling of home I feel is now suffering greatly, as is the feeling of having to earn that status, having to search for hours or earn the tracks you play. Since digital record pools / music sites everyone can now download anything by paying a membership fee or by paying per track, which is awesome for the artist/producer/remixer, but will eventually be the death of vinyl (I refuse to believe its dead yet).Dont get me wrong, there are lots of artists being given exposure that would not be possible without these sites (myself being one of them) but it is also one of the reasons why I think most DJs sound the same. Everyone is given the exact same remixes, exact same tracks, same selection, instead of having to earn them. I will be following this post up with an interview with Phoenix's DJ Rocko (Commissioners & Bumsquad DJs, Phoenix New Times 2010 BEST LOCAL DJ, 3rd place in Beezo Battle) on a related topic within the next couple of days, so look out for that.
Peace until then