• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Lieff Ink

TELL YOUR STORY

  • About
  • Services
    • Writing • Editing
    • PR
    • Writing Tutor
  • Words
  • Press
  • Blog
  • Clients
    • Client List
    • Testimonials
  • Contact
  • Book
    • Accolades
    • Reviews

All Things Must Pass: The Rise and Fall of Tower Records

July 25, 2016

Tower Records posterRecord stores represent my childhood so when my mother told me about Showtime’s documentary about longtime retail giant Tower Records I clearly needed to watch it. All Things Must Pass: The Rise and Fall of Tower Records tells the story of a company that was the brainchild of founder Russ Solomon, a big personality with big dreams who became a staple in the music business. Featuring interviews with Solomon, various members of the former Tower Records executive team, Dave Grohl, Bruce Springsteen, Elton John, Geffen Records founder David Geffen, and Universal Music Group executive Jim Urie, among others, the documentary provides a comprehensive history of how the company started, flourished, and then filed for bankruptcy in 2006.

When the music industry experienced a catastrophic shift in the late 1990s that signified the end of record stores, the shift also meant the end of an extremely important era in music. After 50 years, our family business, Spec’s Music, was sold in 1998. Although a few stores scattered around Florida and Puerto Rico still maintained the Spec’s name, the soul of the company was gone because the people who built it were no longer in charge. Corporate ownership meant uniforms instead of the distinctive styles of the former music-loving employees, fixtures that focused on pop music only instead of a variety of genres, and an overall sense of the death of a place where people made memories. That being said, people still shopped there. But in December 2012, when the flagship Spec’s store closed its doors after 65 years, the age of “going to the record store to visit your friends” (thank you Cameron Crowe) was really over.

Established in 1960 in Sacramento, California, Tower Records’ beginnings were similar to Spec’s as they initially specialized in mostly non-music items that eventually turned into all records all the time. Once a retail powerhouse with almost 200 stores in 30 countries on five continents, Tower started as a small-town drugstore and morphed into a chain of retail stores recognized and revered all over the globe.

My family was raised in records stores, worked in record stores, and learned the value of customer service and the power of music of record stores, so when it ended it was tough on us. But time moves on and all these years later my parents and I live across the country in the mountains of Colorado and still run into former Spec’s customers. Additionally, former employees created a Facebook page for Spec’s where they share photos and memories and my mother and I go to the only record store in Eagle County every year to celebrate Record Store Day and the industry we loved.

Although Spec’s was a much smaller company than Tower, I felt like I was watching the history of my family’s business as interviewees talked about people starting as clerks and then moving up to managers and buyers, Solomon being adamant about not having a dress code for employees, and how Tower stores became social epicenters where people hung out for hours looking through records with their friends. Even Elton John said he shopped at there every Tuesday and that he “spent more money in Tower Records than any other human being.” One former employee said it best when she described Tower as a chain of independent record stores – meaning that the one you walked into felt like it was only one that existed because each store featured the individual flavor of the city and the people who worked there. Spec’s was the same way – there was nothing cookie cutter about those stores and the people who worked there were extremely knowledgable about, and genuinely loved, music.

Solomon was and still is a character and a brand all on his own, and was definitely the face of Tower throughout its existence. He went to NARM conventions, partied hard, and wanted his company to be the biggest retail record store chain in the world. As a result of his willingness to be the biggest and best, Tower expanded to Japan and became the first American company to open a retail store without a Japanese partner. Next was New York City, London, Singapore, Buenos Aires, and at its height Tower boasted 192 stores worldwide. But eventually the company began taking the same hits that Spec’s, and every other record store in America, did with big box stores selling CDs at cost and Napster giving music away for free. As we all know, ultimately digital music won and record stores shut down all over the country.

If you’re a music fan, or someone who ever spent time in a record store, watch All Things Must Pass because it will bring back memories of a time that should always be cherished. As Solomon explains in the film, “We were part of people’s lives because music was part of people’s lives.” Well said.

Laura

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Blog Archive

  • March 2023
  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • September 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • May 2010
  • April 2010
  • March 2010
  • February 2010
  • January 2010

Footer

Laura Lieff was named Colorado Mountain College’s 2017-2018 Part Time Staff Member of the Year for her work as a writing tutor and teaching assistant.
Laura Lieff was named Colorado Mountain College’s 2017-2018 Part Time Staff Member of the Year for her work as a writing tutor and teaching assistant.

Work With Me

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter
lieff-ink-logo_updated-2
  • About
  • Services
  • Words
  • Blog
  • Client List
  • Contact

Copyright © 2023 · PO Box 1228 Edwards CO 81632 · info@lauralieff.com