If you’re a hardcore LP record collector in the Lowcountry, you probably already know what’s coming up Saturday. If not, let us introduce you to Record Store Day before it kicks off on April 18.
Record Store Day is an annual celebration of independent record stores, built around exclusive vinyl releases, special reissues and in-store events that turn shops into gathering places for music fans.
It was conceived in 2007 by a group of independent record store owners and employees who were watching their businesses get squeezed by big-box retail and the rapid rise of digital music. The first official Record Store Day took place in 2008.
From the beginning, the goal was simple and practical: Bring people back into physical record stores, give independent retailers something unique to offer and create a direct bridge between artists, labels and listeners in a way that felt communal rather than transactional.
So this Saturday, record stores all over Charleston will open their doors at 8 a..m. to welcome dozens – if not hundreds – of people into the shops to check out exclusive releases and dig through the crates for old favorites.
This year’s list of exclusive Record Store Day releases has more than 350 titles, including albums by Bruce Springsteen, Paramore, The Cure, Fleetwood Mac, Olivia Dean and Madonna.
Places like Monster Music and Movies in West Ashley and Gray Cat Music in North Charleston are stocking up and staffing up for one of the busiest days of the year.
Monster Music will have a food truck and a sidewalk sale of discounted vinyl set up outside the store. Gray Cat will have discounted vinyl as well, along with fresh baked snacks and live acoustic blues from KC Rounsefell.
Record Store Day is a boon for brick-and-mortar stores every year because it brings in dozens of potential new customers.
“I’d say the mix of customers on Record Store Day is about 60% regular customers and 40% new people,” said the owner of Gray Cat Music, Drew Anderson, in a recent interview with the Charleston City Paper.
“People will be in town on a vacation or a work trip, and they’ll look up which stores are participating in Record Store Day, because they don’t want to miss out.”
“We had so many down years as the CD declined,” said Galen Hudson, the owner of Monster Music and Movies. “For anything to go up was a surprise. By year three, I thought there was no way it could get any bigger, and I was wrong about that.”
The renewed interest in vinyl started building in the early 2000s on a small, underground level. The movement was mostly made up of collectors and audiophiles who never fully abandoned the format and DJs looking for fresh beats.
In the late 2000s, labels began quietly pressing new releases on vinyl again, and sales numbers began to climb after decades of decline. Retailers said people were missing something physical that they could own in an age of all-digital music. There was also a segment of fans who simply bought albums as objects of art, framing the covers rather than playing the music.
In 2022, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), which tracks album sales, announced that LPs were outselling CDs annually. What had been a revival became a full-blown market trend, with yearly growth in vinyl sales becoming one of the most consistent bright spots in the music industry.
And Hudson said that none of that growth happens without Record Store Day.
“I think Record Story Day absolutely was the stimulus for the vinyl resurgence,” he said. “In 2007 when this began, very few record labels were pressing anything on vinyl. But as the event kept getting bigger every year, the vinyl resurgence got a boost. The vinyl renaissance would not have happened without Record Store Day.”
And after nearly 20 years, the big day still gets bigger each year for these Charleston music stores.
“I’ve been doing this for about 10 years, and every year it seems to get more popular,” Anderson said. “I have less customers who don’t know about it than who do. We’ll have a line waiting outside at 5am, and they’ll all know exactly what they want.”
MORE INFO: monstermusicsc.com and graycatmusic.com
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