The new Brooklyn Record Exchange at 599 Johnson Ave., Co-Op 87 records in Greenpoint is in the process of relaunching as a second BRE location (image courtesy of BRE)
A pair of vinyl record stores from the founders of Greenpoint’s Co-Op 87 (87 Guernsey st.) and the indie record label Mexican Summer are set to debut.
The Co-Op 87 space has been operating under reduced hours and will re-brand and relaunch as the “Brooklyn Record Exchange” sometime this spring. Meanwhile, the Brooklyn Record Exchanges’ first location will open this weekend on the second floor inside the same complex that is home to the live music venue Elsewhere (599 Johnson Ave.) in E. Williamsburg.
Bedford and Bowery caught up with Ben Steidel of Co-Op 87 who explained the new E. Williamsburg shop is “just a larger version of what we were aiming to do at Co-Op, with room to do all the things we wanted to do there.”
BRE at 599 Johnson Ave. (courtesy of BRE)
Greenpoint is home to many record stores including Captured Tracks (195 Calyer St.), The Record Grouch (986 Manhattan Ave.), Academy Records (85 Oak St.), The Thing (1001 Manhattan Ave.), and even more vinyl stores are located just across the Williamsburg/Greenpoint border including Rough Trade Records (64 N. 9th St.) and Earwax Records (167 N. 9th St). Continue reading →
This week Greenpoint-based record label Stars & Letters‘ Mark Roberts pulls together a very borough-centric mix. It represents other BK labels including Triangle Records, Secretly Canadian, Ceremony Records, Ghostly International, Mexican Summer, Captured Tracks and Sacred Bones. All one for and one for all! Ready to get real on the camaraderie?
Following my previous post on the first night of Greenpoint record label Mexican Summer‘s five-year anniversary festival in October, here is a concluding report on the second half of the fest. It took place at Pioneer Works in Red Hook on Saturday, October 12th, from afternoon well into the night. I regrettably missed early performers Soldiers of Fortune, Weyes Blood, Quilt, and Linda Perhacs – regrets made much worse by hearing the room still buzzing about the latter as I arrived. Our photographer Gus Ponce said Linda Perhacs’ music reminded him of psychedelic church hymns (and luckily captured a great photo, below). Another friend in the crowd later speculated, “I wonder what you dream about, Linda Perhacs.” Mexican Summer reissued Perhacs’ absolutely gorgeous 1970 album Parallelograms, more info here. Continue reading →
The crowd filling in at Pioneer Works - (c) Gustavo Ponce
On October 11th and 12th, Greenpoint record label Mexican Summer celebrated its five-year anniversary with a weekend-long festival at Pioneer Works in Red Hook. We were lucky enough to be there to celebrate with them and sample seventeen (yes, count ’em, seventeen!) astounding acts from their roster. A review of the first day follows. And as a special bonus, before we set foot at the festival we asked co-founder/label manager Keith Abrahamsson to share the label’s history and some favorite things about being located in Greenpoint. Here’s what Keith had to say:
Around six months ago I saw diamond plate going up on a renovated wall at 195 Calyer street, just east of Manhattan avenue. I wrote it off at the time as simply the ugliest siding I had yet seen in a neighborhood that knows its ugly siding.
Katie Garcia, general manager at Captured Tracks records, swears that while their wooden sign may hang over it the label had nothing to do with the diamond plate. Seeing the shop and offices a few steps below it – a bit more tasteful on the whole – I’m inclined to believe her. Continue reading →
