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By lylehsaxon (Thu Dec 21, 2006 at 05:06:07 PM EST) (all tags)
About the time I left the Sacramento area (in California), I found out that the original Tower Records store was from - Sacramento!  It was a surprising discovery, because Sacramento is mainly a sleepy retirement town with a lot of shopping malls more than anything... [light bulbs going off...].  Ah... but of course - a shopping town gives birth to a retail store.  Well, that's shocking news!  Anyway, I was surprised at the time since I didn't think of the town as being a leader in anything.

Then when I jetted over to Tokyo from San Francisco, there were very few foreign things here of any kind.  Few foreign stores, few foreign cars, few foreign manufactured odds & ends, and few foreign bipeds.  Then....


Then the value of the yen more than doubled over a period of months, and everything changed.  Among the changes was the coming of foreign stores, including Tower Records.  Visiting their Shibuya store (which occupies all of an eight story building), felt a little like revisiting California.

2006... I hear that Tower Records is going bankrupt!  "What?!" I cried in dismay to the bearer of this unwelcome news, to which I was told that the Japan operation is independent from the US operation, is doing okay, and will stay open.

Relief and wonder!  I don't buy a lot of CDs, but when I do buy one, I get it at Tower Records, so I'm glad they're staying open.  Nevertheless, it feels a little weird that this store that began in Sacramento, of all places (my old home town before San Francisco), is vanishing from the land of its origins and is only living on in Japan!  Why is that?  Is it that they're just selling more records in the absence of a certain large and disruptive discount superstore?  I don't know what the details are exactly, but in any case I'm glad Tower Records is still here in Tokyo!

Lyle (Hiroshi) Saxon
http://www5d.biglobe.ne.jp/~LLLtrs/

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"Tower Records in Tokyo" | 4 comments (4 topical, 0 hidden) | Trackback
Wow, tower records in sac... by LinDze (2.00 / 0) #1 Thu Dec 21, 2006 at 07:47:36 PM EST
I remember going to their gigantor store out at Watt & El Camino every other tues.

Our primary mission was actually next door at the bowling alley. They had a pretty sweet multi story Lazer Tag setup in there. After a while we got to know the kids who ran the place and they would play whatever CDs we brought in. So wed get there early head over to Tower, pick up 2 or 3 CDs, and then proceed to RTFO at Lazer Tag to the new tunes.

I also seem to recall a few adventures at the drive through porn store further down by Marconi...

-Lin Dze
Arbeit Macht Frei


Old Fair Oaks... by lylehsaxon (2.00 / 0) #3 Sat Dec 30, 2006 at 08:44:09 PM EST
Say - do you ever go to Old Fair Oaks?  I used to live a two minute walk from the bluff overlooking the river there - and go for walks in the middle of the night (with a German Shepard dog making me bold) along the river, crossing that old steel bridge and a couple of times having to endure the smell of the dog when it stupidly tried to catch a skunk in the woods along the river....

Those midnight walks were great for thinking!  I would surely conquer the world with my newfound midnight wisdom I often thought.....

Lyle
The shortest way home is the longest way 'round....
[ Parent ]

Cant say that I do by LinDze (2.00 / 0) #4 Sun Dec 31, 2006 at 10:08:25 PM EST
I live down on the coast now, south of the bay area. Probably been 6 or 7 years since ive walked around that area.

-Lin Dze
Arbeit Macht Frei
[ Parent ]

Tower.. by sasquatchan (2.00 / 0) #2 Fri Dec 22, 2006 at 09:34:12 AM EST
A family friend-of-a-friend (FOF) used to work there. A bitter cranky non-customer friendly kinda person. Was almost triumphant that they were closing.. Go figure. But she, like the family she's friends with, all buy everything on-line. Their comments being "why pay $18 at tower when Amazon carries it for $12"..

There's truth to that, but that's also what's lead to the wall-mart-ization of America.



"Tower Records in Tokyo" | 4 comments (4 topical, 0 hidden) | Trackback

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