Robert Baird

Much as shopping for records in Paris or Berlin or London sounds magical, a recurrent dream of stores stuffed with rare records at bargain prices and new stuff that’s never jumped across the pond, New York City is and may always be the record shopping capital of the world. How did Mr. Berry put it: “Anything you want we got it right here in the USA.”

New York’s preeminence as the place to search for old and new vinyl, (or CDs from any era if that’s your thing), was brought home to me last weekend when after a tasty brunch at the venerable Hope & Anchor bistro/joint, and before descending into the final and most painful ring of hell which is IKEA on a Saturday afternoon, my wife and I strolled past 360 Van Brunt Street, i.e. on the main drag of Red Hook such as it is, and there I stumbled upon an acquaintance, Bene Coopersmith (pronounced Benny) who’d opened a new record store.

A long time Sunday fixture at Fifth Avenue Record and Tape Center, one of the oldest and craziest record stores in NYC, Coopersmith hasn’t quite picked a name for his new place—a local newspaper article mentioned “Swoopys Groove Palace” but Coopersmith laughs and waves me off when asked about that particular handle. A carpenter among his many other skills, Coopersmith has fixed up 360 with a skylight and new plank wood floors. A pair of turntables lurk just inside the front window. The space itself has quite a history having been the site of a popular restaurant called 360 (closed in 2007), a onetime home for spinning classes and even a saxophone repair shop.

Whether Bene will make a go of it will depend, like everything else in Red Hook, on the B61 bus, which other than owning a car, is the only way in or out of the neighborhood. While I only shopped for a moment—wife waiting patiently outside—it seemed like he had the beginnings of a respectable collection. An in-the-shrink, M- copy of U2’s Unforgettable Fire was $6 and a copy of Rufus Harley’s Bagpipe Blues, which is profoundly strange stuff if you don’t know it, also in VG++ shape, was $8. So far, the quality versus price equation seems to be working about right. Added into the mass of record stores in Greenpoint, a few survivors in pricey Williamsburg and a handful scattered across Carroll Gardens, Park Slope and that center of all things hipster, Bushwick, it may now be more accurate to say that Brooklyn, New York is the record shopping capital of the world? Best of luck Bene!