my name is mwd

Poor Laura today accidentally dropped a bomb shell on me whilst we were heading into work, assuming I knew. Alas, I was blissfully ignorant until that moment. The news? Fopp, the record shop that saw me through my student days, is no more.

From the Fopp website:

It is with great regret that we announce the closure of Fopp.

Our store chain is profitable, well regarded and loved by our loyal customers and staff. However we have failed to gain the necessary support from major stakeholders, suppliers and their credit insurers to generate sufficient working capital to run our expanding business.

We would like to thank staff and customers for their support over the past 25 years.

A sad day indeed.

Those that know me will know I’m a bit of an amateur muso – not quite armed with Jon’s encyclopedic knowledge on the topic, but I’m an avid fan of most forms of music, with the exception of canned record company nonsense that makes up a lot of the current charts. I really get a thrill out of hearing new music, and of finding new music to listen to. Finding something fresh to me, particularly in album form, be it old or new, and those first few listens, is something I take great enjoyment from. Part of this process is finding random things, which is a service that Amazon and iTunes Music Store, as wonderful as they are, just can’t substitute. There’s other high street stores of course, like HMV and Virgin, but their range is less eclectic and enticing. For small towns like Cambridge, where the range of alternative vendors when compared to towns like Glasgow, the loss of Fopp is most frustrating.