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In which the neighborhood changes
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2008 07:44 pmWe have a Tradition here at the Confusion Factory. Every Yuletide, often on the Solstice, sometimes as late as Christmas Eve, Steve and I go together or meet at the Music Gallery in downtown Waterville and buy music to tide us over the holiday. How much music we buy depends on how much funding is available. The Rule is that we buy Holiday Music from green in hand. Some years, that's meant we've each chosen one CD, sometimes it's meant we've carried home twenty. Such is the life of the freelance writer.
This Tradition has spanned fifteen years or more. We've known Bruce, the owner, since he opened the store in the basement spot that's now ReBooks, underneath our friend Ellen's bookshop, Children's Book Cellar, which was...a pet store, I think, back in the day. Bruce relocated to more visible, second-floor digs, renting from Sign of the Sun, plugged in to the local music scene, such as it is in Waterville, and turned us, and others, on to some really fine home-grown artists, as well as jazz and blues artists from every-dern-where.
Bruce called Steve today while I was at work. It is, you will apprehend, the day before Christmas Eve and the second day after the Solstice. He knew our Tradition, having participated in it for so many years, and he wanted to be sure that we knew that...
...he was going to be closing the store on January 15.
June, he said, when we talked to him this evening, was the worst month his store has had...ever. July and August weren't much better. Then came October and the Official Economic Meltdown. He ran the numbers and realized that he was pouring money down a hole.
He'll be taking the business online, he says. He's got old vinyl, still factory sealed. He's got some other treasures, that he hopes will pull him through.
I hate this.
Anyhow, the Tradition. This year, we picked up Gordon Bok in concert, Willie Nelson and Wynton Marsalis, an anthology of sea shanties, a Michael Hedges best-of, and the second album from a local guy named F.B White. Last time for that Tradition.
Well. We exchanged email addresses. Told each other we'd keep in touch.
And, hey...Johnny Winter's going to be at the Skowhegan Opera House on Valentine's Day. Who would've known that, except Bruce?
This Tradition has spanned fifteen years or more. We've known Bruce, the owner, since he opened the store in the basement spot that's now ReBooks, underneath our friend Ellen's bookshop, Children's Book Cellar, which was...a pet store, I think, back in the day. Bruce relocated to more visible, second-floor digs, renting from Sign of the Sun, plugged in to the local music scene, such as it is in Waterville, and turned us, and others, on to some really fine home-grown artists, as well as jazz and blues artists from every-dern-where.
Bruce called Steve today while I was at work. It is, you will apprehend, the day before Christmas Eve and the second day after the Solstice. He knew our Tradition, having participated in it for so many years, and he wanted to be sure that we knew that...
...he was going to be closing the store on January 15.
June, he said, when we talked to him this evening, was the worst month his store has had...ever. July and August weren't much better. Then came October and the Official Economic Meltdown. He ran the numbers and realized that he was pouring money down a hole.
He'll be taking the business online, he says. He's got old vinyl, still factory sealed. He's got some other treasures, that he hopes will pull him through.
I hate this.
Anyhow, the Tradition. This year, we picked up Gordon Bok in concert, Willie Nelson and Wynton Marsalis, an anthology of sea shanties, a Michael Hedges best-of, and the second album from a local guy named F.B White. Last time for that Tradition.
Well. We exchanged email addresses. Told each other we'd keep in touch.
And, hey...Johnny Winter's going to be at the Skowhegan Opera House on Valentine's Day. Who would've known that, except Bruce?
