There were other record stores in Grand Rapids. But this was my store.
There was a flyer taped to the glass—“Store closing, 40% off everything!”
MAXIMUM FIDELITY BY CARLY PLANK 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 22
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I could not keep myself from peering through the dusty glass of the windows at the front of the neon-green building in Fulton Street. Staring into the alarmingly uncluttered abyss, past the CLOSED sign and the diamond-shapes in the black metal grate pulled across the doorway, I thought back to the first time I walked the aisles of CDs and the boxes of vinyl beneath them. Why was I so sad? I could still buy music online, and there were other record stores in Grand Rapids. But this was my store, I felt comfortable here. We had a history. I had a sinking realization that the publically unheralded closing of my favorite record store represented everything that I fear in the world.
I sighed with relief as I completed my last exam of finals week and stepped out into the heavy air of summer. I was living on five hours of sleep stretched over the past 48 hours. Deliriously, I intended on driving home, almost running directly into the path of an oncoming car, but instead I turned and headed down Fulton Street towards the neon-green and purple record store. I liked the purple sign titled Beat Goes On. This time there was a flyer taped to the glass—“Store closing, 40% off everything!” A little bell rang as the door opened, sounding to me of an angel earning its wings. The owner, Mario Leon, greeted me from behind a desk in the corner, next to a turntable spinning the soul record playing on the speakers overhead. His frosty gray hair, trimmed beard, and dark, beady eyes denoted an aged innocence.
The store was like Christmas morning to me. The walls and ceiling were painted black and lined with rock and movie memorabilia, VHS tapes, and signed posters of Bruce Springsteen, Bonnie Raitt, Sonny and Cher, and Chaka Khan. I would discover that Leon had met Raitt and Khan, with Raitt dedicating her past two local concerts to him. “The story behind that? Go ask Leon,” said Grand Rapids Press reporter Rachael Recker in a 2009 article. She also reported that the store “will stay open for a few more days as the inventory is liquidated”. Leon cited digital music trading, illegal downloads, and the recession as influences on the store’s fate, which he believes may foreshadow that of the music industry. However, he found a way to keep his store in business until early November of 2012.