Label owners get into record store biz

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This article was published 21/07/2015 (4007 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Take a seat at the bar and enjoy a soda at the new record store in the West End.

Local record label Eat Em Up Records opened its first record shop at 466 Sherbrook St., on May 1. The two West End residents behind the venture, Jan Quackenbush and Brandon Ackerman, joined forces in 2012 to work on the label full-time and focus on seeing it grow, which eventually led to opening a record store.

“It’s a logical extension of running a record label if you are going to take it seriously,” Ackerman said. “It’s a really tough business, art in general but music, producing your own music, it’s hard to get it out there but if you have your own record store it gives you more avenues to trade around the world.”

While the first Eat Em up Records album came out in 2004, the label is now steadily releasing albums and promoting shows around the city on a monthly basis. The shop provides a glimpse of the label’s identity and the sort of rare, obscure punk and rock ’n’ roll music it aims to promote.

“We have a huge selection of compilations of rare ’60s music, late ’70s punk music as well as strange exotica albums and singles,” Ackerman said. “We may not have the Beatles record you are looking for but we have hundreds of other records from the ’60s that will blow your mind.”

Both Ackerman and Quackenbush have been collecting rare records and hard-to-come-by, weird goods, including books, cassettes and shirts, since they were young. Now they are happy to be able to sell those items.

While a portion of their new product is ordered in from Europe, they’ve travelled to the States to pick up other items, or contributed them from their personal collections. Ackerman said the idea was to create the store they would both want to go into in Winnipeg.  

“Every cool city has one underground rock  ’n’ roll record store that is just sort of that niche and I think that is the role we are trying to fill here,” Quackenbush said.

With a couple of bar stools lined up at the front and a fridge stocked with soda, the record store encourages customers to stay-awhile and enjoy the store. The two said the neighbourhood has been really receptive to the new shop and are seeing quite a few walk-ins.

The record shop is open Tuesday through Sunday from noon to 6 p.m. To find out more about Eat Em up Records, visit eatemuprecords.bandcamp.com/