Relevant Records in Cambridge attracts hundreds of visitors for Record Store Day
By Jacob Grattage
Relevant Record Shop and Café on Mill Road celebrated Record Store Day for the tenth year in a row, attracting hundreds of visitors on Saturday (12 April).
The celebration involves more than 300 independent record shops across the UK and is designed to champion the unique culture surrounding them.
Artists and labels release unique albums only available at the participating independent businesses.
This means that shops up and down the country see hundreds of visitors, who want to get their hands on new or rare releases.
Some dedicated fans are known to queue outside the shop days in advance, wanting to be the first inside.
Andy Powell is the co-owner of the Relevant Records and Café along with his wife Angie. He jokingly describes the shop as: “The best in Cambridge, if not the world”.
People had started queuing in front of their shop since four o’clock the previous morning, nearly 48 hours before the start of the event.
Andy said: “The first person was in the queue yesterday morning, I don’t know whether they slept, but they definitely stayed outside – I wasn’t monitoring them 24 hours a day, but there were definitely some overnighters.”
Andy said the annual celebration always draws a large number of people to the shop, especially new customers.
He said: “We will obviously have regulars who visit during the whole year – but on Record Store Day we do see people who we’ve never seen before.”
Being the only record store in Cambridge taking part this year, he said the event had boosted footfall.
He noted: “It might be because there’s more people aware of it now [Record Store Day] than there was previously.
“But it’s always been popular, and it’s always been a very busy day.”
He said the fastest-selling records were the ones aimed at younger audiences, with the likes of Taylor Swift, Charli XCX and Gracie Abrams releases selling out first.
Matt, a customer from Toft who had travelled to the shop with his young daughters, said that the celebration should be for people of all ages.
He said: “My daughters’ generation are just getting into vinyl, and all these young artists coming up are just fantastic to listen to, and they love their music.”
It was not their first time celebrating as a family. A few years ago they had camped outside the shop from the early hours of the morning.
Matt said: “It was alright, It wasn’t cold or wet – we had bought some camp chairs and sat under the bus stop, so we had a bit of shelter.
“We were about 39th or 40th in the queue, and that was at three o’clock in the morning.”
The event had drawn in new participants to the celebration thanks to the release of rare or previously unreleased music.
Harry, a local record collector, said the exclusive releases attracted him the most.
He said: “The only stuff we went in for was the Record Store Day releases, some of this has never ever been released – which is insane.”
Another customer was Jack, who had visited Cambridge from London. Although already an avid collector, he had never experienced a Record Store Day before.
He said: “We didn’t know about Record Store Day, we were really happy to have found the shop – it was really cool and they were really busy.
“It seemed like everyone was having a good time.”
For more on Record Store Day, go to recordstoreday.co.uk.
