ROCHESTER — Once thought to be a relic of the past, vinyl records have become increasingly popular with a younger crowd over the past few years as popular artists like Taylor Swift are releasing their new hits on the older medium.
Hussein “Huss” Esmailzadeh has owned and operated Rochester Records since 2016. Each year he sees more and more customers interested in vinyl old and new. He keeps a large stock of items in store, some new but most have been donated by customers and community members.
“I’d say that 40 and younger is really what’s driving the market,” said Esmailzadeh. “I mean, there’s a lot of us old timers that still collect but, it’s these young kids. Taylor Swift, they gotta have every different version of the album. So, that’s a big thing. Colored vinyl and stuff is big.”
Swift’s most recent album, “1989 (Taylor’s Version),” has five variants. Each version is a different color — Tangerine, Crystal Skies Blue, Sunrise Boulevard Yellow, Aquamarine Green, and Rose Garden Pink.
Swift’s last album that wasn’t a rerelease of old music, “Midnights,” also had multiple versions. When the backs of four of those variants were displayed together, they created a clock.
“You get a piece of art but with streaming what do you get here?” said Esmailzadeh. “You can put this up on your wall and you got a picture, so I think that has a lot to do with it coming back.”
“Midnights” was the top-selling record of 2022 with 945,000 copies sold, according to Billboard Magazine. Last year marked the 17th consecutive year that vinyl has seen an increase in sales. Music Week reported in October that vinyl sales have increased by “13.2% year-on-year” since the start of 2023 with nearly 4 million vinyl LPs sold from January through September.
“The last three years, four years vinyl started really skyrocketing,” said Esmailzadeh. “I know last year was the first year since ’87 that vinyl outsold CDs.”
Cassette tapes are also making a return. Esmailzadeh believes this could be due to Guardians of the Galaxy’s use of the Walkman. Even Swift put her new album on cassette for fans to enjoy.
Another reason for vinyl making its return is the sound. Vinyl records have a warmth and fullness to them that is often lost when put onto a CD or online streaming service.
“In reality when you go digital, like a CD, you only have so much space that you have for music to exist in, where an analog signal can be bigger,” said Esmailzadeh. “So they have to compress that down and it loses some of the ‘fullness’ of that song.”
Rochester Records has about 25,000 to 30,000 different records in the front of the store and another 200,000 in storage. Esmailzadeh makes sure to keep popular albums stocked, but the buying industry has changed with the times.
“It’s a gamble, because you can’t return them,” said Esmailzadeh. “Once you buy them, they’re yours. Back in the old days, they sent you a box and whatever you don’t sell got sent back. Then they would put a little cut on the record so that they know that it’s a used record, not a used record but it was already sold.”
Rochester Records is one of three record stores in Rochester. Hidden World Vinyl Records on 6th Avenue Northwest and Treedome on South Broadway also serve the city’s vinyl records enthusiasts.
Esmailzadeh has to be very selective when it comes to new inventory. He has some new albums in the back of the shop that didn’t sell as well as he liked and some artists sell as soon as they are on display. He also keeps higher demand and unique records in the shop.
“I purchased the sealed original Nirvana ‘Nevermind’ vinyl for $500 and this was about four years ago,” said Esmailzadeh. “I was gonna keep it myself, but I put $850, thinking that was some stupid money. It wasn’t there for a week and somebody came and bought it. I looked it up just recently and it’s close to $2,000. That’s the value of everything going up and it’s not inflation. It’s just everybody wants this now.”
Joe Ahlquist / Post Bulletin
Joe Ahlquist / Post Bulletin
Joe Ahlquist / Post Bulletin
Joe Ahlquist / Post Bulletin
Sara Guymon is a Post Bulletin business reporter. Guymon grew up in New Ulm, Minnesota. She graduated from New Ulm Public High School and went on to attend college at the University of Minnesota Duluth. While at UMD, Guymon pursued a major in journalism and a double minor in photography and international studies. Prior to coming to the Post Bulletin, she worked as a staff writer for the Brainerd Dispatch. There she covered the City of Baxter and business.
