SMOKESTACK: HEY VINNY! IT’S BILLMAN FROM SMOKESTACK. WHAT ARE YOU UP TO TODAY? VINNY: “Right now? I am just doing some of my accounting from yesterday’s record fair and then I’m gonna be pricing some records.”
WHAT WAS THE RECORD FAIR YOU WERE AT YESTERDAY? “It was over in south Seattle, the South End Record Show at Clock Out Lounge. Kind of a small little affair, pretty much the same size as the record fair that’s coming up in Bremerton.”
YES! LET’S START THERE: CALLOW AVE RECORD FAIR DECEMBER 7 AT RIDGELINE. ARE YOU GONNA BE BRINGING IN SOME PEOPLE FROM OUT OF TOWN AS VENDORS? “Yeah… we’ve got people from all over the state. We’ve got some vendors coming in from Spokane. We’ve got people from Olympia coming in. We’ve got a few locals coming in who haven’t ever sold before, but they have big collections that they want to pair down. Then, we’ve got Bigfoot in Bremerton and C-Side from Port Orchard coming over to put up tables for some local clout.”
TELL ME MORE ABOUT BEATS N’ CATS… “I guess I’ll start with my vision from like five years ago… In about 2019/2020, my wife and I had moved to Japan. And my plan, when we came back, was to start the first record store in the Bremerton area. Then, while I was gone, three record stores popped up. Over those few years, I’d come back to visit every once in a while, and I would talk to Clint and Mandi at Bigfoot’s (House Of Vinyl in downtown Bremerton). And we got to be friends. And they were very encouraging…. because I got pretty disheartened. I didn’t want to saturate the market so-to-say. But Clint was extremely encouraging. He was pretty much of the ‘more-the-merrier’ mentality. He was pretty integral in getting me started. Just giving me advice, giving me some pointers on how to source records and where to go from there. My wife and I moved back in January of this year, and I had spent almost four years in Japan just buying records… When I got back, I pretty much hit the ground running, sold a few records to Clint to get started, and then, with his, I guess, blessing, I started doing some pop-ups.
“That had all gotten started because of Ridgeline Brewing… One of my friends, when I first moved back, told me about Ridgeline and how they have Turntable Tuesdays, where you bring your own records and spin them while you drink beer. So I thought: ‘That’s a pretty neat sounding community.’ I was just trying to find some more record enthusiasts and whatnot. I met with Jesse, the owner of Ridgeline, and I barely even had time to introduce myself and he said ‘You should do a pop up here, that would be great!’ My entire plan was to get to know him a little bit and gain his trust so-to-say… and then do a pop up. But he had no hesitation. And I was kind of floored, to be honest. Just how welcoming everybody had already been when I hadn’t even been here in a few years.
“So I just set to work… Jesse and I started doing some promotion. And a month later when I had my first pop up, almost 100 people showed up. Overwhelming support. I massively underestimated the want for another record store here. Then the PEX, the People’s Exchange on Callow, they also caught wind and got in touch with me to do another pop up there. I had some overwhelming positive experiences there too. So I owe a lot to the PEX, as well, for getting started, for that initial bump in believing in what I wanted to do. I just kind of fell in love, I guess, with the Callow scene…”
I LOVE THAT… IN A WORLD OF STUFF LIKE DISCOGS AND ONLINE RECORD SELLING, WHAT MAKES YOU WANT TO DO THESE PHYSICAL POP UPS? “It’s 100 percent the connection. I mean, yeah, you can buy whatever record you want. There’s a bunch of rare records that I’m looking for, that at the click of a button, sure, I could just buy it… But, almost every person that sells records feels this exact same way: It’s miles above selling online because you’re there for the community. You get to talk about the records. You get to talk about what you love. You get to show off your stuff.
“And from the buyers’ standpoint, there is almost nothing better in the world than going into a record store with almost no expectations… There’s no greater feeling than digging through thousands of records and finding that one record that you’ve been looking for, for years… where, like I said, you could buy it at the click of a button, but the hunt is a part of it. And building the network and the community that is around it. I’ve made so many great friends just in the last year at record fairs that even when I get my store open, I’m not gonna stop doing them, just because I love the community so much.”
IT SOUNDS LIKE YOU ARE STILL AIMING FOR A BRICK & MORTAR? “Yeah… actually, I signed my lease last week. So I’ve been extremely busy. It’s on Callow. Well, actually on Burwell. Right on the corner of Callow and Burwell. Right where the barber shop is, it’s right next to that.”
DUDE… THAT’S MASSIVE. CONGRATULATIONS! “Thanks, I really appreciate that. It’s been kind of overwhelming at some times already, but I’ve got a lot a head of me.”
AND YOU PROBABLY HAVE A LOT OF RECORDS IN FRONT OF YOU I’M GUESSING… HOW DO YOU GET ALL THOSE RECORDS BACK FROM JAPAN? “As I mentioned before, I had pretty severely underestimated the demand not only for just another record store in Bremerton but for Japanese records specifically. And Japanese artists. We had already made enough money that we were able to go back to Japan strictly just for buying records in July. That time, we bought about 300 cds and 300 records… We got them shipped to us on layaway. I got them last month, and they’re pretty much all sold already.
IS THE JAPENESE-CENTRIC STUFF STILL GONNA BE YOUR FOCUS EVEN WHEN YOU OPEN THE BRICK & MORTAR? “My goal is to be able to sustain two trips per year. I already have another trip booked for the end of January. I don’t have a solid date yet on my store opening. It’ll be mid-to-late February. But I’ll be going to Japan at the end of January through the beginning of February to restock and bring back a couple hundred records for the grand opening. Hopefully that’ll sustain me for the next six months or so. We’ll see, with the overhead, if I can sustain two trips per year or just one. I pretty much miss Japan so much that I just want an excuse to be able to go back. For me, my favorite thing in the world is just record shopping in Japan.
IS THAT SOMETHING YOU KNEW YOU WERE INTO BEFORE YOU WENT TO JAPAN? “I had been record collecting since I was a teenager. I had no idea about the Japanese record market. I knew about Japanese records, I knew like their general superiority, that they have the Obi Strips and all that. I didn’t know nearly the demand or the value… or just how much fun it would be. Japan is the second largest music market in the world behind the US, but they have a third of the US population. It’s pretty insane over there. They have a mentality where they don’t hoard their records. They buy a few records, listen to them for a couple years and then resell them. So all the record stores are priced to sell because they are always moving inventory because the buyers, the consumers, are also moving their own collections.”
IS YOUR COLLECTION STRICTLY JAPANESE MADE STUFF? OR IS THERE A WAY TO PUT IN TO WORDS WHAT YOUR COLLECTION LOOKS LIKE? “I try to be as accommodating to everybody as possible, which means diversifying as much as possible. As far as Japanese pressings go, I buy of course classic rock because those are the staples, but I also try to get 80s and 90s modern stuff. Japanese record stores are great for hip hop. It’s mostly American pressings, but it’s hard to find stuff. So I always make sure I stock up on hip hop. Even old soul records and old blues records, I like to find in Japan. Also, you can find a lot of Brazilian and West African records there that are harder to find here… As far as Japanese bands themselves go, I pretty much just have my finger to the pulse of what people like. People are really digging on City Pop right now which is late-70s to mid-80s, a weird amalgamation of disco, funk, boogie and pop all with a Japanese flair. It’s rare to find. The kids are really digging on it these days, so that’s what I sell the most of.”
SO YOU GOT THE KIDS COMING OUT… THAT’S DOPE. “I’ve got pretty much the entire age range. It’s very heartening to see how many kids, you know teenagers to young adults, are frequenting the record stores. Like, they just got a record player for Christmas or their parents’ got them a turntable and a few of their favorite bands, and now they are branching out. They actually want recommendations or they have some City Pop artists that they know of from YouTube… They’re between 16 and 20 years old. And when I was kid, that was not a thing. You know, nobody my age was listening to records.”
WHAT WAS YOUR STORY LIKE WHEN YOU WERE A TEENAGER? “I was actually born in Bremerton. Completely inconsequential. I grew up in Portland. But, umm, it wasn’t a good childhood. Very strict parents, restrictive parents. I wasn’t allowed to listen to anything other than christian or country music until my friend’s dad gifted me a turntable and some of his records. And, I don’t know, it must’ve hit my parents’ nostalgia button because they let me keep it. So my records just kind of became my escape. I could listen to whatever I wanted. That was kind of my little safe zone. We moved to Yakima. And there were no record stores in Yakima. But it was just kind of my dream to be surrounded by records my entire life. It was a pipe dream. There was no way, you know in 2005, that a record store was actually a viable option. But the years kind of gradually moving forward and my collection amassing and records coming back, and then, the community that I’m surrounded by… They’re so encouraging. They’re so welcoming. It’s just something that I can’t not be a part of now.”
WHAT BROUGHT YOU TO THIS AREA AND WHY THIS AREA TO OPEN A BRICK & MORTAR RECORD STORE? “My wife is an engineer at the shipyard. We own our house here, so we were always planning on moving back. We moved here in 2015 after college. I can’t explain exactly why, but I just immediately fell in love with Bremerton and so did my wife, Sydnee. We absolutely love it here. We’ve made so many amazing friends. The tight knit community, that I’ve mentioned of the small businesses is something that I had dreamt of being a part of for almost ten years now. When we moved to Japan, it kind of felt like my life was on hold until I could come back to Bremerton because it felt like home. Because of the community that I’ve grown to become a part of.”
WOULD YOU BE LOOKING TO DO ANY OF THESE POP UPS IN OTHER AREAS OF KITSAP? “I did a pop up in East Bremerton at Chaos Bay last month, and that was my first time branching out. Honestly, I was planning on doing the pop ups for another couple of years before opening a brick and mortar. But I had a friend/customer by the name of Chris who sent a message saying that his wife just moved out her art studio. So there was an open spot that he thought would be great for it. He gave me his leasing agent’s number. I called her up. We did a walk thru. It looked perfect. And the price was right. So I talked to my wife and we were just like, ‘We should probably just pull the trigger on this now, there’s no reason not to.’ I was planning on doing more pop ups… I was in talks with Slippery Pig about maybe doing one in Poulsbo. One in Gig Harbor and a couple of breweries in Tacoma. But that’s kind of grinding to a halt now with how busy I am, going for that grand opening. So I don’t know if I’ll be doing more pop ups, at all.
BUT YOU’LL STILL BE DOING THE RECORD FAIRS… Yes, The Callow Record Fair is shaping up to actually be pretty popular. A lot of people are asking about it. I’ve been doing a lot of promotion on the other side in Seattle because I’ve been doing that record fair every week for the last five weeks. So I’ve been handing out flyers and there’s been a lot of interest there.
THANKS FOR PUTTING YOUR FLYERS ON TELEPHONE POLES! I’M A BIG FAN OF THAT… (Laughs nervously): “Uh, I can’t be doing that anymore.”
OH NO, HOW COME? “Umm… Cause it’s illegal.”
WELL THANKS FOR DOING IT WHILE YOU COULD… “Actually most of my customers came in from flyers,. They just loved my stupid posters. I’ve found that people really respond to the stupid stuff…. I had some other dumb ideas that got nixed. I had to run them by wife to make sure that they weren’t too dumb… That was kind of one of my favorite parts too. I’m really gonna miss doing that. I’ll probably still do flyers like that but just on my instagram and in local businesses…
“I’m hoping to be able do the record fair annually. I think that would be a great Bremerton tradition. I don’t think Bremerton’s ever really had a record fair. Record fairs aren’t really that new of a concept, over the past ten years, they’ve exploded. As far as I can tell, Bremerton’s never had one. Bainbridge Island had one this year, Sequim had one this year, Port Townsend has one each year… We just figured: Why not Bremerton? Jesse and I did some asking around. There was a lot of interest, a lot of people seemed very excited about the prospect of it, so we decided to go for it… The space is big enough for eight vendors, just barely, but it’s a free space so can’t really ask for much better than that. Hopefully it will be good for the vendors, hopefully it will be good for the customers.”
I’VE GOT ONE OTHER QUESTION IN MIND, BUT IS THERE ANYTHING WE SHOULD KNOW OR THAT YOU WOULD WANT TO SHARE? “I guess, just keep an eye out on my instagram and Facebook for the grand opening date. I’m gonna have live music, a DJ probably…”
AREN’T YOU IN A BAND? “I am. Yeah. The Manholes. We’ve promoted on Smokestack a few times. It’s not a big enough space to have full bands to play unfortunately. So my band or any other full bands won’t be playing, but solo acts will be there… I don’t have anybody confirmed just yet.”
LET US KNOW WHEN YOU KNOW SO WE CAN GET IT OUT THROUGH OUR CHANNELS… “Appreciate that… Oh, one thing I do want to mention about my record store, because we’re called Beats N’ Cats, we’re going to be hopefully teaming up, I’m in talks right now with the Kitsap Humane Society about promoting an adoptable cat of the week or month, and showcasing some pets that are available at the Humane Society with some discounts at the store if you adopt a pet… Kind of doing work to help promote our local humane society. That will be a large goal for us.”
BEATS N’ CATS! AWESOME. THAT TOTALLY BEATS THE QUESTION I HAD IN MIND. I WAS JUST GONNA ASK HOW MANY RECORDS YOU HAVE IN YOUR COLLECTION? “Ahhh… Priced or total?”
TOTAL. “Oh gosh, five, six thousand… but I only have about 2,000 priced.”
WELP… BETTER GET BACK TO WORK THEN! “That’s pretty much my days. I’m trying to spend four or five hours working on the shop and then the rest of the day in my little office up here. I’ve got about 2,000 records in this room that I’ve gotta get cleaned and priced in the next few weeks…”
ALL THE LUCK, AND THANKS FOR TAKING SOME TIME OUT TO SHARE YOUR STORY WITH SMOKESTACK… // BILL MAN
CHECK OUT THE CALLOW AVE RECORD FAIR w/ eight vendors from around the state selling records, cds and other music media, a food truck, vinyl spinning all day and more. Free, all ages, 12-6 p.m., $2 early bird entry at 11 a.m., presented by Beats N’ Cats at Ridgeline Brewing, Bremerton.
AND KEEP A LOOK OUT FOR THE BEATS N’ CATS Grand Opening and more on the socials… @beatsncatsrecords
