Here is a taste of the tail end of the glory era of Memphis music...the late '70s. Check out this Billboard magazine from January 1978...it's got it all for Memphis music fans! Quotes from Sam Phillips about Paul Ackerman; tons of hype & advertisements on power-pop should-have-beens the Scruffs and Power Play Records; a great mention about how Memphis vice-squad cops were checking out the Sex Pistols in Atlanta in advance of their Memphis show; tons of great articles on the burgeoning new wave scene, new wave bands, new wave records and imports (JEM!!!); but, most importantly, a great article on Memphis' best record chain of all time, Pop Tunes. I think the photo in the article is from inside the Summer Ave. Pop Tunes, where I bought my 1st 45 around this time, C.W. McCall's "Convoy," and where I waited in line with various Raleigh/Frayser stoners for most of my teenage concert tickets (Cheap Trick/Kansas/Foghat/Aerosmith/etc). Be sure to read the whole article about the ridiculous way customers had to purchase records at Pop Tunes. Their methodology was similar to the way Service Merchandise sold vacuum cleaners or the way hard-working homesteaders bought sugar, meal, and other staples from Mr. Olson's Mercantile in Little House on the Prairie.
It's hard to believe Pop Tunes lasted as long as it did with this method--from 1945 to 2009. It was sad to see this legendary Memphis record retailer/wholesaler whimper away so ignominiously in 2009, but at least the downtown Pop Tunes' sign is slated to end up in a museum unlike the gorgeous Summer Ave. sign, which was destroyed by morons who took over the property about 10 or so years after the damn thing wasrestored to its splendor for Pop Tune's 50th anniversary in 1995.
P.S. The Taliesyn Ballroom where the Sex Pistols played is now aTaco Bell & the original Shirley's Poplar Tunes, started in 1945, is soon to be a sandwich shop. Yum.
(Photo Jim Shearin, courtesy of the Commercial Appeal)
It's hard to believe Pop Tunes lasted as long as it did with this method--from 1945 to 2009. It was sad to see this legendary Memphis record retailer/wholesaler whimper away so ignominiously in 2009, but at least the downtown Pop Tunes' sign is slated to end up in a museum unlike the gorgeous Summer Ave. sign, which was destroyed by morons who took over the property about 10 or so years after the damn thing wasrestored to its splendor for Pop Tune's 50th anniversary in 1995.
P.S. The Taliesyn Ballroom where the Sex Pistols played is now aTaco Bell & the original Shirley's Poplar Tunes, started in 1945, is soon to be a sandwich shop. Yum.
(Photo Jim Shearin, courtesy of the Commercial Appeal)
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