Even though vinyl started its comeback in earnest about 10 years ago, not a lot of people I know own record players. iPods? Yes. Turntables? Uh-uh. Flipping through crates upon crates of albums at the recently opened Doc’s Records & Vintage on the West Side last week, however, I started to long for my old Panasonic hi-fi.
Check out some of the gold I found: Devo’s New Traditionalists for a measly $12; 2 Live (“Mutha-fuckin'”) Crew’s Move Somethin’: $10; King Crimson’s In the Court of the Crimson King: $12; Giorgio Moroder’s Cat People soundtrack: $5; The Grateful Dead’s Workingman’s Dead: $8; the list goes on. At least I know enough turntable-equipped people to take solace in the fact that I can buy them stuff. Vinyl, though, is only one facet of Doc’s business (albeit a large one). Inside the 3,000-square-foot space are vintage posters (Tom Selleck as Magnum P.I., the badass cover of Iron Maiden’s badass “Trooper” 45, A Clockwork Orange), vintage clothing (cowboy boots, platform heels, dresses), vintage and non-vintage t-shirts (there’s a righteous Three Stooges t going for five bones that reads “Chaos. Panic. Disorder. My work here is done.“), books (everything from The Portrait of a Lady to How to Make ESP Work for You), CDs (Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, The Stooges), and action figures (Arnold Palmer, NASCAR Barbie). Doc’s opened last month about two weeks after closing its original spot in Hurst, where the store was located for about two and a half years. Fort Worth was a natural choice for Doc’s second incarnation, according to Jenkins Boyd, who co-owns the store with his father, Jerry Boyd. “There aren’t any good record stores here, and we want to give people a good place to buy records other than Half-Price Books.” Doc’s also has some vinyl on consignment at the nearby Montgomery Street Antique Mall (2601 Montgomery St., 817-735-9685). Father and son got into the business by collecting records and going to record conventions “for a long time,” said Jenkins, who noted that he and his father still attend about three cons per year. The duo buys material but is “very picky,” said Jenkins. (Don’t offer traditional gospel or big band. “They just don’t sell,” he said.) The place has several record players for sale but doesn’t do repairs. Word of mouth and street traffic are driving business currently, according to Jenkins. On the day that I visited, just about all 15 parking spaces out front were full. Jenkins said that in-store performances are in the works. Visit 2111 Montgomery St. (wouldn’t it have been killer if the address were 2112?!) or call 817-732-5455. … The Metrognome Collective is once again doing its part to enhance the improvisational avant-rock scene in Fort Worth, you lousy bums, by hosting a show on Saturday by Hentai Improvising Orchestra (featuring members of The Great Tyrant, Zanzibar Snails, and Jin Men Ju, among others), Yanari, and PFF(F)T! (featuring members of Stoogeaphilia, Ghostcar, and The Underground Railroad). The show is at the Metrognome’s base of operations, the Firehouse Gallery (4147 Meadowbrook Dr.), and starts at 9 p.m. $5 donation. The show follows an opening reception (starting at 7 p.m.) for photography artist Rene West. Visit www.metrognome.org.
Contact HearSay at hearsay@fwweekly.com.
