As Record Store Day approaches (it's this Saturday), Foursquare and real estate brokerage Redfin combined forces to create some interesting data on the top 10 U.S. cities for fans of record stores.
Milwaukee, whose vinyl shops I wrote about in February, clocks in at No. 5, below Portland and Chapel Hill, but above New York and Philly. Not bad.
The cities were ranked by most record shops per capita. For funsies, Redfin also worked out how many new vinyl LPs (at $20 each) you could buy with the money that equals the median price for a home in each city.
While today's New York Times noted that online music surpassed sales of LPs and CDs for the first time ever last year, Nielsen also tracked a nearly 52 percent increase in vinyl sales in 2014. So, recorded music pressed into PVC is definitely not dead.
Here are the top 10 cities on the list of Cities Keeping Vinyl Music Alive, in order:
The top three finishers in Milwaukee in terms of Foursquare ratings:
- Exclusive Company, 1669 N. Farwell Ave.
- Acme Records, 2341 S. Kinnickinnic Ave.
- Rush-Mor Records, 2635 S. Kinnickinnic Ave.
And, finally, some Redfin data:
- ZIP Code with the most record shops per capita: 53202 (interesting, considering two of the top three shops listed above are in Bay View)
- Median home price in 53202: $216,900, which equals 10,845 records (at $20 each)
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
