Originally Posted by Trollheart

Second hand shops used to be a great way to fill in gaps in your collection, or buy new music. There was one called Freebird (originally accessed via a winding staircase up, where local lads would slouch against the wall and ask for money, then later they relocated, ironically, to a basement, so you still had to use stairs, but this time down. No seekers after loose change though, as it was in a better part of town). Basement X was another one, a real basement, so dark you felt like you were going into like Santa's Grotto or something (hey I was young and didn't have that many references for dark places) - quite intimidating but also friendly. Best part about those shops was you could browse literally for hours and nobody would bother you with "can I help you", translation: "buy something or get the **** out, this isn't a library."

Also cool that they would, if you asked and they were in a good mood, preview a record for you, play it on their system, and even if you didn't like it and decided not to buy it, you got no hassle. I miss those shops. You could go in with about twenty quid and come back out with zero cash but a bag of maybe forty to fifty records. Sweet. And of course later if you needed money you could sell yours to them. They were a lot more picky about that though, and you got next to nothing for them, so it wasn't a road I went down much at all.