A-1 Records: Inside The Vinyl Vault


Face masks are a must.   One of the world’s premier vinyl spots, A-1 Records opens the doors to its basement archives to reveal some of the never before seen stacks of music treasure.

The store’s vinyl specialists explain the significance of A-1 Records within NYC and tell tales of encountering producers, crate diggers, and music fiends such as Lord Finesse, Mel-Man, and John Frusciante of the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

734 thoughts on “A-1 Records: Inside The Vinyl Vault”

    • First off I respect A-1 and what’s going on there. Shit I wish I lived next door. Matter of fact I wish I worked there.
      But I’m not sure what the point of taking about how “crazy” Alphabet city was back in the day when A-1 didn’t even exist. Typcially hipster protocol I guess. I guess it supposed to make it more authentic. As for New York being a city of immigrants. Yea it was, but I don’t know what working people or even middle class that can afford to live reasonable in that city now never mind immigrants. Those days are long gone. You are right about NYC being American, overpriced and commercial as it gets. Lets at least be real about that.

  1. @ cal . do it for the love ! i seen too many people quit cause they weren’t makin money and dealt with alot of fake people too. the fake people gonna always be there and the money might not ever come but that nice beat you can make that will make the hair stand up on the back of your neck is what should be just as motivating ! they said i was shit and im still here lol
    I bought my daughter a drum set for christmas ‘and a keyboard this year ‘ if i never get in maybe she has time to be a lil aleshia keys or something. either way she has an advantage cause i never saw anybody doin this shit till i was in my early 20’s . at 30 they say your bret farve in this game ‘ either way im gonna keep goin.if charlie wilson can keep touring at 60 why should i quit because we make two different genre’s of music . no way !

    • I’ve met enough fakes outside of music Tony…but on the real I feel ya, brought my boy a drumset for Christmas, he’s two.

  2. Been there mad times…used to go to IAR a couple blocks away and walk there pretty much everyday after school to dig… what a great spot….. pretty reasonable prices too

  3. I hope you guys DO KNOW that y’ll live in vinyl paradise! Not just N.Y.C…..
    The whole USA is just a totally insane vinyl digging dream come true…
    Tons of wax and cheap as f***….

  4. @ maggot brain ..if you can’t get there then the thrift stores is a good place to look too ! might take a while to build up a few shelves worth of records but if your a consistent digger you can find quite a few gems there too ! you can even get a few crates at the pawnshop . a dollar a record u cant beat it ! i go looking once about every 2 weeks. i know i dont sample too often but im slowly doin my thing. i usto think sampling could be be taught but i found out its more like a practice makes perfect kinda thing. but you guys are pros at it so you already know’ making a perfect 2 bar loop fit in a song im making takes me 2 hours to find the right tempo ” pitch ” timestretch damn lol so i started taking small small pieces and load it into my sampler fuck it

  5. @ tony traxx
    THX for your advice but I am not from the US…
    I am digging in old europe and I know where to look for cheap records.
    And you definitely can find lots of dope records over here.
    I just wanted to say that you guys are really lucky because you got an unbelievable amount of wax in the US to look for…and you got a greater chance to find it for next to nothing….I was on holiday in the US and Canada and I was just going mad…Could have bought a truckload but could only keep the essential ones because of the weight limit on my flight back…I did take more than was allowed with me already…

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