Record Shop: Pure Pop Records – Burlington, VT

If you don’t mind uneven floors and weird basement smells, you’re bound to find treasure at Pure Pop Records. Wooden bins line the walls, with additional bins and bookcases scattered in the middle, making for quite the maze of music. Old posters of Nirvana and The White Stripes can be spotted on the walls between the gold ceiling and the dusty floor. Pure Pop is that classic record shop full of character, where signs are made by hand, stickers of local bands slapped about, and boxes of CDs, vinyl, and other items are stacked everywhere.

For the past 46 years, Pure Pop has been on the lowest floor of a brick building in downtown Burlington, Vermont. Established in 1980, the indie record store specializes in new and used vinyl and CDs. Most of the bins feature mostly alternative, pop, and rock spanning all sub-genres from indie rock to death metal. with smaller selections of blues, country, folk, hip-hop, jazz, reggae, soul, and world music. You can also find a small assortment of books and DVDs.

The long-running independent shop offers consignment deals to local artists, has ticket giveaways for concerts at local venues such as High Ground, and occasionally hosts in-store listening events, and has even hosted a few intimate live performances.

♪♪♪♪ New Section
♪♪♪ Used Section
♪♪ Tapes
♪♪♪♪ CDs
♪♪ Rare Collection
-♪ Apparel
♪ Novelties
♪ Patches, Pins & Posters