The city of record stores never fails to impress me. That really is the best way to describe Portland, Oregon. I’ve talked about my visits to more than 10 record stores in Portland, which isn’t even half of the stores in the city limits. If you include the suburbs, there’s easily another half dozen more. But hey, I’m not complaining. Variety Records in SE Portland is another one of the many, many shops that make Portland such a great city for vinyl.
What to Expect from Variety Records
Variety Records is, at its core, a used record store. Dare I say, it is the epitome of a used record store. Thousands of records are here waiting for you to dig through them. Many of the records here, if not most, are priced below $15. This isn’t the kind of place that is picky when people bring in boxes of grandma’s old records to sell. If it spins and isn’t too egregiously damaged, you will likely find it here.
As far as what to expect, expect to spend a whole lot of time digging. This isn’t the type of place that you enter when you are low on time or looking for something specific. There are plenty of record stores that fit that description in Portland. This is where you come because you record shopping as much as you love records.
Selection
This shop has a fair amount of all the standard record store genres, with a heavy slant towards older records. Pretty much all the stock here is vinyl pressed 20 or more years ago, so don’t expect to find much contemporary music. Some more recent records have wormed their way in, but they are few and far between. Naturally, this means there’s lots of rock and country, not much hip-hop, rap, or electronic music, and plenty of presidential speeches and other spoken-word relics.
If you want to pad your collection with a bunch of records that are easy to throw on so you have some background tunes while you clean the house, this is a great place to get it. You’ll find lots of seasoned collectors here browsing the bins but don’t expect to come up on anything particularly rare or sought after.
Pricing
This is what I would call a “discount” record. All of the stock is used and many of it is pretty well-loved. However, it is all priced accordingly. Similar to another used record store in SE Portland, Dig Vinyl, a significant portion of the records at this shop are under $10. Walk in on a whim and walk out with a stack of records for less than $20 kind of place.
My Take on Variety Records
There are so many record stores in Portland that it borders on ridiculous. Variety Records is a great shop if you are into serious crate digging and miss the days when thrift stores actually had a good selection of cheap records. If you are particularly nit-picky with the records you buy or are on the hunt for something specific, this might not be the shop you’re looking for. For that, I would think Music Millennium or Everyday Music might be more your speed. If you’re into crated digging this is a great place to spend an afternoon.
Records Purchased
Marty’s Greatest Hits- Marty Robbins