Fats Beats started back in 1994 in New York and have opened stores in L.A, Amsterdam and Tokyo. If you're a fan of Hip Hop then this was one of those stores that you had to go to if you were in one of these cities. In 1998 I too tried visit Fat Beats to buy somes tunes and place some copies of Rago Magazine and Wolftown snippet tapes in there.
BUT somebody called LATE gave me and my sis the wrong address and we ended up going to some unsavoury neck of the woods in Manhattan that looked like scenes from Starsky and Hutch!! We walked past this garage about 3 times, by then the workers there must have thought what the hell are these 2 tourists doing down here!! After nearly getting run over and me and my sister nearly coming to blows we called it a day...sad to say we never found Fat Beats. Somehow we found a cool grafitti clothing shop and then ended up in Canal Street..home of cheapo fakes!
Fat Beats was the place to be and get all the latest underground releases you could see artists performing in there as well as buying records!! With this new download revolution many independent record shops throughout the world have closed down. We can all say this is a shame that records shops all over are closing but ask yourself this..."When was the last time you went out a bought an album, single or E.P?" So in a way we have done this to part of our culture. I for one will put up my hand and say that I don't buy as much music as i used to BUT if i see a record shop somewhere I always have to go in and have a mooch and gauranteed I'll come out with something!!
Fat Beats closes it's door in New York on September 4th and in L.A on September 18th. Although you'll be able to shop online at http://www.fatbeats.com/ it's not quite the same. R.I.P Fat Beats!!
