Vinyl Destination Reptilian Records Closes It Doors, But Chris X Continues On ..
Reptilian Records is callingit quits. On Jan. 18, the Baltimore retail institution, currentlyhoused on Howard Street, closes its doors for good, ending a nearlytwo-decade stint as the city's go-to-shop for fans of the hard, theloud, and the fast.
"I was trying hard to make it 20 years,"says Chris X, aka Christopher Xavier, on pulling the plug on hisstore's 19-year tenure. "But we had to cut the dead weight."
Beforesettling into its current Howard Street location two years ago,Reptilian Records had anchored the 400 block of South Broadway in FellsPoint for 17 years. Its storefront, painted a nuclear shade of green,was a sign of the times. Xavier opened the shop, circa 1990, in thatbrief window before the eras that subculture historians will somedaydesignate as "The Time Before You Could Buy Your Cool at the Mall" and"The Time When You Could Buy Everything Online."
Like shoppingat other market-specific stores, a trip to Reptilian was an end initself. For the better half of the '90s, those whose tastes strayedfrom the beaten path were happy to take the detour to seek out the CDand vinyl bins at Reptilian--just as many of those same patrons soughtout the books and the music that could be found on the shelves atAtomic Books on Read Street in Mount Vernon. But times changed, and sodid consumer habits.
"Fells Point used to be a destinationwhere you could go and hang out," Xavier says of his store's oldneighborhood and the type of customer it attracted. "People would comein and talk for a half an hour. But then [clothing store] StickyFingers was gone, [skate shop] Chat Street was gone, and businessstarted going down hill fast."
With fewer stores in the areaappealing to the same clientele that was keeping Reptilian in business,foot traffic into Xavier's shop slowed. In an attempt to follow thedollar, a satellite store, called Son of Reptilian, was opened inHampden in the late 1990s. "We were about a year too early," Xaviersays of the second store's doors opening. "Holy Frijoles was the firstcool thing there, and Atomic Books is there now, but it was just toomuch of a strain for us to have two stores open in the same town." Inan attempt to bring all of its business under one roof again, Reptilianclosed the Hampden shop a year later, and concentrated on keeping thestore on Broadway alive.
It worked for a while. "Closing Son ofReptilian rejuvenated the original store," Xavier says. "But the musicbusiness itself was closing." The withering economy coupled with thechanging nature of the music business presented a challenge. Easyaccess to MP3 downloads and the entrenched attitude among a newgeneration of music fans that music should be available free made itharder for an independent record store to keep its doors open.
"Ihad one of my distributors tell me that he's seen over 500 independentrecord stores close since 2006 due to downloading and the ease oflooking for music online," Xavier says, adding that the trend was onehe'd noticed with his own operations. "Things dropped off at the storeand our online sales started taking off."
With an estimated 75percent of his revenue coming from the Reptilian web site, the futureof Xavier's bricks-and mortar-venue looked bleak. "As sad as it is, andas much as I hate being just an online store, the actual store wascosting more than it could make," Xavier says.
MP3s might havehurt the store proper, but Reptilian's vinyl sales have been strong.The comeback of vinyl and the buying activity of the fans that the formattracts have kept Xavier hopeful about his business's future. "Peoplewho care about aesthetics are buying LPs," he says. "You get a realfeel for an artist through the jacket, the sleeve, the poster, theliner notes. People who download MP3s to their iPods aren't asinterested in that aspect of the music-buying experience."
Thevinyl experience is something Xavier's record label, Reptilian Records,has never abandoned, putting out a variety of singles from local,national, and international acts. Since the '90s, the Reptilian labelhas given a home to homegrown talent, such as Blank, the first bandfrom Ryan Shelkett of Liar's Academy. as well as more renown acts, suchas Seattle's Supersuckers.
The Reptilian label will continue tofunction out of the Howard Street building that currently houses thestore. Xavier purchased the property two years ago and has set up amail-order operation for sales from both the online store and the labelon the premises. Scapegoat, a publishing imprint started by Xavier inthe fall 2004 with graphic designer Kevin I. Slaughter, also shares thespace.
Publishing was the next logical move in Xavier's careerof championing musicians that were occasionally overlooked, oftenundervalued, and sometimes just too provocative for other outlets toconsider. "The catalyst to do the publishing was the same as for myrecord label--I am friends with many artists and writers who couldn'tfind anyone to publish their work," he says. Scapegoat's publishingroster includes erstwhile City Paper contributor Carlos Batts, whose book American Gothic focuses on the photographer/artist/filmmaker's interpretations of the classic Grant Wood painting of the same name. American Gothic was the imprint's inaugural release and has since been followed by a bound edition of the controversial Answer Me! 'zine, a collection of writings by Satanic High Priest, Peter H. Gilmore entitled The Satanic Scriptures, and Androphilia,a manifesto on modern homosexual identity from writer Jack Malebranche.With a diverse and weighty catalog, Scapegoat is drawing comparisons toother independent publishing houses such as Feral House and Gates ofHeck.
"Just as Tom Hazelmeyer [of Amphetamine Reptile Records]was an inspiration when I started my record label, Adam [Parfrey ofFeral House] and Katharine Gates [of Gates of Heck] were influenceswhen I started Scapegoat," Xavier says.
Like his publishingmentors and his record label, Xavier presents the work of artists whomight have a difficult time not only finding a publisher, but alsofinding an audience. A major distribution deal assures that Scapegoat'sbooks can be found not only online via outlets such as Amazon, but alsoin large bookstores such as Borders. Upcoming projects for Scapegoatinclude plans to release work by local photographer and City Paper contributor Sam Holden. And Xavier also has plans for a book of work by H.R. Giger, best known as the creator of the Alien xenomorph.
Ona personal level, Xavier's life is also set to change--as is his name."I'm getting married on 9/9/09 to a woman I met in LA on 6/6/06," hesays. The event will result in his name officially becoming ChristopherXavier Donovan. ("Donovan's my middle name," he offers.)
AsXavier talks, there's a hint of wistfulness about the demise of thestore that was for many a local institution, but he never lapses intoself-pity or nostalgia. Asked about the Fells Point location wherebands such as the Supersuckers, Man or Astroman?, the Melvins, andCandy Machine all played in-store sets, he simply laughs and says "It'snow a check-cashing place, I think," he says. "One of many." Xavierused to hang signs behind the cash register at the old Reptiliannlisting the products and services that the store did not offercustomers, including no green peppers, no batteries, and, at one time,a note reading we do not cash checks.
"It's ironic that ourlogo is a dinosaur," he says with a laugh. "But I don't think we'refacing extinction. We're going to evolve."