Results tagged “recordman”

Ottawa to introduce new fuel economy standards. They will be "at least" as stringent as American fuel economy standards. In response, David Suzuki blew upon a party horn sarcastically and waved a tiny flag, his derision apparent to all and sundry.

A couple weeks back, Spacing Wire posted this brilliant old TTC ad that made us hungry for more forgotten gems of Toronto advertising. The video in question was uploaded by a user calling themselves WNED 17, and their entire archive is made up of similar videos. In fact, their profile page provides a mission statement: "Youtube user WNED17 is proud to present repeat portions of broadcast captured in the 1980s and early 1990s via...

Last Wednesday, legendary Canadian music retailer Pindoff Record Sales sold off their 72-store Music World chain. Two days later, the new owners filed for bankruptcy protection and and will likely lay off 648 employees by the end of January. And so it goes. According to court documents, Music World plans an "orderly wind down," including closing stores and liquidating inventory. The retailer has been in dire straits for years, propped up by the Toronto-based...

If you missed the disappointing auction, you still have a chance to grab something from the now defunct Sam the Record Man—this time, for free! The building at Yonge and Gould Streets has been clearing out today and leaving the odds and ends outside under a sign indicating they are free for the taking. Unless you’re into Daddy's Boys on VHS or collect foam boards advertising CDs and their prices, there isn't much. But the whole point is to have some sort of Sam's memorabilia, right? They've randomly done this before and will probably do so again, so keep an eye out.

Ontario Environment Minister Laurel Broten will not build a two-storey garage for their home after all. Not that Torontoist doesn't think that the garage was a bad idea, because we do, but one of her neighbours is trying to get the court to make her pay him back the $10,000 he spent preparing for the municipal board hearing. Isn't that kind of excessive? Dude, you got what you wanted. Torontoist does not see where in the Environment Minister's portfolio it says "recompense schmucks," so if you chose to spend the money on lawyers rather than your much needed dental work, tough titty.

Sam Sniderman (aka. The Record Man) wants the Sam's building to be sold to Ryerson University. Unfortunately, this does not comply with the conspiracy to turn every store on Yonge Street into a discount shoe outlet or nail salon. Sorry.

We don't normally post ridiculously open-ended questions on Torontoist, but the discussion about the Sam the Record Man sign and the excitement over a new column about Bad Buildings in the city got us thinking about that whole "Toronto aesthetic" thing that keeps coming up time and time again in our city. Not about defining that aesthetic, though (there isn't an over-arching one—if anything, the lack of an aesthetic is our aesthetic), and more about trying to actually evaluate the way that our city looks.

Who's up for a trip through time?

Photo by David Sherret from Flickr.

The biggest bargain in Toronto shopping this year belongs to Jason Naworynski of Etobicoke, who bought the Meteor neon sign inside Sam The Record Man—the whole thing, including the neon-lit marquees on either side—for a bid of fifteen hundred dollars; easily less than a tenth of its original sale value (let alone its historical value). Jason was the only bidder on the item, despite Sam's being packed with bidders for its bankruptcy auction (and, at times, more media covering the auction than people participating in it). "Are you kidding me?" he said. "That's a steal." Jason plans to keep the sign in his warehouse for a couple of years until he figures out what to do with it. Luckily, it won't be alone—Jason also bought the seven movie theatre seats Sam's had installed, old seats from a theatre torn down to make way for City Hall back in the day. He paid $425 for them—less than sixty bucks each.

The Star is reporting this morning that The City of Toronto has designated the Sam The Record Man store as a heritage building, protecting the signs from being auctioned off. Kyle Rae said that "[the City will] sit down with the owner or future owners as the property is being sold, and we hope to be able to maintain the two discs and `Sam' signs on the rooftop as part of the ongoing history of Yonge Street." If it was possible to slow-clap over the internet, we'd be doing it right now. Well done, Toronto.

Photo by Eyeline-Imagery in the Torontoist Flickr Pool.

So much for preserving Toronto's cultural heritage—it looks like pretty much the entire stock of Sam The Record Man's flagship store is going up for auction.

Sam the Record Man is closing its Yonge Street store on June 30. Remember when Sam's was the only place you could get a cassette of The Lowest of the Low's Shakespeare My Butt? Remember cassettes?

We rarely do an Extra, Extra, but tonight's an exception for two reasons: first, two major crime events -- a bus hijacking and a shooting -- happened in downtown Toronto over the past twenty-four hours that merit mentioning; and second, in each story the facts are getting lost along the way and, as usual, the media is muddling the details of what actually (seems to have) happened. It's our goal in this recap to try to synthesize and clarify all the information coming in, as well as point out some holes in the coverage that's out there so far. If you spot a mistake that we make, please let us know in the comments with a link to whatever source you're getting your info from, and we'll correct ourselves.

No, we’re only kidding, we’ll try and not make this a weekly thing (after all, we hate Youtube clogged blogs as much as the rest of you) but after last week’s reminder of SCTV’s brilliance we thought it was well past time to revisit SCTV’s glorious take on early 80’s Yonge Street in Garth and Gord and Fiona and Alice. See! Sam the Record Man! Observe! That store that still sells bongs, posters and t-shirts! And marvel! That that bit of Yonge Street hasn’t changed all that much! (Maybe a bit less neon? We guess they need that energy now to power everyone’s favourite eyesore, Yonge/Dundas Square.)

"Hey hey. Ho ho. Ashlee Simpson is a no-talent goat."

The prospect of seeing giant-sized pictures of this guy flashing on a screen at Dundas Square just got a lot better. Cell phone behemoth Nokia is planning a North American first in Dundas Square with their "Say Hello Toronto" big screen ads. Using the Nokia 3220 and the Nokia 6225 mobile phones with built in digital cameras, Denzil Minnan-Wong and other downtown passersbys will have the opportunity to be photographed and see their photo displayed on seven giant video boards at highly obnoxious downtown Toronto areas. Photos are taken with the fancy new phones, and then they're posted within the hour on the giant video boards located at Dundas Square, Yonge and Richmond, Yonge and St Mary's and on Yonge Street at Sam the Record Man. Get your Minnan-Wong on at Dundas Square from Dec. 20-24.