Record Store Day Announces 10-Year Celebration
Record Store Day will celebrate its 10th anniversary on Saturday, April 22nd. The annual event seeks to promote brick-and-mortar music shops through special vinyl and CD releases issued by an array of artists.
Record Store Day (RSD) was created in 2007 at a gathering of independent record store owners and employees. Since 2008, RSD now includes 1,400 participating independent stores in the U.S. and thousands more globally. While the major labels have since joined the celebration, independent labels remain the crux of RSD, providing 60 percent of the official releases in 2015.
Along with the myriad special releases, RSD also names a new music ambassador each year. While Metallica notably perused the stacks and met with fans at Rasputin Music in San Francisco during the first Record Store Day, the Eagles of Death Metal’s Jesse Huges was named the first RSD ambassador – after coining the idea – in 2009. Since then, RSD ambassadors have included Josh Homme, Ozzy Osbourne, Iggy Pop, Jack White, Chuck D and Dave Grohl.
Metallica served as RSD ambassadors last year, performing a set at Rasputin and releasing a live CD, Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité, Metallica!, to raise money for charity. Among the year’s other notable releases were a trio of David Bowie vinyl releases, an exclusive Bob Dylan 7-inch EP, a virtual reality video and viewfinder from Run the Jewels and Johnny Cash’s Best of the Johnny Cash Show and his Sun Records reissue All Aboard the Blue Train.