Tucked into a bedroom-sized space in the basement that houses music venue and youth culture emporium The Wall, Metal Gate exists to part wearers of black leather jackets from their money.
The record store is crammed with replica medieval daggers, gothic-lettered concert posters, a listening station and around 30,000 imported and locally produced compact discs by fringe to downright obscure European, Japanese and US hard rock bands.
"We release the CDs, we promote the local artists and we organize the concerts," said owner Space Chen (陳征), president of Metal Gate, Rock Empire promotions and Screaming Shout Records. "We're the most professional metal store in Taiwan."
PHOTO: RON BROWNLOW, TAIPEI TIMES
Occupying the slightly larger space next door, not to mention the opposite end of the rock 'n' roll spectrum, White Wabbit Orange (小白兔橘子) carries an equally comprehensive collection of post rock, post punk, new folk and indie pop.
If Metal Gate is ground zero for guitar fiends who hammer note-perfect chord progressions on their Fender Stratocasters, White Wabbit is the place where, if customers hang around long enough, they are likely to meet all of the disaffected synth-players in Taipei who remember what they were doing when Kurt Cobain died and view the term "shoe-gazer" as a compliment.
But White Wabbit (www.wwr.com.tw) and Metal Gate (www.rockempire.com.tw) share much in common, even if some of their customers wouldn't be caught dead in the rival store. Both opened five years ago, around the time when the Internet and mega chains were driving independent music stores in other parts of the world out of business. And both have thrived on foot traffic generated by concerts at The Wall and by pairing their retail operations with music labels that release CDs by Taiwanese and foreign bands.
"People who listen to this kind of music buy CDs," said White Wabbit head Yeh Wan-ching (葉宛青), better known as KK, a comment that was echoed by staff at other music stores in Taipei. "They might download a song or listen to a sample on the Internet, but then they'll come to our store and buy the CD." (Samples are available on White Wabbit's Web site.)
Her store carries imports, which sell for NT$400 or more, and licensed albums which it sells under its White Wabbit label for NT$360. It also produces albums by local artists like Bad Daughter (壞女兒) and Peppermint (薄荷葉), and KK's band Nipples. KK estimates the store sold around 200 CDs a month when it opened. Last year she sold around 1,000. Not bad for a business that started life as a side project to her band, inside a converted men's restroom in the now-defunct music venue Zeitgeist.
Chen said sales at Metal Gate have grown by a similar rate, from 100 to 500 a month, though he believes the figure would be higher if people weren't downloading music from the Internet. "We're small potatoes compared with stores in Europe and Japan," he emphasized several times, with no hint of false modesty. Still, his Taipei location generates more sales than his stores in Hong Kong, Singapore or Beijing.
It's been a different story for larger stores that sell non-mainstream music. A decade ago, the old Tower Records on Zhongxiao East Road was the place to go for young music buyers who suspected that Faye Wang (王菲) and Phil Collins were not the last word when it came to rock music. Tower carried such artists, but mixed with those titles was a decent selection of indie, techno and hip-hop albums by lesser-known international artists. Staff knew what they were talking about, and customers bought what they recommended.
Six years ago, T-Wave, operated by local computer store T-Zone, and French retailer FNAC, were running similar operations. Tower and T-Zone are now closed, and FNAC Taiwan is now run by the Shin Kong Mitsukoshi (新光三越) corporation. "We stopped ordering imports," said one FNAC employee, who, though he had a large tattoo on his arm and possessed an encyclopedic knowledge of indie rock and heavy metal, presided over a much-reduced collection.
Now, when it comes to record stores that carry everything, Eslite is the only game in town. Both its flagship Xinyi Road branch and older location off Dunhua South Road boast comprehensive collections of everything from Japanese pop, European techno and local World Music CDs to the latest releases from US indie music labels such as Thrill Jockey and Sub Pop.
Staff from each location posts their recommendations on blogs; the Xinyi branch's blog (eslitemusic.blogspot.com) organizes reviews by author, the one posted by the Dunhua branch (www.wretch.cc/blog/eslitemusic) organizes reviews by genre.
When asked how many indie rock and heavy metal titles his store carried, assistant manager Wu Wu-chang (吳武璋) pulled a chart off the wall and counted 19 alt-rock labels from the US, Hong Kong and Japan that he regularly orders music from. He said the store carries around 120 titles from each label. They sell around 1,000 to 1,500 of these CDs each month. Five years ago, the figure was 1,500 to 1,700. "The owners of this store are committed to maintaining a good selection of music," Wu said.
Without the backing of a large corporation, it seems that focusing on obscure titles is a better business model for a record store that sells non-mainstream rock music. Jason's Records (傑生唱片, www.jasonrecords,com.tw), which is located just north of a clutch of wedding photography boutiques at 2F, 17 Zhongshan N Rd Sec 3 (台北市中山區中山北路3段17號2樓) and does not enjoy foot traffic from concerts, has survived for a decade even though its collection is centered on dark, death and speed metal. (Jason's also carries titles ranging from electronica to jazz.)
White Wabbit doesn't waste much shelf space on classic or mainstream "alternative" groups like Pearl Jam. And even though more people listen to nu-metal crossovers like Limp Bizkit, Metal Gate eschews such music for harder-driven or more technically proficient artists like Edenbridge and Gary Hoey.
Both KK and Chen say they sell the kind of music they like. "I wouldn't recommend something to a customer unless I liked it," KK said. "I like the hard stuff," Chen said. "Nu metal is too simple."
But it's also true that the artists these stores feature cost less in terms of licensing fees or to bring to Taiwan for concerts. "Lincoln Park charges half a million [US] dollars per concert," Chen said. "I can bring Steven Vai or Dream Theatre here for US$50,000."
Chen said his Taipei store wouldn't be viable if he weren't able to combine it with his Rock Empire concert promoting arm and Screaming Shout label, and if he weren't able to book artists for pan-Asian tours and sell their music in China and Hong Kong. "We sell around 300 to 400 CDs every concert. In Thailand we sold 1,000 Dream Theatre CDs at a concert in one night," he said. "I couldn't survive without China and Hong Kong."
Rock Empire is bringing Swedish guitar virtuoso Yngwie Malmsteen to Taipei tomorrow, followed by Michael Shenker next weekend and Edenbridge next month. It is perhaps a measure of his success that Chen said he has already signed Megadeth to play Taipei in late April or early May and is in negotiations to bring Metallica here next year.
KK said White Wabbit also negotiates to bring artists to Taiwan, although, true to its indie-slacker form, "we usually don't succeed." Unlike Chen's business, which faces competition from other labels like Magnum (馬雅音樂, www.magnum.com.tw), owner of Jason's Records, hers is the only business in Taiwan that focuses on the extreme niche of the indie market.
Her partner Xiao Hua (吳逸駿) said White Wabbit was like a consulting firm for people who like indie music. Whereas customers used to go to Tower for advice on what foreign CD to buy, they now go to specialized stores like his. It also helps, he said, that White Wabbit provides album notes for many of its CDs in Chinese; otherwise, a customer wouldn't know what to make of a band name like Broken Social Scene or the Palace Brothers.
The store's collection is so extensive that some foreign musicians performing at The Wall have told Xiao Hua it's better than CD stores back home. And besides, he added, "most people don't know where to download this music anyway."
For your information:
Metal Gate and White Wabbit Orange are located at B1, 200 Roosevelt Rd Sec 4, Taipei (台北市羅斯福路四段200號B1)
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