I used to love video shops.
When I say video shops I mean those little places that rented out video tapes.
These were often corner shops or general stores. There was even a fruit, veg and fish shop locally that had a shelf of random video's for hire.
Often these shops just asked you to write your landline number down on a sheet of paper by way of membership. Others had their own codes and numbers for tapes and members.
The most sophisticated outfit in the UK was Blockbusters, a chain which sort of cornered the market eventually. I went to the local Blockbuster a lot as their horror collection was excellent in the Nineties. Membership came with a plastic card and I still have mine somewhere. Due tapes could be deposited in a postbox on the outside wall and you could get sweets, popcorn, Doritis and Haagen-Daz ice-cream there too!
It was a sad day when DVD became the film format of choice and like a digital cuckoo booted video out of video stores. This took some time while both formats co-existed but eventually video cassettes: VHS, Betamax and the earlier V2000 were no more, consigned to the rubbish bin of technology.
Ultimately Blockbusters themselves went bust and the closure of the national chain was the final epitaph of the video store phenomenon as we knew it.
Kids these days don't even know what video tapes are. They don't even watch TV's in the way we did, choosing rather to sit in their rooms streaming You Tubers playing X-Box on their phones!
As video was a technology that was both born and died during the first half of my life and a format I adored I spent a good deal of time in the Nineties and Noughties collecting the oldest horror tapes I could find. Pre-Certs, Big Box, Clamshells and slipcases, I lovingly collected them all.
In many ways this is one of the many complex reasons for collecting I think: to be an archivist before somethings dies out forever. Certainly my videos are like an archive of a period now gone, the age of the video store.
Did you go to video stores readers back in the day?
I have always tried to get my favourite tv series in a form that was my own. So I began collecting tv tie-in books. Then I had a go at audio recording shows on compact cassette, sitting silently holding my microphone near the tv speaker! In 1981, I finally managed (with a friend) to scrape together the cash to rent a VHS recorder! Our first recordings were 'The 5 Faces of Doctor Who' on BBC2, it felt like a miracle. We celebrated on the day a blank three hour tape finally came out for less than 10 quid!
ReplyDeleteTime went on and prices came down so I replaced a lot of my recordings with sell-through cassettes. Then I switched to DVD and I also do blu-ray (if the show was shot in HD or on film). Now it is so easy to get stuff that I don't even own a recorder. In the past it was a real achievement to get your own copy of something. Now I expect it, is that progress? I suppose so.
Great memories Kev and you were at the cutting edge of hime recording by the sounds of it!Am I right in thinking that some lost Dr.Who audios have been found in just that way through home recordings? 1981 eh, a VHS recorder. That was right at the start. People forget that home video first appeared in the late Seventies and you were straight in like my brother who got one too. Videos were hellishly expensive to buy, the recorded films I mean. Were blank tapes dear in 1981?
Deletehime? home! doh!
DeleteYep, blank tapes were so expensive that each week I recorded Blakes 7 (season 4), I had to decide if I was going to keep it or tape over it with next weeks as I couldn't afford to tape them all!
DeleteYou are right that audio recordings (probably on reel to reel) of 60's Doctor Who have saved at least the soundtrack of almost every episode. Some have now been released on dvd with animation replacing the visuals.
Worked in a video rental store for the summer of 1986 during the uni summer break. That was still pre-cert time in Finland as the law came into effect in 1987. Us staffers had free rental as a fringe benefit, but as I recall seldom used as the hours were long and there were much more interesting activities available in spare time. The spark to collect big box VHS came much later, and has lasted to this day.
ReplyDeleteWhat a great memory Arto, working I na video store. Its the stuff of a potential film like Hi Fidelity for record shops! ha ha. I would have loved to have worked in that store too talking about films all day long! As for much more interesting activities, what could be more interesting than watching old horror flicks! ha ha. I don't get to car boot sales anymore really and last time I went there was a noticeable absence of video tapes of any kind. Maybe we'll stumble on a huge box of clamshells this summer Arto!
DeleteBefore the Blockbuster corporate takeover,we had a mom and pop video rental store called Illusive Images. It was fun to rent there.All the boxes were displayed on the a wall with a little numbered Velcro sticker on it. If you wanted a movie, you detached the sticker and took it to the counter where the counter guy retrieved the movie for you and you rented it for one day,slightly more for 2 days.He often put a sign in the window with a rent-2-for-price-of-one specials and also rented Nintendo games.Of course after Blockbuster moved to town,He couldn't compete and had to close,what a shame.
ReplyDeleteI loved those early video stores like this Brian. It still amazes me that here in the UK some shop owners went to prison for renting what became known as video nasties. These same nasties can now be seen on late night TV or You tube. Today's generation have no idea how the vdeo generation fought for the right to watch movies at home and put censorship where it belongs - in the bin!
DeleteI only learned about the video nasty ban through watching the Young Ones, and even then I didn't understand what it was.I have always been interested in overseas culture,particularly pop culture, therefore I know now what it was all about.
DeleteWas there no censorship of video n the States Brian?
Deletethat's one aspect of the VHS craze I never got into - renting. We always bought what we wanted to see. Sometimes we would buy tapes on other people's recommendatiions without ever having seen the movie in the theater and we were rarely disappointed. To this day I would rather wait for the Blu-Ray to come out and buy it than go to the theater.
ReplyDeleteWow Ed, you must have spent a lot on those brand new video cassettes! They were hellishly expensive in the UK in the 80's. The price did fall in the 90's as the technology became universal. Its a shame you don't go to the cinema. Personally I find it a great experience and have done since being a kid even though cinemas themselves have changed a bit.
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