And so it came to be…rumours and whispers drifted across the late summer afternoons, swirling around the Oldham Street detritus and buzzing anxiously through the windows of Manchesters’ soul brothers, beat junkies, funk merchants and just plain old believers. I consciously chose not to believe it, swatting away the ides of August with the Evil D’s and a back catalogue of Truth and Soul wax.

So the shop went and it was down to the basement, still trading Friday and Saturday, perhaps not as Fat, but hey many of us need to lose a few pounds. Three visits later and one quick cigarette break with Chris and it was gone, relocated to London in the back of Jazzman’s van.

So the Jazzman and our big city brethren get Fat City. What can never be traded however are the friends, joy, inspiration and moments created over the past 15 years. Chubby Grooves, Treva Whateva, Central Heating, Rae and Christian, Frying the Fat, First Priority, Tony D; so many grooves and faces which became friends and family. Relationships and pure love for the music built Fat City and that relationship followed me from hand shakes in Afflecks to the aforementioned fag break with Chris on the last day of trading. People come and go in our journey and I know that without Fat City my story would have been different and my shelves and soul considerably bereft.

Fat City take a bow as Manchester salutes you, now can we please have another soul and funk specialist asap.

Do visit our (not-for-profit and ad-free) website and show your support to the stalwarts of the Manchester Record Shop Scene, Mr Sifter and all. http://www.recordshopcity.co.uk

It did look like the writing was on the wall when they relocated down to the basement although credit to Jon K he managed to create a good vibe down there – it must have been a pretty chaotic place to work!!

Its made me think a bit about the decline of the record shop as the hub of a music scene. It can't be seperated from the general decline in vinyl and maybe even the physcial buying of music. The music scene is constantly evolving, as someone said to me over the weekend people probably used to say vinyl would kill off live music. I think back to some of the record shops that have come and gone over the years in Manchester ( thinking of Manchester Underground, Powercuts, Eastern Bloc, Decoy Records, Spin Inn) I wonder if anything will come and fill the gap left by Fat City. I wonder how many shops are even left across the North Of England. Hopefully it won’t be a case of you dont know what you have til its gone.

I have to say though, for me, the internet has been more good than bad. Yes, it can be a soulless place to do your record buying. But in terms of being turned on to new music the number of blogs and online staions) is bringing the knowledge to a new level. Its interesting for a start that so much of the debate about the decline of record shops is happening on line. I think the thing is, we need to make sure that the online world retains some local focus by supporting blogs llike this and local radio shows like my own (http://salfordsoulfunkjazz.podomatic.com/) and the guys at Groovement.