Iconic music store on Dominion Rd spins its final record

A well-loved music store on Dominion Road celebrated its final day in business on Saturday, as the owner moves to preserve its legacy online.

Opened in 1998, Musiquarium offers an array of secondhand records, CDs and movies to discerning customers.

Owner Rick McShane has run the store independently for almost a quarter of a century. In that time, he has seen his little stretch of Dominion Road change considerably.

“It was a real retail hub down here, there were just secondhand stores. As time wore on, they took off, and most of them got replaced by eating establishments. So, I'm pretty much the last of the retailers now.”

The store is in what was once a block of four individual shops. Today, a single restaurant occupies most of the space, with plans to expand further once Musiquarium is gone.

A gradual decline in sales meant that McShane was always realistic about the future of the store, yet Covid-19 brought the end sooner than he had anticipated.

“After the last Auckland lockdown, it’s just been flat.

"Economically things are a bit tighter for people. There are fewer people down here just walking around.”

Vinyl’s boom in recent years did provide some reprieve, but McShane found it difficult to compete with larger chains such as The Warehouse and JB Hi-Fi.

CDs were always a much more reliable source of sales. And while these too were trending downwards, McShane had noticed them becoming more popular among young people.

Asked why this might be, McShane suggested several possibilities.

“Sometimes it is that stuff you can’t get on Spotify or whatever. I think some of it is the price of new vinyl now. I mean $60 for a new record, or $10 for a new CD.

"There’s still that thing of having the booklet, you know you can still play the CD, flick through the booklet, sing along.”

During Te Waha Nui’s time at the store, a few customers entered to make their final purchases.

According to one, the closure of Musiquarium will be a great loss for the area.

“Rick knows the industry like you won’t believe. He’s an expert.”

At McShane’s request, the customer agreed to pose for a photo. For him, the image will serve as a memento for what he will miss most about running the store.

“That sort of face-to-face thing. They’re good people. A lot of them have become good friends. That is the worst thing."

tform as a silver lining because it demonstrated the business’ willingness to embrace change in order to keep its legacy alive.

Everything had to go at The Musiquarium, including the furniture Photo: Regan Harris

The loss of a physical store won’t entirely remove McShane from the industry. He will continue to sell New Zealand music on a dedicated website that has proven quite popular with overseas buyers.

A second website, recordstore.co.nz, will stock Musiquarium's wider collection.

Created by a group of AUT undergraduates almost a decade ago, the latter site is undergoing upgrades. McShane hopes to have it up and running for online transactions later this year.

According to Dr Lewis Tennant, a lecturer in communication studies at AUT whose research has involved record store culture in the digital era, the closure of a store like Musiquarium is disappointing but not surprising.

“In terms of what that mass market, big-box retail model of capitalism does to small stores like that, it's really hard to turn many consumers from the cheaper price.

Dr Tennant regarded the store’s move to an online pla