Recycled Records

So much vinyl! The staff was super friendly and there was so much to look at. At first we didn’t see much vinyl but then walked up the «Stairway to heaven» and found the whole top floor was full of it! I will definitely be back!

Other reviewers have said it all. I found it to be very «eh it’s OK». Kind of a shady setting but you don’t have many options for vinyl in that town.

This is a very cool «man cave» store. Records, DVDs, beer signs, zippo lighters, porn, car & gun magazines, original Nintendo games, and more! The owners seem to be just as eccentric as the store itself and that’s a compliment.
My only issue is a lot of the inventory is locked up or kept behind the counter, but the employees were kind enough to let me behind the counters to get a closer look.
I left with a NES game I needed and a stack of old 80’s car magazines (Ferrari Testarossa forever!) all at very fair prices. A highly entertaining store to lose yourself in for an afternoon.

Visited here to sell some LPs and CDs. Very interesting place. If you have time to dig around, who knows what you might find? I saw posters, t-​shirts, musical instruments, magazines, CDs, DVDs, even jewelry. I didn’t have much time to look around. I will be back to dig through the piles.
I ended up getting about $ 1 each for my records and CDs. Not great for some of the LP titles, but they have been gathering dust in my basement for 20 years.

I had no idea there was a vinyl record store in downtown Springfield, IL. As many know me I have a serious addiction to vinyl. Every year my wife and I stay in Springfield, IL during Thanksgiving to visit family.
So after shopping for some black Friday deals I was curious if there was any vinyl records shops in Springfield, IL.
I used my Unilocal iPhone app and found Recycled Records. We parked on the street right in front of the store. When I walked in I thought… uhhhh…where is the all the vinyl records. So I sought out an employee and he pointed to the upstairs where there is a sign that says «Stairway to Heaven».
Walking up the the stairs I truly found vinyl record heaven. 50,000 records on vinyl. WOW!
They had a lot of bargain bins. I also found a very cool picture disk of The Beatles «Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band» album.
Since it was record store day on Black Friday I also picked myself up Skrillex’s first album on 180g vinyl.
Bottom line: Got vinyl? or need some vinyl? This is the place north of St. Louis.

weird reviewing a place that i just browsed through. the place is one long hall of used dvd’s, cd’s and a few other various ‘recycled’ items. it was cool.

Good selection of music movies and games. Prices seemed pretty high on most 2^nd hand games and music.

Is that freedom rock man?
I got nothin but love for this place and have given them my business since they opened. Good selection of vinyl upstairs, thats right I still l still listen to records. recently picked up a pristine copy of skynards second helping now that I think of it.
They also have new CD’s, used cd’s, dvd’s, games, stereos, instruments and other picture postcards. this place has all kinds of stuff you want, stuff you don’t want, junk … A basement full of furniture, a rack of old playboys, 18 boxes of comics. the list goes on and on. Mark and Gary are great and know their inventory like nobodys busi-​snatch. Stop in and have a smoke with Mark, o wait you cant do that in this country anymore… Stop in anyway and check out their fine bone-​a-​fair before the fascists in this country outlaw second hand shops.
Power to the people!

A larger-than-you’d-expect collection of new and used CD as well as floor full of used LPs. Populated by the requisite collection of odd-​balls, né’er do wells, and social misfits (who I hold in the highest esteem). The place is funky top to bottom (including the furniture for sale in the basement). If that’s not your thing, avoid this place and head over to Best Buy…

I stopped in to get out of the rain, and found little somethings for my girls: an antique locket and a really cool sterling lipstick holder AT RECYCLED RECORDS, no less.
Truly great eclectica and owner Mark Kessler is a nice guy, and a smart businessman; he was happy to negotiate price with me and was completely good natured about doing so.

I’ve jadedly called Recycled Records «the worst independent record store in the world» to friends. It’s an exaggerated and untrue pronouncement, but this place does leave me wanting quite a bit. Maybe I’m just spoiled having seen some of the best of the best in places like New York, Chicago and Atlanta, and, granted, Springfield is in a bit of a culture vacuum and I have a feeling its customer base is less than robust. But really, is that an excuse? I could argue with myself back and forth, so let’s just save it and get down to brass tacks, shall we?
As Lee (the only other person to review this Springfield shop isn’t even from Springfield, but that’s a topic for another essay) pointed out, there’s not much of a point in having a record store and closing it before dinner time. I know the dudes that run this place deserve to have a life, but the fun of a truly great music shop is browsing it when it’s dark out.
The selection isn’t bad, but it isn’t great either. I almost always find a couple interesting used selections when I visit, but it’s clear Recycled Records make its money on big-​ticket knick knacks, novelties and electronics. More power to them, of course, but the music suffers as a result.
I’ve found the staff to be pretty helpful, though a bit scatterbrained and noisy. No bother, though. Record stores and their employees should be quirky.
Another highlight: They have free bumper stickers that say SILENCE SUCKS. I just wish that wasn’t the most refreshing part of the store.
Recycled Records is fighting the good fight in a retail environment that becomes more sterile and homogenized by the day, and God bless ‘em for that. It doesn’t change the fact that the store’s selection is sub par and its hours ridiculous.

Three stars for being a decent music store in Springfield.
I would probably love this place if I lived in town, and would know all the guys who work and hang out there. I’d be a regular.
Something about the place kind of gave me the creeps. Was it the creaky wooden floors? The fact that none of the employees said hello to me when I, the only customer, walked in and looked confused? Was it Abe Lincoln’s ghost?
I wish I had more time to browse, but everything seems to shut down around 5:00, including Recycled. The selection seemed pretty extensive, and they had a whole floor of vinyl upstairs, which was the creepiest section of the store. I really wanted to look at the old porn section that was «employees only».
If you’re in town, stop on in. Unless it’s past 5:30.