Crooked Beat Records to reopen in new Del Ray location in June

Crooked Beat Records will reopen in Del Ray in the first week in June, owner Bill Daly tells ALXnow.

The record shop closed at 802 N. Fairfax Street in Old Town on April 29, a week after Record Store Day. Daly signed a five-year lease for the 1,200-square-foot basement in 2417 Mount Vernon Avenue — in the same building that houses Cheesetique, the Del Ray School Of Music and Piece Out Del Ray.

“We’re looking forward to reopening,” Daly said. “We’re getting there, but it’s a huge move. There’s a lot of stuff. We were hoping to open on Memorial Day weekend, but it’s likely to be the first week in June.”

Daly said he got more than enough volunteers to help with the move, which he says is 90% complete. The new store is about 200 square feet bigger than the Old Town location, and Daly said the new space will be used to sell more used records. Incidentally, the store isn’t buying used records at the moment since Daly just bought 6,000-to-8,000 old records from estate sales.

A former DJ at North Carolina State University, Daly worked for a record shop chain for years before founding Crooked Beat Records in 1997 in Raleigh. He moved the business to Adams Morgan in D.C. in 2004 and then to Alexandria in 2016.

“It’s bittersweet to close in Old Town,” Daly said. “We’re going to miss it here. In our 25 years this was the best location. Parking was easier and our business increased by 20% than Adams Morgan. Here (in Old Town) they pulled right up, and we were a destination point for people who were into vinyl. They came from Baltimore, Richmond, the Eastern Shore, all over.”

Daly says that updates on the new location will be posted on the Crooked Beat Instagram page.

“The new underground space is going to be great,” he said. “Customers who have seen it say it reminds them of underground record shops in Seattle and Boston.”

Image via Crooked Beat Records/Facebook