Revolver

Two and a half stars!
Revolver buys, sells, and trades CDs, vinyl, and DVD/​Blu-​Rays. Honestly, I’m surprised that stores like this still exist. Places like Best Buy, HMV, and Wal-​Mart have been downsizing their stock of physical media for a while and the limited items that they do sell are at greatly discounted prices. Why would someone pay $ 10 for a used CD at Revolver when they could get it brand new at HMV for the same price or less? Not to mention that most people now get their music and movies from streaming services for a fraction of what Revover charges.
All of the negatives about the Bonnie Doon Revolver store apply to the Londonderry location as well. They do not separate their new and used stock — it’s all crammed in the same disorganized, loosely alphabetized bins. They don’t sell a lot of new music but the little bit they do sell is barely noticeable because it’s stuck between mouldy, ring-​worn Perry Como and Bing Crosby records that somebody brought in after their grandparents died. They do have a lot of vinyl here which is priced at around $ 15 each — on average.
The best deals on music here are on the 45 RPM (7 inch) singles. There aren’t very many at this location compared to the Bonnie Doon store though. Once again, they’re just haphazardly arranged — not separated by alphabet, genre, or condition. Many of the singles are just $ 2 each with most expensive ones being $ 5. I snagged a copy of Ace Frehley’s «New York Groove» single from 1978 in pretty good shape for only $ 2 (Thanks, Revolver!). It seems that some of the things that should be expensive are cheap and vice versa. Unfortunately, Revolver affix the price sticker directly on the record sleeve (the PAPER record sleeve!), which is a big no-​no for collectors. They had quite a few obscure vintage country singles too which were all sealed in protective plastic, so they obviously came from the estate of a collector. That’s not to say that everything in the 45 section is a great find, but there were a few gems there.
As we move into the digital/​streaming age, purveyors of used media are becoming a thing of the past and Revolver probably don’t have more than a couple of years left in them. The best thing about used music and video stores is the possibility of finding rare and out-​of-​print items. When these types of stores are gone we’ll be at the mercy of the eBay sharks, so enjoy them while there are still some around. Just be prepared to dig through an unsorted mess.

I figured I would do a little update on Revolver as I have now had a bit more interaction with the staff as well as had the opportunity to trade in some of my movies for new titles. You can either bring in your music and movies for store credit or cash here. I highly suggest taking the store credit route as you will obviously get more this way. I brought in 8 DVD’s today and they wouldn’t take 2 of them. I didn’t ask for an explanation as to why and none was offered so I just assumed they were too old to be worth anything to them or that they already had alot of copies on the shelf. The offer I got was $ 6.00 in cash or $ 15.00 in store credit. Again no explanation was offered as to how they came up with this number although I wish I had asked as he never went to the computer to check the value of anything like they do at their sister store Gamecity which is upstairs. It wasn’t a big deal for me as alot of what I brought in were films that originally only cost me between $ 5-​$ 10 so it’s not like I was expecting big money but if you have some more hard to find films you might want to question their offer if they attempt to low ball you.
Despite the lower offer I still found the young man who was working to be fairly nice. He answered all my questions and was very quick about checking the shelves when he informed me I needed to wait for him to see how many copies of the movies I had brought in they had in the store before he could tell me whether or not they were willing to take them.
All in all the whole trade in process was quick and totally painless and the staff are friendly and approachable. (I still wish they would wear nametags though) If you long for new CD’s and DVD’s this is a great place to add new stuff to your collection and get rid of ones that may be collecting dust on your shelves. I would still be reluctant to outright purchase something however as the higher prices I mentioned in my last review still seem to be an issue with some things here. I saw a used copy of «The Fault In Our Stars» for $ 17.99 that I was excited to purchase up until I realized that it was supposed to be a Blueray and DVD combopack and it was missing the DVD. Thanks but no thanks I will stick to trading.