Mole’s Record Exch

Today, I visited two used music stores in Cincinnati, Mole’s Record Exchange and The CD Game Exchange.
I LOVE Mole’s Record Exchange.
The shop is tucked into the corner spot on a building across from a giant church and the folks at The CD Game Exchange were kind enough to give me directions as the two establishments are within walking distance.
When I got there, the guy running the counter that day, Tom, was out washing the shop’s windows. After I showed up, he came back inside and I must say that he proved to be AWESOME. You’ll usually find yourself at a music store talking to one of two types of people behind the counter… the first being a snooty, music snob who rants and raves about that ONE bootleg by Grateful Dead and the second being a true music-​loving, helpful audiophile who seems to know EVERYTHING about music and is able to help you find things you might like. Tom is definitely of that second type and he made the experience of going to the store fun. I think I spent two of the three hours I spent there just talking to this guy and he is full of awesome insight when it comes to taking care of vinyl & turntables as well as ramping up stereo equipment. Definitely an awesome resource for music knowledge and helpful too! I was buying a Gary Numan album called «Warriors» and it turned out that the wrong Numan album was in the case, so after he tracked down the right one he helped me find the other one as well because it wasn’t on the CD shelves. Super awesome guy!
NOW, for the store itself. This place is the oldest record store in the city at 38 years and it definitely feels it. There’s a lot of awesome old posters on the wall… I really got a kick out of the Beavis and Butthead one, as well as the one advertising a tour with Monster Magnet and Professional Murder Music. Old school!
Lately, I’ve really been on a CD-​kick as far as purchasing music goes, and I found the selection as this place to be pretty decent. The racks look deceptively slim on the CD side, but when you realize that only the booklets are on the shelves in plastic sleeves, there’s a lot more content than you think. I would say that this place mainly caters toward the rock genre in this section, although there were a few good gems in other genres as well.
The vinyl section was VERY good, from what I looked through. It seemed as though most genres were represented pretty decently, and they were very well priced.
I think a lot of the charm of this place is in how cluttered it appears to be. As another reviewer mentioned, when you go into the CD section, all of the CDs are filed underneath their letter, but not necessarily in alphabetical order. It’s like hunting through your Grandma’s attic for a hidden gem… and it seems like you always have a fair shot of finding something.
On this trip, I picked up:
Gary Numan «Warriors»
Gary Numan «I, Assassin»
Peter Gabriel” «Us»
Outkast «Stankonia»
It came out to about $ 31, the CDs were in awesome shape and the two Numan CDs were actually re-​releases with awesome bonus tracks.
So far, out of Everybody’s, Shake It, and the CD-​Game Exchange… I must say Mole’s is my favorite. I will definitely make an effort to come here every other trip :)

Although Cincinnati has a few amazing independent record stores scattered throughout the city, Mole’s Record Exchange is not one of them. In fact, Mole’s is probably my least favorite record store I have been too, and believe me, I have been to a few of them. In all fairness, I have only visited the store once but I was so annoyed with this visit I vowed never to return.
The first thing I noticed when I walked in is the place was completely empty, except the guy working behind the counter and there was no music playing. I found this to be weird, considering we were inside of a store that sells nothing but music. Secondly, and the thing that really made me not want to come back is the guy who was working there was extremely rude. From the moment my friend and I walked in he was criticizing me for the band hoodie I was wearing. While he continued to rip on me for wearing said hoodie, he tried to get me to buy a bunch of movies I was looking at by continuing to tell me how good of a deal they were and so on when they really were nothing special.
Now, I expect people in music stores to be a tad snobby about music but this was just ridiculous. Yeah, I might only be a 20 something but that doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate music. Sorry cynical old man working the counter, but you won’t be getting any of my money! Take my advice, stay away from Mole’s and spend your money at one of the other great stores in the area. I promise you that the selection and treatment will be way better elsewhere.

Over the years, I have spent hundreds of dollars in this store. 99.9% of what they sell is used, consisting primarily of records and CDs. I have only bought CDs.
Pros
–I have never bought a CD that was too scratched or defective to be played, without distortion, in its entirety.
–they sell things that are not available at any other local stores. Their sources for used CDs are not just other local stores, but also out of town/​state/​country stores. For instance, I bought an album by a 1960’s group called «The Jarvis Street Revue.»
–some of this extremely obscure stuff is very easy to find, for the CDs are arranged in categories according to genre. One big category is «rock,» but then there are little categories, like «prog-​rock,» and «60’s psychedelic.» The latter two categories are must visits for me. Sometimes they are the only categories I visit. Each of them has very obscure stuff, and the «prog-​rock» has standards, like «Yes» and «King Crimson,» as well.
Con
–the arrangement of CDs will sometimes appear to be in a random order. For instance, in the «rock» section, all of the artists whose name begins with the letter «S» are appropriately placed together; but since there is no additional arrangement, one has to go through the whole «S» category to find something that may or may not be in stock. This would take me about 20 minutes to go through such a large collection. The good news, though, is that all one needs to do is ask the person manning the counter if they have something, and they can give an answer in seconds.