Ernest Tubb’s Record Shop, Historic Nashville Radio and Retail Site, to Close After 75 Years

variety.com:

Chris Willman Music WriterIt was a bad sign for historic music retail in America when the building that used to house the famous Tower Records in West Hollywood was finally demolished in February.

And now things are looking grim for the other most iconic record store in the U.S., and an even longer-standing one — Ernest Tubb’s Record Shop, a fixture in downtown Nashville since 1947 and in its present location since 1951.“It’s with great sadness that we share the news that the Ernest Tubb Record Shop — building and business — will be sold,” said an announcement on the store’s social media, adding that the store will shut down some time in the spring.The store is important in country music history not only as a retail site but as the longtime home of a radio show nearly as old as the shop itself, “The Midnite Jamboree,” which still broadcasts live following the Grand Ole Opry on Saturday nights.

It was on that show that Loretta Lynn made her name at the beginning of the 1960s, performing from the tiny stage at the back of the shop and going out over the WSM airwaves.

Plans for the location will be up to a new buyer after the store shutters, but it’s understood that maintaining a legacy business is extremely unlikely to be high on a purchaser’s agenda in one of the nation’s most crowded nightlife corridors, where drinking, not Bear Family boxed sets, is the high-volume attraction.“Our goal has always been to protect, promote and preserve the great history of the record shop and building,” the store’s announcement said. “That desire remains as strong today as ever.