The main thing right up front: we run the Bop Shop — a record-store-turned-listening-room where live music actually matters, and we're bringing a stacked lineup of Fringe shows to that cozy 50–60 seat space during Rochester Fringe (Sept 15–26).

I'm Chris Lindstrom and I sat down with Tom live at The Bop Shop to have a wide ranging conversation around music, live performance, passion, and nerdery of all kinds.

Check out the episode on Just Can't Not wherever you get your podcasts or on Lunchador.org!

https://player.captivate.fm/episode/4fec7a55-ff2c-4d66-bcd3-08c9c8829883/

Tom has been in the record and presenting game for decades, and what we mean by a “listening room” is simple: people show up, sit, shut their phones (mostly), and pay attention — just real-time music that breathes. We talk through why the acoustics are surprisingly gorgeous (thanks to old ceilings, records on the walls and a whole lot of lucky geometry), how they record almost every show for our YouTube channel, and why artists love playing here — it's intimate, respectful, and actually a fair stop on a touring route.

We also walk through a few Fringe highlights you’ll want to catch: Joe Fonda’s Bass of Operation (original modern tunes), the experimental Sound Signal ensemble with film visuals, Ricky Ford’s powerhouse jazz dates, a soulful organ trio, and a quirky freebie — trumpet plus two cellos — if you see all five shows we book.

Along the way we riff on physical media nostalgia, why Bandcamp and buying directly help artists more than a streaming blip, and how being present — literally showing up — is the secret sauce of enjoying live art.

So if you like good sound, nerdy backstories, and the sort of human moments that make you rethink everything (I promise, someone once said that after a guitar set), come see us at 1460 Monroe Ave in Brighton or grab your tickets at rochesterfringe.com — we’ll save you a seat, and maybe a beet jar recipe if you're lucky.

Mentioned in this episode:

Joe Bean Roasters

Visit joebeanroasters.com to get fresh roasted specialty coffee either by the bag or with a Perpetual Joy subscription!

All right, so it's like so.

And I've been presenting for 38 years.

Wow.

Yeah, 88.

So we're just gonna jump in.

Okay.

All right.

Just sit somewhere anyway.

All right, now I'm gonna, like, actually officially start the show.

Okay.

I'm, you know.

Sure.

Bob.

Shop shirt.

Oh, well, perfect.

All right.

I keep forgetting it's not video.

Oh, we're recording the video.

I know.

Yeah.

Delighted.

Yeah.

All right.

Okay.

Well, that music means it's time for another episode of Just Can't Not.

I'm here live at the Bop Shop.

We're talking to Tom, the owner.

Go to rochesterfringe.com to get your tickets for all the events.

And yes, you want to get them for as many events as you can.

Tom, why don't you give me your full name and talk about the Bop Shop for a second?

Okay, well, I'm going to.

My name is Tom Cohn.

I worked in the record business all through the 70s and early 80s, and in 82 I opened a store, flea market booth.

And it's evolved into this ridiculously large event after this many years.

So I've kind of been immersed in the music and love of music.

I never played an instrument.

I just sort of was about the artifacts, I guess, more archaeological desires in my youth.

You know, kind of a nerd.

I mean, that's, that's how I go through so many things that I love is nerdery first.

Absolutely.

I'm like, I, I, I hate to say it, but that's, that's kind of, you know, the geeks shop here all the time.

Yeah, but this is a great music, is a great thing.

I'm trying to think of appropriate words for it, but it's just a little.

Bit closer on the mic for me, Tom.

Perfect.

Thank you.

Music means a lot to me and a lot of the people who come here and listen to my shows.

It's a listening room.

Music these days is more important than ever for our psyche and the way we feel and how we go through our day.

And it's been like that for me for 50 years.

So I started, I went to concerts non stop through the 70s and early 80s.

And then somewhere along the line, you know, I'm getting to know a lot of the jazz musicians in Europe and New York City and some folk people too.

But I figured out about 88 is when I started presenting And I figured it was still a little bit cheaper to bring the band here than to go to New York for two nights.

It's even worse now that's.

That's an efficiency problem.

Right.

Like, oh, I need to see this and I'm just gonna bring it to me.

Well, it's also like, what a great thing for something to come to for.

The artists that I deal with that for touring and routing.

Yeah.

So they're trying to put together a week of gigs so I can be part of that link, you know, between Toronto and here.

And a lot of the folks who play the Ann Arbor Jazz Festival or play Buffalo or Detroit or whatever.

Sure.

I'm en route one way or another.

And so we often do stops here and often I'll take Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays, which is usually a hard date for a touring artist to get a gig someplace.

Yeah.

So it works out really well.

And I get to have some really amazing people play here.

That's also a built up thing over time.

It's, you know, that's, you know, at the start it's, oh, I'm just enticing.

But after a while, that's reputation.

That is the work over decades to say, hey, we're gonna, we respect the artists here.

We have the people that want to listen to this stuff and that's super valu.

Like, even if it's not the biggest show they can possibly get, it's a show where the people care and that means so much to an artist.

That's exactly what we try to cater to here.

We can seat approximately between 50 and 60 people comfortably.

It's a listening room.

So we really insist on people paying attention to what's going on.

Keep quiet to the performance, don't take videos or use your cameras or a minimal anyway amount, of course, photographing.

Because we do record everything.

Yeah.

Film everything.

So there's a YouTube channel with literally hundreds of shows up from what we've been doing for the last decade or so.

Wow.

Well, speaking of shows, let's talk about some of the shows coming in for the Fringe Festival because, I mean, that's why we're here.

And then we're gonna dive into Nerdery for a little bit as well.

No problem.

So I can deep dive in that one.

Yeah, let's talk about some of the shows that are coming in for Fringe.

The stuff I do, I.

My wife and I really listen and try to figure out what would make sense sounding really well in here.

Plus I have a ton of friends.

So the first show is Called the Bass of Operation.

This bass player named Joe Fonda, who's played here at least 60 times.

He's here actually next month, too.

Has a group with a saxophone player named Jeff Lederer, a drummer named Harvey Sorgan, and a bassoon player that plays like Coltrane.

It's an amazing amalgamation of new music.

It's all newly written stuff.

Yeah.

It's just all original tunes almost all the time.

And it's.

They're fun and easy to listen to, and it's not abstract.

Like, I've been known at times to have some stuff, so it's one thing.

And hearing that instrumentation between the two reed players, it's just astonishing.

Yeah.

You know what goes on.

And there actually is a video of their previous show here up on our YouTube if you want to kind of get a feel for what they sound like.

It's also a great way, like, for the people that aren't part of the regular clientele, that aren't as immersed into the genre to get that, hey, sometimes you need that little bit of a.

Hey, I need to.

I need to understand this a little bit before I go out for a show.

Yeah.

And anyone we present these days, there's a YouTube somewhere.

Oh, there has to be.

Yeah.

At this point.

So you get a feel for whether it's going to be abstract or comfortable.

You know, we've done some folk stuff, acoustic blues stuff.

That's some really legendary stuff this year.

And a few things coming up in the fall that are really exciting as well.

Nice.

But the.

The series I put together for the fort fringe is.

Most of it's based around who's around.

Hey, that helps.

Convenience is a huge thing.

Like, also, it's something that I've learned over time is there's something about just being present for people doing great creative things.

Right.

And it's about booking, too.

Like, hey, people that are available, that show up when they say they're going to show up, that, you know you're going to get a quality show and it's important to.

All right, Got sidetracked.

Sorry.

Here, I just gotta find something.

No worries.

Yeah.

Because that's.

For me, that's something I've talked about a lot, Especially with the photography scene, with people trying to break into different spots, is that being present and contributing to these creative outlets, really looking at the things, talking to the artists, it matters so much.

Being present is so wildly underrated.

And the artists that we have here are really easy to understand.

Yeah.

Talk to.

A lot of musicians will come and spend Some time afterwards, talking about instruments or, you know, charts that they write.

Most of this stuff is actually fairly written, but with lots of improvisation kind of mixed in.

Well, because that's the hang part of.

Right.

A lot of this kind of music is, hey, we're feeling like this should go on more.

Let's just do it.

And those are also the skills you build and the improv skills you build over time.

Because, you know, Fringe has so much improv, so much different style of performing.

But this kind of music is like.

Improv is kind of endemic to a lot of this music.

Much of our stuff isn't completely improv, for sure, at the end of the week.

Well, the next thing coming up is some local people, and it's called Sound Signal Contemporary Music Ensemble, which I'm not 100% sure what it's going to sound like, but I trust the people involved, including Charlie Pillow and Dave Revillo, who are faculty at Eastman.

Nathan Smith on saxophones, and there's a whole slew of other folks.

It's a nine piece.

Oh, wow.

That's going to be here with a lot of strings.

Oh, that's fantastic.

Played based on a film that's going to be projected behind the band that we're playing, improvising to whatever is visually going on behind them.

Very cool.

That's kind of a fun challenge.

Yeah.

Because we haven't never done anything like that before.

And it turns out we've got two others this fall with visuals and one show in quad, which we've never done yet either.

But that'll be interesting sounding in here.

I love that too.

Like, if you play as much as these people do and you are dedicated to performing in whatever form is engaging to the audience.

It's not about, you know, eschewing tradition.

It's the how do you.

How do you engage with the audience that there is now and, you know, maybe some of those multimedia engagements.

Hey, it might grab some new people that want to listen to this and just coming.

Coming here with an open mind.

Yeah.

Especially because you can taste everybody before you come here.

Most everything I do is fairly easy to listen to.

Most everything.

I'm really looking forward to this thing because it's the instrumentations.

Flute, bass clarinet, alto saxophone, clarinet, French horn, flugelhorn, viola, synthesizer.

Wow.

Russian and E bass, whatever that is.

How does that much.

I mean, those kind of mute.

Those kind of instruments are not subtle when it comes to their volume.

How does the space.

How does the space handle that?

The acoustics in here are breathtaking.

Yeah.

If you watch some of the videos we posted, the acoustics here, it's probably because the irregularity of the records and the thin ceiling.

Yeah, I was gonna say because it's kind of absorbing some stuff with the soft.

You still have a lot of color.

If you've been in the store during the day.

When it's a record store, it doesn't look like anything like the venue.

Everything you see here is on wheels.

Yeah.

So we can morph this place into a pretty comfortable 50 seater with a little standing room.

The acoustics are great all the way to the front door.

See, I love that too, because that's, you know, it's.

It has to be functional.

And I love function.

Right.

So, like, much.

So, like my.

The space I built is all about function first.

And.

Yes, I like the way it looks.

I like the feel, but function matters.

To me more like function after.

I was gonna say partially lucky.

I was gonna say how much of that was because, like, you still have some of the old, like, tin ceiling style.

Right.

And we left that alone.

But what happens is the irregularity of all the stuff that's around the walls.

Yeah.

Acts as acoustic tiles.

Yeah.

So you could really hear really well in here.

I was gonna say, just even sitting in here, like, I can feel.

You can feel that little deadness in the air in the best possible way for that kind of thing.

And as.

As a nerd like, that has to be very gratifying to hear this, hear performers in a space that is beneficial because there are places that are ostensibly venues that are, you know, a little discordant.

They're not thought through to that level.

Right.

Yeah.

And I'm sure it's like somebody who's paying attention to that.

You can hear it.

You can hear it when you walk into the venue even before somebody's playing.

We know the bands that play here, the artists that play here know how to play.

The rooms are playing in.

Yeah.

So when the artist plays the room, the audience.

What happens is when the three things combine into one thing.

The audience, the room, and the band coalesce to one thing, that's where magic happens.

Well, it's kind of the moment too.

Yeah.

Right.

Like, it's the kind of thing where you can listen to a live recording, but that feeling you can't have in it.

And seeing, especially with improv stuff or just things that are going on, it's a conversation.

Yeah.

The artists are talking and listening to each other.

So someone might go wander off in one direction and everyone will follow.

Yeah.

You know, It'll flow nicely.

It'll be pretty.

It won't be cacophonic mostly, but you can see in the eyes.

You can see in the feeling, the expressions.

There's so much going on that you can't.

That doesn't involve hearing.

Yeah, there's just as much as seeing.

For sure.

I, you know, I enjoy when I.

When I'm not too busy running the show, I usually sit back someplace, close my eyes and sort of become part of the.

The music that's going on.

Well.

And I think that's part of that whole experience.

Right.

There's for.

For serious.

I know I'm going to say serious audio people.

I don't prefer the term.

Yeah.

Audiophile nearly as much because I think it also connotates a certain kind of snobbery.

Yeah.

Audio.

That's not.

This is not.

Definitely not audio file.

Right.

And the reason I say that is because there's this.

There's this mentality I got.

I dove in for a while where you're trying to make this perfect environment.

Right.

You're.

You're.

And we tried.

We try to do the best we can.

Yeah.

You know, we got upgrading equipment and Dan Gross, who does the recording and the filming and stuff here is always getting.

Every show is better.

Yeah.

Really figuring out the room.

We.

Our piano can be miked beautifully and it's just a.

Kind of a lightweight spin it.

But we can make it sound like a baby grand if it's mic'd correctly positioned correctly, and the right player knows how to play that piano.

It's that intentionality.

But it's all in service to the people in the room and capturing as best you can.

I think that's the part of that.

The whole practice of optimizing your listening for a solo thing is you are separate.

You're separate from other people, you're separate from the performers.

Even though you're trying to recreate this live feel at the same.

In your headphones.

At the same time, though, the band, the artists will.

It's a journey.

Yeah.

That you can go on, you know, and sometimes those things really work perfectly.

Yeah.

At times.

And most of them do here we got some.

You know, but if you got some time, go to the YouTube channel.

There's like gazillion fantastic stuff to see.

And speaking, you know, for all the shows, make sure you go to rochesterfrench.com I think you can filter on the venue.

You can filter on Bob Shop and see all of the shows coming in.

So definitely do that.

I kind of Want to go back to.

You mentioned you're listening in the 70s and 80s is kind of formative to the way you.

The way you started to dive in deeper.

Right.

What was the kind of things you were really into during that time?

Oh, dear.

That gets a little weird.

Yeah, I love it.

Oh, gosh.

I had a record start job when I was 16.

Oh, so you're one of the.

One of the precocious people in as soon as you can.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

I was going to con.

I saw the talking heads at RIT cafeteria.

Oh, wow.

Gang of four police.

Was that.

That was like right around the 77.

I was gonna say right at when the first album came out.

Because that first album was so.

Is so special and it's so disconnected from the perfection.

Oh, yeah.

Because it's.

It's nerd, it's really funny, it's nerdy.

But it's also coming out of that New York scene at the same time.

Yeah.

The new.

You know, I never got the city very often.

I only went to CBGB's once.

But we had our own bar here called Scorgies that had all those bands playing as well, which, you know, I was there all the time.

But when I started listening to music, it was rock and roll first.

You always hear.

You know, I was really into the who and kind of classic rock, Alice Cooper and Black Sabbath.

And I saw, you know, I saw all those bands back in the 70s, but it morphed into jazz too.

So I was listening to a lot of Miles Davis in 74, Ornette Coleman, Coltrane at the same time.

Patti Smith, the Sex Pistols and the.

And the Cramps.

Yeah.

So you're kind of like.

So I'm going to pause on the Cramps for a second because that's something I knew so little about.

And I went to a show in.

Went to a show in Pittsburgh Fringe in April.

And is this.

This creative guy who's doing this like old school show where he had the film of Plastic that he put images on.

He would crank it, like animating it.

Yeah.

And the whole show was about, I think, Christmas in the Cramps, where Santa's using them as like.

It is just an odd show and it's so particularly fringe.

But somebody who loves that music.

He told the whole story of the band.

I knew so little of it.

Yeah.

There's a new record just came out.

Is it really?

That just came out of stuff.

The demos that came out in 76 and 7, they stopped by the store.

Many times and just like truly genuinely Odd people and like doing this off stage.

They weren't that odd.

Yeah.

Really?

No, they were pretty because like the performance was so like is so like over the top.

Right.

This, the whole time I saw him.

Was like the portrayal.

What were they doing great.

But it was this raw energy that was out there.

And then you know when you see in the Ramones in the early days and, and it was about.

I mean Ramones were a girl group.

And it's lean too.

So influenced by the Shangri Las and all the girl groups.

Oh, absolutely.

Hence why SPECTRE tried to get a hold of them and ruined them.

I mean, just minus the, Minus the nice tone of the singing.

Yeah, well, yeah.

Minus the quality parts.

But it's like in the best possible way.

Sing beautifully.

Yeah.

Because it's like that leanness.

But I, I, now that you mention.

It, deep down that stuff was about spirit.

Yeah.

You know, seeing the Cramps and seeing.

Oh God, how many, you know, the Clash.

Yeah.

Bands.

It's pretty special.

It's about the energy in the moment.

Yeah.

Seeing Patti Smith changed my life.

I have to imagine, you know, 77.

It's just that like that giant force.

Yeah.

Of energy.

Anything like it.

At that point I was like, oh my gosh.

What, what, what am I seeing?

I mean, what a, what a weird romantic moment that is not about like the, like that part, but the romance of the feeling that that power and that powerful singing can bring it.

You know, when you're in your 20s, you know, this is your, you know, just kind of absorb everything you can if you're that open minded.

And that's kind of how a lot of my taste evolved.

I worked for a record company in the 70s too, into the early 80s called Rounder.

Okay.

Who were major bluegrass label.

But also had George Thorogood when he hit really big.

Oh wow.

And they also were a distributor.

Okay.

So they distributed every small independent label anywhere in the 70s, you know, for bluegrass and old time fiddle music and you know, just all kinds of stuff.

They.

And I learned a lot.

Well, it's a functional, it's a functional company.

Right.

It's not just, oh, we don't just make a record.

We don't just promote it.

You're doing the rest of the stuff too.

Was really important and I was glad to be part of it.

And I was just a sales rep, so it wasn't anything fancy.

Yeah.

But you know, you know, every.

I learned so much about every genre from reggae to Hawaiian slack key guitar to, you know, old time fiddle music.

And Bluegrass.

I can have a good conversation about bluegrass as easily I can with John Coltrane.

Well, I love that too.

Like, for me, like, so my nerdery is food and drink.

Like, I wrote restaurant reviews for a while.

And the thing that I found so enticing about it.

And this dovetails to my mention earlier that I'm nerd first.

Right.

That's how I go through everything is you can never know enough.

You can never know enough about food and drink because there's so much history and culture and, you know, and geography.

Same with records and the music industry.

Yeah.

There's never an end to learning about something new and interesting, whether it's from the turn of this entry or next week.

And that's the part of the discovery and the art of listening to something new and kind of doing that.

I see records and heard about records I've never seen every day.

Yeah, older records.

Old stuff from the 50s and 60s.

You know, lots of.

Lots of weird stuff comes through the store.

So you mentioned listening to new stuff and like, part of the experience of.

Part of having genuine experience and being, you know, an aficionado and, you know, an expert, like, in, you know, an understanding, trying to understand music and be involved and understand context.

Is there something that you've come across recently that you were listening to that was like a new thing that grabbed you?

Oh, that's a tough question.

Not that I can kind of fish out of my brain.

I'm excited about the Cramps reissue.

Sure.

That was the Alex chilton demos from 76 and 7.

There's new stuff.

You know, I try to listen to a little bit of everything.

I don't listen to much rock anymore.

It fluctuates a lot.

My listening habits at home vary a lot as well.

There's a lot of really great new jazz being happening.

Interesting.

Really, really, really a lot of it.

It's pretty obscure stuff.

The labels are really hard to get, but, boy, is there some fantastic writing going on in jazz.

So what about the context of what it is of those things now?

Like, how does that.

How does that.

Is it fundamentally different from, you know, I would say mainstream, you know, the jazz that people know from the past, does it have.

It's not fundamentally different if you've been involved with it all along, but it can be challenging.

But there's still new ideas, you know, stuff Leo Widada Smith's doing, and he's been around a long time, but there's always new and challenging ideas.

Yeah, and it's the ideas the music doesn't have to be challenging.

The ideas can be the flow of ideas that makes the jazz that I like come to fruition.

To what.

What we can create here in the store.

How do you describe those ideas?

Right.

Like, is that.

Is it more just like you need.

A musician for that.

Yeah.

Which I am not.

It translates to how the audience feels when the artists are doing it.

For me, anyway.

Yeah.

And that's how I.

You know, there.

There's.

There's other ways to look at that or listen to that, I suppose.

Yeah.

It's about just listening to a lot.

Yeah.

You know, and there are.

I get a lot of.

Listen to a lot of CDs and some.

Meh.

They're okay.

Good ideas.

Some are just breathtaking.

Yeah.

You know, some sound like other records.

There's, you know, Cats that Rich Halley has a new record out that I listened to the other night.

Some sax player that I like.

Solid record, fabulous record.

Wasn't really breaking new ground, but the playing was superb, the arrangements were superb, and, you know, the tunes were fabulous.

Ricky Ford's gonna be playing here on the Friday.

There's one other in between, but.

Oh, please mention Ricky Ford.

Ricky, gosh, he's the closest thing to train that I think anyone's gonna hear at this point in time.

He played with Charles mingus throughout the 70s with the Oduli Ibrahim and a slew of other cats all through the late 60s, through mostly 70s.

All his solar records were done in the 70s.

Just a fantastic player.

The band he brings with him every year is just unbelievably good.

So it's pretty exciting to hear that stuff.

This will be maybe the fifth time he's been here.

He comes every year, so I'm gonna do one more nerdery thing specifically about.

About, like, about records and things.

And then I kind of want to talk about the shop and things about that.

So when you're, you know, as somebody who, like, I'm super focused on the podcast side, but when I'm listening to, you know, digital recordings with podcasts and otherwise, like, oh, I can hear.

Oh, they changed the mic.

Oh, they changed, you know, they changed the bit rate on the thing.

Like, you can hear that stuff.

Not because I have the best equipment, it's just you're paying attention.

Right.

When you're.

When you're listening to.

When you're listening to a recording, what are the things you look for to say this is a recording that I.

That I think is a good one?

Right.

What are the.

What are the things that you are grabbing from.

That is about feel.

Yeah, it's about feel.

I'm not a pure audiophile like Benny, you know, I like all formats pretty much.

If the seat.

You know, I like CDs too.

I prefer vinyl.

It's a warmer sound.

But if the CD is mastered properly from the master sources, they sound fine.

Yeah.

A lot of the early days, CDs were horrendous.

Well, and then there was this time where everything got over compressed too.

And that was just so it's.

They've figured it out.

It's a format that's necessary.

And anything's better than Spotify.

We don't use a streaming service.

Yeah.

At all.

I have nothing to do with any of those things.

We use Bandcamp to learn.

And Bandcamp's great because the artist gets the money.

Well, I think that's an important point just to pause on for a second is, you know, if you're talking to an artist or you want to support them, part of it is asking them, how do you want to be supported?

Where do you want me to get your music?

There's a lot of ways they're doing it where the artist can get.

Bandcamp's one of them.

Yeah, absolutely.

Buying it from the artist at the gig is the best way.

Huge.

Through some of the stores.

Most of my stuff comes from the distributors, but I do buy a lot directly from artists.

Yeah.

And I pay them up front for anything I stock.

Oh, it raises their.

Raises their ability online.

Oh, I can't remember the name of it.

Things that the artists do.

Patron.

Patron.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's huge.

And that really is a great thing for a lot of artists, especially the ones that aren't on commercial radio.

And a lot of my musician friends use the.

Use that form, especially the acoustic and the blues and the, you know, Bill Kirchen, who I bring to town every year, has a really good patron, and he's here at least twice a year.

Yeah.

Between me and at Abilene.

So that's fantastic.

Everyone commended Commander Cody and the hot and Lost Planet Airman.

Wow.

That's Lincoln guy.

I was going to say.

That just brought me back.

I was talking to somebody.

Talk is the hot rod Lincoln player.

Completely.

Yeah.

So I. I was.

I was listening.

I was doing another preview, and there was an artist who I listened to as a kid who's part of that, like, you know, novelty record side of things.

Okay.

And like, I listened to a lot of that when I was a kid, and I just got to talk to somebody who Was on one of those albums.

Okay.

I got to say, it was Jim's big ego out of Boston.

Well, I actually have heard of them.

He was part of that, you know, you know, the mid to late 90s, part of the, like, the Dr. Demento, D.J.

Side of things.

I kind of vaguely remember some of that.

And I just got to talk to somebody.

Like, for me, as a kid, I like, those are the things that meant so much to me because I was a. Yeah.

I wasn't a.

So I didn't know how to be a social person yet.

I didn't know how to, like, engage.

Might not be the right way through.

Yeah.

But those kind of things were there for me at the time.

And they felt comfortable.

They felt like, you know, they felt at home.

And it feels like that's kind of how this space is for the people that love this kind of love this.

Kind of music that's, you know, it.

Feels like the space is very much for the people that need it.

So when.

When you're.

When you're laying this out, everyone needs it.

Yeah.

I think what we're dealing with, it's just.

We need to be able to take a minute and escape.

Yeah.

And take a minute and think and take a minute and smile and take a minute and enjoy your friends.

And a lot of what goes on here is that.

That type of thing.

Yeah.

So when most of my audience are people who know the store.

Yeah.

You know, the new people are really stunned when they walk in and actually realize that this is actually a venue that works.

Yeah.

Well.

And then also, like, if you want to dive into something, you have somebody to talk to who knows.

Who knows how to give you real advice.

And it's something that's so.

So underrated, is you can go in and talk to a person that cares about what they're doing.

Yeah, that's true.

Here I've got a staff that has expertise in different areas and a classical expert.

I can fudge just about anything.

Same.

But some guy, you know, one gentleman who works here part time, but he's like, if you need to know anything about the Beatles of the Stones.

Yeah.

Or the.

Who are Beach Boys.

He knows catalog numbers, everything you want to know.

Jim, who works here part time, owned a store in Pittsburgh, you know, during the punk era.

I've been at it for 50 years now.

Yeah.

So, you know, the people that are here know lots of things about lots of things, and it's easy to figure it out.

You know, I can figure out what someone's looking for pretty easily.

With a bit.

With only a little bit of information.

Sure.

You know, the Internet helps.

Yeah, for sure.

You know, so I'm kind of.

I'm kind of intrigued.

So, like, you know, a shop.

So when.

When did this.

When did the shop open?

1982.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

So, right.

Flea market booth.

I was gonna say right before I was born.

So, like, dear me.

So opening.

So opening then.

And like, you've gone through these.

Gone through these.

You know, the ups and downs of physical media, Right.

And the different genres, right?

From records.

Stories about that.

From records to cassettes to CDs to CDs, to then basically that.

That valley of.

It started to fall into the digital.

And then there was this.

I'd say this resurgence, this beautiful resurgence of let's.

Let's listen to music purposefully again and not just have that.

Right.

That's.

That.

And that's why streaming is terrible.

Yeah.

A, the fidelity.

B, nobody gets paid unless you're Metallica.

Right.

But.

And even, you know, just the streaming services are shite compared to physical.

Physical.

It's a way to learn, of course, for sure.

But as things are, CDs are starting to come back in the consciousness of younger folks because they're tired of just not having anything in their hands.

The physical.

You know, to me, CDs are tough because I can't read the liner notes anymore, but.

But it's still something to hold in your hands.

And it's a product that the artist can kind of relate to and.

And the.

The buyer can relate to what's there.

It's important.

It's an important part of the human need.

Yeah.

Well, I think it's also.

I think is the word I was looking for.

It's also engaging in that whole practice of.

This is one thought, right?

Like, an album is a whole thought.

It's not a song.

It's a whole thought.

And much of the jazz is like that much.

Everything like that, you know, anything like that and, you know, seeing the artist and talking, a lot of talking about.

Some of the people who hear are musicians or they just really enjoy what they're hearing.

They'll spend time talking about what would that passage that you did hear.

I really like that song.

Where the lyrics come from, you know, what the story is behind some of the songs.

Especially, you know, the folk singers that we have here and the acoustic blues singers and stuff that have, you know, the singer songwriters that come through here.

It's pretty special.

We've got one thing in the fall that everyone really should check out.

Oh, wow.

Yeah, so he's, he's got this singer songwriter thing going with this, this woman named Alice Howe.

But that's not French.

But that's also beautiful.

Right.

Like there's this, oh, you're part of this, you're part of a whole.

And then you get that chance to stretch and you get to learn about them as a.

To learn about them as, as an artist in a way that you wouldn't have known.

Just you might hear the talent, you might hear the skill.

Right.

But then you get to hear their perspective, which is, I think that's the whole thing is like understanding somebody's perspective.

Where are they coming from?

Why are they doing this?

And the hope is you can hear it.

Right.

And you know, I think that's the other thing is, you know, that's in the, that's in the ear of the beholder.

Right.

You are, you're in what the interpretation has to do with the event and what's going on.

Yeah, it doesn't work for everybody, but it works stunningly for some.

Yeah.

I remember having a show here a bunch of years ago.

There's a guitarist named Pete McCann, ridiculously great guitar player.

And I remember there's a young, you know, 20 something kid over the counter listening and I just heard him under, under his breath, man, I gotta rethink everything.

Yeah, he did.

It was exactly what he said.

But what, I mean that, that kind of moment can't happen necessarily another way organically.

And it's like feeling it in person.

Right.

And that's the thing is like that moment is so invaluable.

Yeah.

But I think for all of us that care about things, we have those.

Moments for human lives.

That's invaluable.

But I think we, we all have those moments too.

Right.

Where we realize you cherish those moments.

And then it brings you to other things that you can experience galore.

And exploring things is, you know, same with food, you know.

Yeah.

I'm a foodie of sorts.

Yeah.

So Jan and I are always looking for cool restaurants or cool recipes to cook.

Yeah.

We don't own a television, which is a little weird, but we one's in a closet somewhere.

We can go back quickly.

There's a couple more shows Fringe I want to talk about.

We talked about the sound signal ensemble, which is going to be really interesting because I'm not quite sure what to expect.

Yeah.

Then I have a couple of friends playing.

Jake Wark is a saxophone player from Rochester, and Mike McNeil is a pianist from Buffalo.

This is.

This is completely improvised saxophone with electronics and piano.

Great.

Probably not written, but truly interesting stuff.

And they've.

They've both played here before.

Jake played for.

He was a student of Paul Smoker, who was at NAS for a bunch of years.

Okay.

Paul influenced a lot of people, including me.

Paul was able to teach me how to listen differently.

So how did you.

How would you describe that teaching?

Oh, dear.

Listen.

By listening.

Yeah.

And hear this.

Hear this.

Do you hear that?

Oh, yeah, that makes sense.

You know, the artists are always willing to talk about that stuff.

They love their, you know, you know, trot their egos up a little bit.

But I think there's something special about that.

Like when you.

When you see somebody that really cares about the thing or is even.

Is just super enthusiastic.

Like when I'm.

When I'm doing tastings.

Right.

Or I'm talking to somebody, like, oh, how do you.

Like, I'm.

I'm a spirits judge for competitions.

Right.

And like, when I'm tasting with somebody, I'm like, what are you tasting?

And then you might listen to something side by side or taste something side by side.

And like, the differences.

And then how do you describe that?

Can vary a lot.

Yeah.

And then how do you describe the difference?

And it's not about snobbery.

It's about caring so hard about these things.

About your palette.

Yeah.

You know, because it can be different.

Well, it's musical palette, too.

Right.

Like, this might just ring to your ears a certain way.

Did you use to paint?

Yeah.

You know, and then it's.

You can look at it as, you know, some of the avant garde stuff that we've done in the past.

It's kind of like listening to Jackson Pollock, you know, if you could translate that into something right.

Visually abstract.

So the shows, this particular batch of shows is all mostly people who I've known a long time.

Yeah.

Of course, the Ricky Ford's going to be epic.

And that sells out every year for sure.

And then the last show, there's two shows.

The last show is my friend Stu Cutler, longtime great guitar player.

It's a classic organ trio and it's fun as hell.

It's just really just.

He's a great guitar player.

He's also played here a bunch, so you can watch videos.

And then just for kicks and giggles, I've thrown in a freebie.

Yeah.

At the end of after festival.

I'm not sure they want me to talk about this.

Hey, we're talking about it.

Anyway.

Well, my friend Taylor Hobinem is a trumpet player out of New York, and he's coming through, and he was just gonna stop by and say hey.

And he's coming with two cellists.

Huh.

All Asian Americans.

Yeah.

So this show is free.

Yeah.

To anyone who attends the five fringe shows here.

I love that.

I love that little.

That little bolt on of, hey, somebody's.

Coming by, and it's gonna be interesting.

I mean, trumpet and two cellos is like, okay.

Yeah, that might work.

Yeah.

And knowing these cats who I've seen a ton of times, I mean, it's gonna work great.

Yeah.

But something a little bit different.

Right.

And I. Strings sound great in here.

Cellos and stuff like that.

I can also see it on your face.

Just like.

I'm not sure exactly how it's gonna work out, but I'm excited to see how it's gonna work.

The exploratory thing.

Yeah.

What's new?

What.

What.

What sound can I hear or feel differently when I walk away from this?

Yeah.

You know, when we had Doug McLeod last month, this great blues player that just is astonishing.

Fabulous storyteller who's 80, and just.

Just a.

And people came away with, you know, really happy about what they heard and felt, and they could feel his emotion in the songs that he was singing.

Yeah.

And the stories that he was telling about all kinds of history.

And, you know, he lives in Memphis now, but.

And that's.

That happens all the time.

Yeah.

You know, the singer songwriter is a little more apt to that.

Of course.

But even the jazz tunes have stories.

Yeah.

I can't think of any specifically, but almost everything has a story behind it, whether it's from eating dinner someplace or being on a mountaintop.

When John Orebigon went out west during COVID he spent a lot of times in northwestern Nebraska or South Dakota playing solo saxophone in rock quarries and.

And sculptures.

I mean, what an exploration.

He made a record out of it.

What an exploration.

That had to.

Really.

Pure exploration.

Yeah.

You know, times the saxophone sounds like the wind.

Yeah.

You know, it's.

And the wind is going to influence how he creates his tone on the saxophone.

He's gonna be here this summer, actually.

Maybe.

Anyway, I've got shows booked at June already.

It's like, oh, shoot, in July.

Oh, my God, I love it.

So let's close out for today because we can do this forever.

I'm enthralled.

I'm really enjoying our conversation.

Do this and it's fine.

We can talk about other subjects if you want to do it.

Would love to do that.

So get out the plugs.

Go to rochesterfringe.com filter on Bob Shop.

You can look for all of the shows here.

Get your tickets rochesterfringe.com Tom, where else do you want people to follow?

The Bop Shop and where is it located so people can come by.

That's a good idea.

Yeah.

Right.

The plugs.

We're on Monroe avenue in Brighton.

1460 Monroe Avenue.

Just as you enter Brighton from the city on Monroe Avenue.

It's a little strip mall with a green awning.

It's pretty easy to find.

We have a website, which is the safest bet as far as knowing what I'm up to.

We have a mailing list which you should be on.

And we also do Instagram and Facebook, which I have minions do.

I'm never on Facebook anymore.

I just gave up on Facebook.

It was just too much rubbish to wade through.

And if you're not on it all the time, it doesn't.

You see stuff you just don't want anything to do with.

No.

A lot of friends around there and I like to find out what they're up to.

The only time I post anything is when I'm cooking.

I'm listening to this record and making this dinner.

I love it.

You know, that kind of thing.

And I'm drinking this wine.

Perfect.

That's.

I'd like to do that more.

We've been so busy this summer.

I haven't had time to do much cooking.

Yeah.

And all.

I just canned a bunch of beets.

Beautiful time of year for that.

Starting to get them out.

Yeah, it's great.

So I learned canning from my.

Mainly from my grandmother, not my mother.

Yeah.

So I can.

I can do a few things, you know, when I have time.

Yeah.

But it all takes time and then listening.

Even at home, listening to specific music when I'm either reading, which I do mostly.

Yeah.

I'm an avid reader.

Or if I'm cooking or I'm playing cards with my wife.

You know, just that kind of thing.

It's.

It's all about the atmosphere that you decide to put yourself in.

Yeah.

And we offer an atmosphere here that I hope people will like.

And I think you should come enjoy that atmosphere during the Rochester Fringe Festival from September 15th to the 26th.

Get your tickets.

RochesterFringe.com, come see the Bop Shop.

Come say Hi to Tom.

Come during the day and see the records because it's very different than it does when.

During a show.

Yeah.

Listen to some great music.

And then if you want to listen to other shows on the Lunchadore podcast network, go to lunchadore.org Speaking of reading, I think the week this is coming out, we're launching our Rochester's book club podcast reader's advisory with a whole bunch of librarians locally.

They're doing an amazing job.

Excited for everybody to hear that.

There's actually a book signing on the 23rd.

Oh, love it here.

Always more.

She wrote a book called the hundred things you need to do in Rochester.

Oh, yeah, I remember that.

Well, she's coming.

Her second book's coming out.

Oh, that's awesome.

About 100 things you didn't know about Rochester.

Okay.

It's on the website and I'm in it.

Not real thrilled about that.

Yeah, it'll be fun.

We're doing the book signing here.

They'll probably be wine.

That's fantastic.

You know, so she wanted to do it here.

Yeah.

Because I helped her out with some stuff.

Putting it together, but.

Fantastic.

But you can all read about all that on the website and so.

As well.

So nice.

Well, thanks, Tom.

And then we'll see everybody out on the fringe.

Bye.

Cheers.

Done.

I hope I didn't.

Do you edit that?

Nope.

No, I didn't swear today.

No, you're good.

Hey, Dan, how are you?