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St Albans record shop owner Mark Greene mourned - St Albans & Harpenden Review, 4 January 2011
It began in one room of a terraced house on London Road, St Albans.
Such was Mark's boundless energy, enthusiasm, razor-sharp wit, and charm with customers and reps alike, not forgetting his encyclopaedic knowledge of all musical genres, that he quickly moved to his own multi-storey shop. He also rocked a good suit, as you can see in the photo. Mac McCleod, who taught his finger-picking guitar technique to Donovan who in turn taught it to Dylan (see DA Pennebaker's film of Dylan's 1965 tour), the Stones and Beatles, is in the hairy Afghan.
Rod Argent brought his first record here Tommy Steels 'Signing The Blues' on 78. A young Rod also took advice on what to listen to.
Comments
Name: Vanessa
Comment: The memories of Mark and The Record Room have come flooding back. How sad he has passed away. Most of my record collection was bought there. Instead of being blasted with loud music in the shop you could use a sound booth to choose before you bought. So very civilised!
It really was the place to go for records - singles, EPs and LPs. Mark was a lovely man and oh, so knowledgeable; my grandmother loved her classical music and Mark always helped her find what she wanted.
I didn’t know Mark's sister ran Betty’s, again my grandmother worked there. My granny was quite a gal in a less ageist society!
Name: James
Comment: One of my most embarrassing memories was having to ask the young lady assistant for Let's Do It by The Pink Fairies. Good record though! I also remember listening to Whole Lotta Love by Led Zeppelin at full blast in quadraphonic sound in a record booth – fantastic – probably why I am going slightly deaf now!
Comment: Very sad news. In the late 1950s I would cycle from the station to The Record Room after work and although officially closed Mark would open the shop and advise me on recordings made by the obscure people credited as songwriters or mentioned on liner notes on recordings by Elvis Presley, Lonnie Donegan, etc. The result was that he aquired (mainly imported) the most prized vinyl records in my collection. Thanks Mark. R.I.P.
Name: Laurie Prior
Comment: I visited Mark at his shop many times in 1970 when I was a sales rep working for EMI. I would often take him to lunch in St Albans and he introduced me to a small restaurant down Holywell Hill which among their menu of English dishes offered the first ever Tandoori Chicken I had seen - long before Indian restaurants started to offer it on sale. Mark made good fun out of the fact that he was Jewish yet in a local café his regular lunchtime order was a bacon sandwich.
He always gave me a good 'order' for all the new releases and I could count on him to enhance my sales figures. So sad to hear he passed on. I also lost touch with the very knowledgeable colleague at The Record Room who ran the classical counter in Mark's shop, Bob King, who moved to Sussex and started his own record shop at Washington or Angmering. Bob built Mark's classical section to really lively sales levels. Fond memories of Mark and those 1970s days.
(8 August 2015)
In the late 1970s, Mark was a regular customer at Lightning Records on the Harrow Road. He was such a nice, friendly and cheerful guy.
I seem to recall, hopefully correctly, that he would regularly purchase copies of 'Easy Loving' by Bo Kirkland and Ruth Davies. Also, I think, 'The Pearl Fishers' Duet' by Jussi Bjorling and Robert Merrill.