Waltz

A fashionable tape shop

The resurgence in vinyl has resulted in a slew of new record shops opening up in Tokyo and all around the world. But what of their successor, the much looked-over tape? A few independent record stores have a small tape section, but it's always lacking. So, when I heard about Waltz, I was very interested. I grew up listening to tapes, so they have a lot of nostalgic meaning to me. But tapes are hard to find in Japan for two reasons. One is that they're not cool (yet) and there's not a huge market for tapes. The second being that tapes never really took off in Japan, so there are just less of them around in general. From the outside, Waltz looks like a tape lovers dream. There are shelves of tapes, organized neatly by artist and genre. But if you look closer, that's where the cracks start to appear. Firstly, all the tapes are outrageously overpriced! We're talking about three to four times the markup compared to if you just bought them on eBay. What's insane is that people were actually buying them. I saw two purchases during the time I was browsing! There's a small vinyl section (the reverse of many record shops, which I found amusing). However, it has the same problem. It's well curated but extremely overpriced. I left in disappointment without buying anything, and with no plans to ever return. If you're looking for a specific tape, then they'll probably have it here. But, it depends on the premium that you're willing to pay. I'm hoping that another tape shop will open in Tokyo soon to even out the market, because this is unacceptable for anyone who knows the true market rate of tapes!