Thurston Moore opened a record store in London

Thurston Moore has opened a record store, Ecstatic Peace Library, in London’s Hackney neighborhood. Sharing its name with Moore’s record label (and more specifically its publishing arm), the former Sonic Youth singer/guitarist opened the store in February with comic artist Edwin Pouncey (aka Savage Pencil who has done art for SY, The Fall and more) and Soho Music and Zippo Records founder Pete Flanagan. It’s a pop-up that Thurston prefers to call “an experiment” and said when it opened, “We are giving it a month or so. If it works, we’ll keep on keepin’ on.” It’s still going and The Guardian recently stopped by:

There’s not just vinyl but prints, T-shirts, zines, books. I want it all. As if on cue, the first customer walks in. “This is sick,” she says to her friend. I chat to Peter from Richmond who has come all this way to buy some Luc Ferrari and Stockhausen. A young French man on his holidays spends hours going through everything. I notice a special little Norwegian black metal corner. “Satanists are people too, Suzanne,” Thurston says, drily explaining the story of Necrobutcher, bassist of the church-burning band Mayhem.

Indeed this is the joy of hanging out here, hearing fans exchange knowledge. Frankie, who is 19, says this is much better than the time she tried to buy a Doors album and the man selling it to her asked her what she knew about them. “It was scary. Like a test!”

This is indeed more welcoming. “Are you dog friendly ?” a customer asks. “Oh sure,” comes the reply. “We are everything friendly.”

Ecstatic Peace Library is located at 96 Stoke Newington Church St in Hackney, London and is open daily from 11 AM – 6 PM. Check out a few more pics of the store and its selections via Moore’s Instagram, below.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B9JMoe3FXQi/