By Kevin Haas
Rock River Current
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LOVES PARK — Before he decided to rebuild both his business and his extensive collection of CDs and records, Brian Bowman took time to grieve the loss of a shop he had grown over more than a quarter century.
CD Source, located inside the former Park Theatre at 5723 N. Second St., was destroyed in an electrical fire last September. Then it was demolished and cleared away because of safety and nuisance concerns.
“It’s not a person, obviously, but I went through the same sort of stages,” Bowman said.
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Now Bowman is on the cusp of a new stage. He’s preparing to reopen CD Source in a new location at 5704 N. Second St., just across the street from the shop he ran for years after moving from downtown Rockford. The new site will open at 11 a.m. Monday. The business has been in operation for 27 years.
“It had to be another location close, if we were even going to do it again,” Bowman said.
He said rebuilding the original store would have been too expensive, but they found a fitting location across the street that could be remodeled.
Bowman said support from longtime customers and people across the community pushed him to make a fresh start in a new space.
“I had employees from 20 years ago that I barely remembered, emailing and phone calls, saying ‘You’ve got to do it again. You’ve got to do it again,'” Bowman said. “It worked. That’s what made it bearable. It was very touching.”
As for the collection of CDs, records and stereo equipment you’ll see when you walk in the shop Monday.
“It’s pretty solid, considering we lost everything,” he said. “A couple regulars have come in and just kind of snooped around and they’re pretty happy and pretty impressed with how much we’ve accumulated.”
The new shop is a former cleaner’s that Bowman and his team have spent months renovating, including building racks by hand, painting and replacing the flooring. The store also needed heating and air conditioning.
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It is reopening as vinyl is having a resurgence in popularity. Last year was the 17th consecutive year vinyl album sales grew in the U.S., according to Luminate, an entertainment data company. It was also the largest year for vinyl sales since the company began tracking data in 1991. There were 43.46 million records sold in 2022, up more than 4% from the previous year.
“If I really want to listen to something, that’s when I’ll go break out a record,” Bowman said. “It has a warmth to it. It’s an analog sound versus a digital sound.”
Bowman warned that the shop won’t be as organized as the previous place at first. But that will come as the collection grows.
“It’s going to grow fast,” he said. “So they’ll always be things moving and in motion, but it will be shoppable for sure.”
About | CD Source
Where: 5704 N. Second St., Loves Park
Reopening: 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday, June 5
Hours: 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday; 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday
Contact: 815-963-2842
On the web: cdsourcerockford.com; Follow CD Source on Facebook
This article is by Kevin Haas. Email him at khaas@rockrivercurrent.com or follow him on Twitter at @KevinMHaas.