Come For The Records, Stay For The Dad Jokes

Spend a little time with Gary Anderson and you’re apt to conclude that the guy has all the attributes of a natural-born entertainer: big smile, massive moustache, big personality, booming voice, gifted storyteller—and a huge laugh. 

In fact, early in his adult life Anderson spent a fair bit of time on stage—playing drums and providing backing vocals while touring with aspiring Canadian rock bands Hellhound, Fable, and Task Force.

More from Spin:

• Green Day, Justin Timberlake, Noah Kahan Set For BottleRock Napa
• Kerry King Talks Slayer Reunion, Solo Band On ‘Lipps Service’
• Timothée Chalamet To Host, And Perform, On ‘Saturday Night Live’

For the past four decades, he’s brought music to his customers’ ears as the owner/operator of The Turntable, a record store in the Canadian city of Victoria, B.C. 

And more recently, he’s added another schtick to his repertoire as the handwritten message on a piece of paper taped to the front window of his store explains: Free Dad Jokes Inside!

“It started with COVID. People just needed a bit of humor to get through all that,” Anderson explains. 

“Customers started to enjoy it so much, they would come in and give us one. If I liked it, I would pass it along to other customers. People just seem to get a charge out of seeing that little piece of paper in the window… quite often they just come in and ask for one.”

To which, Anderson is only too happy to oblige: no purchase necessary. 

Anderson likes to have a new joke on hand each day, but also has a few standards. Asked for a couple of his favorites, he offers up a pair of doozies:

“Apparently Mötley Crüe has become a born-again Christian group and has had to change their name to Nuns and Moses…

And then this: “What’s the two downsides of being an egg? You only get laid once… by your mother.”

Ba Dum Tss…

Perhaps fittingly for a store offering hard-to-find records, The Turntable is tucked away in a small alley in downtown Victoria, albeit a very unique one. 

Fan Tan Alley is a narrow 240-foot long passageway between two streets in Victoria’s historic Chinatown—the second-oldest in North America after San Francisco—that has been featured in several films, including the 1990 movie Bird on a Wire. There is plenty of foot traffic in the alley from the city’s cruise ship terminal, helping the tiny 330-square-foot store do an impressive half-million dollars in sales in 2023. 

Anderson was one of the first tenants to move into the alley 38 years ago.

“I just thought it was a neat place and that it would take me a little time to make people aware that I was in the alley, but they would eventually come,” he recalls. “It was freshly restored and it was affordable. Now, everybody is happy in the alley because there’s always some sort of traffic.”

After enduring the ups and downs of the music industry for the better part of five decades, the 72-year-old Anderson has no plans to retire from his current gig.

“I don’t see any hurry to get rid of the store or sell it, since I feel very young and immature,” he proclaims with his hearty laugh. 

Anderson currently has about 10,000 to 12,000 records in the store, 40,000 in total (he keeps extra inventory in two storage spaces)—and his own personal collection of about 23,000 more.

How do you find your records and where do you get them from?

At first I used to be one of those guys that would pedal around on a bike to garage sales. Then I got in with the thrift stores and they would invite me into the back room before they put their records out to the public. As time went on, it got to the point that people would call asking if I wanted to buy their records. I would also go to record shows and buy in bulk. I would go to Vancouver shows, three to four times a year, and I amassed a lot of records that would circulate back to me. That was my plan, to bring enough records to Vancouver Island that when people needed money, were moving, or downsizing I would see them come back to me. It often worked.

During the ’90s, nobody wanted records and often I would come to the store and there would be boxes of records sitting outside with “please take these” signs on them. People wouldn’t even steal them, that’s how useless they were.

What’s the rarest record you’ve ever sold?

There was a group from New Zealand called The Human Instinct. They had an album called Stoned Guitar and at one point there was no master left from that record and there was a guy trying to find the cleanest copy of the record, so they could make a master tape from it. He got in touch with me and I had a still-sealed copy and I ended up selling it to the guy for $5,500.

What’s the highest-priced album currently in the store?

I have a Beatles butcher cover (the Fab Four dressed in smocks covered with raw meat and decapitated dolls) that I have priced at $5,000.

Who is the most famous person to ever come into your store?

I guess it’s sort of Robert Plant. Although he actually didn’t come in. He came up the alley with what looked like a couple of bodyguards, stopped, stared into the store, looked around, and then carried on. Another person who came in and stared at this beautiful picture I had on the wall of Elvis Presley was Kurt Russell. Also, the bass player for Nirvana (Krist Novoselic) came in and looked around.

What was your first concert?

It was supposed to be Nazareth, but they didn’t show up. What apparently happened was Deep Purple was playing in Vancouver, they were good friends and so they decided not to show up here in Victoria and went over to Vancouver to party. So the arena seized all their equipment. I guess my first concert ended up being a band called The Collectors who went on to become Chilliwack.

Do you have an all-time favorite album?

If I had to pick just one it would be the Grand Funk Railroad album called Grand Funk. I call it “the Red Album.” It’s their second album. That’s the album that kinda changed me into the direction of being a musician.

How about a favorite band?

I’d maybe say Grand Funk, but the other band I’ve always really liked is a Dutch band called Shocking Blue… They were a cross between psychedelic, Dutch country, and hard rock. The way the lead guitarist played, you could hear all kinds of things. Being that I really enjoyed the psychedelics back then, they were great to listen to.

Would you have any advice or wisdom for anyone wanting to open a record store?

Don’t. The biggest reason is people are again [building] record collections, so there’s less and less circulation. It could become increasingly difficult to build up an inventory.

What about advice for people out shopping for records?

Shop for the older original albums. The grooves were a lot deeper on that vinyl and had a lot more information coming into your needle. Today, a lot of vinyl is shallower. There’s a better soul to the old vinyl. The mids connect the highs and lows a lot better.

To see our running list of the top 100 greatest rock stars of all time, click here.