Duratone Hi-Fi is like a time capsule for audio buffs. For 51 years, it's been a mecca for those who know their subwoofers from their styluses.
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But it closes on Saturday, July 27, and it's holding a grand sale. There are 30,000 vinyl records on offer and loudspeakers reduced from $8999 to $1999.
So the customers of the past are still there, smelling a bargain.
Men past the bloom of youth listen to Beatles classics from speakers nearly as tall as themselves. They fondle the covers of vinyl records and audio cassettes. The logo of the store is a man and woman talking on ancient phones attached by cables.
This treasure palace of ancient audio technologies opened in 1973 on the same corner of Botany Street and Altree Court in Phillip where it remains, at least until this weekend.
Funders Charles and Fay Cull had been trading from home before the actual shop opened.
Music was a passion and Charles, who lectured in German at the ANU, became something of an amateur expert on the machines needed to play it.
"He was the one who had the technical ability, and his friends at morning tea would say, 'Could you get me one of those turntables or recorders', so he would arrange a sale," Mrs Cull said.
One thing led to another, eventually to the shop and other outlets around Canberra. In its heyday, Duratone made cabinets for the loudspeakers, in one case, in wood to match a harpsichord.
It was always about the quality of the sound and not about the bottom line.
"My father used to travel to Europe to source the very best equipment," their daughter Marie Cull said.
"I have clear childhood memories of sitting and discussing the differences in sound quality with my father while he tried out different combinations of speakers, amplifiers, turntables and cartridges and cables."
But her parents, the founders, are now too old to continue - he is 87 and she is 90 - and the family have other commitments.
But even as the final shutting of the door looms, some things come full circle, like vinyl.
"Things change a lot, don't they?" manager Andrew Hall said as he handed over a long-playing record by a well-known popular music "group" from former times to a fan of said "group".
"When I started there were turntables, and then it went to CDs, and then to surround-sound, and then to streaming - and now it's back to turntables."
But bricks-and-mortar now competes with shops in cyberspace, though Mr Hall said the business remained viable. "We could have competed with online but we really had a different business model," he said.
"This business was never done for the sake of making money. It was always done because the owners just loved hi-fi. And it was always about the service to the customers."
But he conceded demand was not like it was.
"Kids are not really buying hi-fi and older people are not keeping hi-fi so there's definitely a reduction in the amount of sales, but there's still people out there who still want to play records and listen to good music, so it's still a viable business for a while longer," he said.
Viable but soon to close.
Steve Evans
Steve Evans is a reporter on The Canberra Times. He's been a BBC correspondent in New York, London, Berlin and Seoul and the sole reporter/photographer/paper deliverer on The Glen Innes Examiner in country New South Wales. "All the jobs have been fascinating - and so it continues."
Steve Evans is a reporter on The Canberra Times. He's been a BBC correspondent in New York, London, Berlin and Seoul and the sole reporter/photographer/paper deliverer on The Glen Innes Examiner in country New South Wales. "All the jobs have been fascinating - and so it continues."
