Want to make a bet? Close your eyes and pick one album anywhere from the World Clinic Shop & Distribution and ask the gentleman behind the counter to say 5 fun facts about it. If you don’t get them (let the Google help you), we will owe you one jar of honey. But this won’t happen. Honey is ours and the knowledge about albums belong now and forever to the shop owner Aivar Meos.
Aivar, who is always behind the counter, is a music lover with long seniority and World Clinic is his one-man-band. There is probably no keywords of music that he is not related to – the first big record store in independent Estonia, representing record labels and international artists, organising festivals and music events, managing clubs, leading music podcasts, doing DJ gigs and so on.
Aivar’s friends often ask whether the man works at all? The honest answer is – no he doesn’t. On the other hand, keeping up with music is a full time and endless job. Aivar constantly monitors the music press and magazines and collects information on the internet, through record companies and distributors. Being a music curator and recommending good music is Aivar’s mission. “Good music must reach people,” he is sure.
Aivar certainly has a small role as a psychologist in his clinic. Often, the decisive question for the diagnosis might be: “Do you want to identify with Nick Cave or move away from him?” And what always helps with gray weather and bad mood? “A smack of reggae – that works fast and takes you quickly to another reality,” says Aivar, convinced that music is the best way to wander in time and emotions.
Aivar is not afraid of technology and the age of clicks. “Vinyl is like a book, you need to have time to listen it, hold it, gaze at it and enjoy its design. Even changing the vinyl in the player is a pleasure of it’s own, a ritual. Vinyl records are my retirement security,” Aivar laughs. “It’s not about money, it’s about the music,” he sums it up.
Unless Aivar is surfing in music, he enjoys silence, gardening or reading books and comics. If Aivar retires and his record store is done, he will probably make his way to Brighton. A city which atmosphere is also enriched by Nick Cave.
P.S. This David Bowie poster is not for sale.
