Terry Currier first discovered Music Millennium in 1972, when he was a 16-year-old living in Vancouver, Washington. Heâd recently gotten a job at the Jantzen Beach location of regional record store chain DJâs Sound City and was dating a fellow clerk. One evening, the girl told him she had a surprise for him.
âI was thinking something different,â Currier says. âBut she took me to Music Millennium.â
Currier was immediately floored by the storeâs selection, which had already gained a reputation among record shoppers for stocking imports and other hard-to-find titles. He found himself visiting up to four nights a week.
âOur store closed at 9, and Millennium stayed open âtil 10,â Currier says. âAnd I could be over here by 9:15.â
Music Millennium had been founded three years earlier by Don McLeod, his wife Laureen, Laureenâs brother Dan Lissy, and Danâs wife Patty. They opened its doors 50 years ago this month, during the Ides of MarchâMarch 15, 1969, at exactly 3 pm. Originally just 800 square feet, the store gradually expanded to occupy the half-block on East Burnside between 31st and 32nd Avenues.
As the music industry boomed in 1979, McLeod, wishing to dedicate himself to his farm in Clark County, sold the company to a businessman with no prior experience in the record store trade. Within five years, Music Millennium was in debt for a half-million dollars and on the verge of bankruptcy, so McLeod returned and bought back the company.
Around that time, Currier applied for a managerial position at Music Millennium. McLeod all but ignored the 28-year-old, curly-haired music nerd during the interview, dismissively telling him the job had already been filled. Two weeks later, Currier got a call asking if he was still interested in the job. McLeod tested Currierâs musical knowledge over dinner the next day.
âThe first question he asked me was who Fairport Convention was,â Currier says. âAnd I mentioned all the current members, and all the former members, and thatâs the way the evening went. The next day he calls me and goes, âYou want the job?â I go, âYeah, when do you want me to start?â He goes, âCan you start today?ââ
Currier was hired as general manager of Music Millennium in September 1984. He and McLeod worked to pay off the debt and become solvent by improving their record inventory and opening âthe Upper,â the storeâs second-floor loft where they sold smoking paraphernalia and other Northwest essentials.
In 1989, to celebrate the storeâs 20th anniversary, Currier suggested hosting 20 days of live music. They purchased a sound system and built a permanent stage for regular performances, a novel idea back then. That same year, they opened their second location at Northwest 23rd and Johnson, which would host more than 300 in-store performances every year, providing an intimate space for national touring acts and a venue for local artists who couldnât get gigs at larger clubs. Between the Eastside and Westside stores, Currier estimates they hosted more than 4,500 thousand live performances.
Music Millenniumâs turn in the national spotlight came in 1993, during the now-legendary âBarbecue for Retail Freedom,â when Currier travelled up and down the West Coast charbroiling Garth Brooks CDs after the country singer stated that he didnât want his latest album sold in stores that carried used CDs. Currierâs protest drew media attention to the plight of independent record stores, and ultimately inspired the creation of Record Store Day.
After surviving near-bankruptcy in the â80s and the threat posed by major music retailers in the â90s, Music Millenniumâs true test came in the new millennium. When digital music distribution took off in the early â00s, record stores saw fewer customers, sharp declines in profits, and, ultimately, store closures and layoffs. Currierâwhoâd assumed ownership of the company in 1996 after McLeod passed away from leukemiaâwas confronted with this new reality when he was forced to shutter the Westside store in 2007.
âThat was one of the hardest things I ever had to do,â he says. âThere was such an emotional attachment to that store. We had been part of the neighborhood for 30 years.â
By devoting all of its resources to the Burnside store, Music Millennium has managed to endure in a fluctuating industry. It continues to host performances and record signings, and last year began offering beer and cider for customers to sip while shopping.
But whatâs had perhaps the biggest impact on Music Millenniumâs survival is the return of vinylâs popularity. Once relegated to a small, out-of-the-way corner of the store, vinyl has been taking up an increasing amount of floor space. Nationwide, vinyl sales have grown for the 13th consecutive yearâ16.8 million LPs were sold in the US in 2018, a 14.6 percent increase from 2017. Currier estimates that vinyl makes up an average 70 percent of sales at independent record stores.
Though the business has seen its fair share of ups and downs, Currierâs continued engagement with and support of the Portland community is a large part of what makes Music Millennium a treasured local institution.
âTerry has been a pillar of the music community since the beginning of time, it seems like,â says the Decemberistsâ Colin Meloy. âHeâs just an ever-present figure. Music Millennium are survivors.â
Zia McCabe of the Dandy Warhols also considers Currier a mainstay of the local music scene: âHeâs kept his business connected to the community,â she says, adding that Music Millennium ârepresents the kind of place that Portland natives are desperately trying to preserve.â
Currier believes his responsibility is not just to maintain the excitement heâd had for Music Millennium as a teenaged record store nerd, but to pass that same excitement on to future generations.
âWhen I showed up at Millennium in â72, it just blew me away,â he says. âIt felt like my home. I always felt like I was the curator, and my job was to bring Millennium into the future and retain the feel that the store had the first day I walked in.â