Idea: Designate Tower Records a cultural landmark

Domenic Priore, the author of "Riot on Sunset Strip: Rock ‘n’ Roll’s Last Stand in Hollywood,” wants the city of West Hollywood to designate the former Tower Records store on Sunset Boulevard (across from Book Soup) as a Strip-themed cultural resource center. He has filed with the city and will get a hearing on March 26 before the West Hollywood Historic Preservation Commission. From the Park La Brea News:

“[The site is] just really important,” Priore said. “It was such a central locus for the music industry back in the day. It was really where all the buzz really was.”

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“It was where a lot of the pop media and the music behind pop media was coming from in a way,” Priore said. “The center of the music industry … was coming out of that one store.”

Tower Records closed on The Sunset Strip in 2006, and shortly thereafter, Centrum Partners proposed a mixed-use project on the property. The project, which would have brought more than 18,000-square-feet of retail space and 20,000-square-feet of office space, was denied twice by the West Hollywood City Council, mostly due to parking and traffic impacts.

If Centrum Partners were to propose a different project, they would essentially be forced to start from scratch, said Brian Lewis, of Marathon Communications, the developer’s public relations firm. Sol Barket, the head of Centrum, declined an interview for this story.

Priore formerly wrote for the store's magazine, the story says.