New store brings ‘art’ of music back to CT. It feels like a treasured grail that’s been uncovered.

Grails, the new Connecticut record store, has to be seen and heard to be believed.

In an age of fast-delivery online shopping, Grails, on Chapel Street, in downtown New Haven,  upholds the old values of browsing, acclimating and discovering.

There is no contact info on the store’s website and the proprietor King Kenney doesn’t hand out business cards. You kind of have to show up. When you do, Grails is a vinyl lover’s paradise. You have to find your own way around the place, since the section labels can be rather poetic.

There’s a comfortable stay-awhile vibe that encourages browsing. There’s also a sense that Kenney has special musical tastes he’s sharing. You know that when you leave Grails, you will have learned about music you haven’t heard before.

Rather than tired, old, meaninglessly broad labels like “R&B,” “Classical” and “Pop,” the categories in Grails’ bins include “Soul Food,” “Living Single,” “Love Supreme” and “Beats, Rhymes & Life.” Operas are filed under “Bravo Brava.” In the bins that are arranged alphabetically, Kenney files bands whose names begin with “The,” like The Rolling Stones and The Kinks, under “T,” emphasizing that bands who choose to use it tend to take that humble three-letter definite article very seriously.

Befitting a store that’s just a block away from two major art galleries and whose neighbors include an ice cream store and classic clothing stores, Grails exudes style, taste and individuality. Grails’ website describes the shop as “a cultural sanctuary,” “a gallery of recorded art” and “an emporium of music-themed curiosities.”

Kenney’s background is ideal for opening such a store. He’s a longtime music journalist (primarily in the jazz and opera areas) who has also been involved with nonprofit organizations. A New Yorker, he came to New Haven in 2020 to be the director of marketing and communications at the Long Wharf Theatre shortly after Jacob Padrón became the theater’s artistic director. Kenney modeled Grails in part on small record shops he knew in New York City’s East Village, “small shops with two aisles, nothing you knew but what you wanted to know more about, everything pristine.”

“I wanted to reimagine a record store as a museum of recording history,” he said. That’s one reason for why he gets “artsy with my naming conventions.” As with a gallery exhibit, how something is described may change the way it is perceived. “I’m curatorial with what I put on the floor,” Kenney said.

On a recent Friday afternoon, there was a steady stream of customers at Grails. It speaks to how quickly the store has attained crucial street cred that the visitors include such leading lights of the local music scene as DJ Dooley-O (there to check out the DJ booth in the corner of the store), Rick Omonte of Mountain Movers and punk rock icon Jim Martin of Broken.

As Kenney sits down in comfortable and stylish chairs situated in front of the sales counter to talk, vintage concert footage of guitarist Johnny Winter is playing on the video screen on a nearby wall. Displayed around the shop are turntables (including some that are children’s toys) and a working Rock Band Playstation game. There’s also a rack of fashionable rock T-shirts.

Events already being held at Grails include DJ sets and a weekly chess night. Kenney hopes to hold in-store record signing appearances by musicians who are in New Haven to play at the city’s many clubs and concert halls. Such signing events were once a regular occurrence at New Haven’s best-known record store of the 20th century, Cutler’s Records on Broadway (around the corner from Toad’s Place in York Street), which closed in 2012.

One of Grails’ first community outreach programs is the Grails Scholars Program for music students in grades 6 through 12 who demonstrate “financial need and a strong interest in music.” The program, funded by the store and a range of donors, was created in partnership with Neighborhood Music School on Audubon Street in New Haven’s arts district.

Grails is part of a long legacy of New Haven record stores that dates back to when 78 rpm disks were sold at furniture stores and department stores in the early 20th century. Besides Cutler’s there was the Yale Co-op, Merle’s Record Rack (which remains in Orange), even a big chain store like Strawberries for a while. On the used side, Festoon’s Records became Replay Records, which later moved to Hamden and closed earlier this year. Elm City Sounds in the Westville neighborhood is one of the few sizeable brick-and-mortar shops in New Haven. Near Grails on Chapel Street, Atticus Bookstore Cafe keeps a couple of boxes of quality vinyl reissues, but it’s a small amount.

Grails’ inventory is not vast either. That’s intentional in keeping with the curatorial vibe. Some of Grails’ initial stock came from Kenney’s own 20,000-plus record collection. What’s on display in the store is trim and neat. The old records tend to be in such good condition that they can be mistaken for new releases. Grails follows the current record store of mingling used records with the many reissues or special editions of new albums that the revived vinyl LP industry releases these days.

“I try to make it 70/30 old to new,” Kenney said. “I put only near-mint stuff out.” Many of the newer disks are “new pressings of classical albums, accessible versions” for those who want to hear the music on vinyl but can’t afford collector’s prices.

Asked for some titles he considers “classics,” Kenney named a number of jazz and rock legends but also albums such as Casiopea’s live set “Mint Jams” from 1982, the Quincy Jones-produced soundtrack to the 1985 movie version of “The Color Purple” and works by South Korean violinist Kyung Wha Chung.

The selection seems quirky, but every record on display at Grails is probably considered a classic by somebody. Most are ripe for discovery by a wider audience. This store, selling music in a format that was left for dead in the 1990s and has experienced a massive resurgence in recent years, is a place of exploration but also one of community. The excitement around the store, whether from musicians or collectors or just plain music fans, feels like a treasured grail has been uncovered.

Grails is located on the lower level of 1020 Chapel St. in downtown New Haven in the same building as Arethusa Farm Dairy. Hours are Mondays through Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. grailsonchapel.com.