Still, I’m lucky enough to live near a major city that has some of the best-curated record stores around. Other Music, for instance, where I’ve gotten some wonderful recommendations from the staff whenever I walked up to the counter. It’s probably an open question as to whether something like Amazon’s shotgun-spray, hit-or-miss recommendation system is anywhere nearly as good (although I admit I’ve gotten some nice stuff that way as well).

What matters is not the way you get the buying advice, but the fact that it comes to you from someone else who is just as enthusiastic about is as you are, or even more so.