I explored Liverpool's oldest record shop with eight decades of history and famous customers

The Musical Box record shop in Liverpool has a vast history spanning eight decades, and proudly describes itself as the “oldest independent record shop in England”.

Selling records since 1947, the fantastic store has remained within the same family and the same building ever since it opened. Our video journalist, Emily Bonner, headed to the historic venue to find out more.

Jack Lewis started the business back in 1947. His sister, Dorothy Lewis, bought the shop in 1951, and it is now a fourth-generation family-run business.

Co-owner Tony Quinn grew up with the store and has many stories to tell. He told us: “I've never really had a proper job. You know, there's nothing nicer than selling records. It's great.

“I used to help out, around Christmas, I think about 1975. So, I would have been probably 14. I used to help in the shop when it was Christmas Eve, because that was the busiest day of the year. I remember selling loads of Elton John's greatest hits.

“You do meet some really nice people. I've got lots of friends who are just people who come in the shop and talk and they'll talk about records all day long, talk about music, who they went to see the other day.”

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The upstairs was the Quinn family's former living room and they've since renovated this into a mini museum. It still has its original furniture and is decorated with the shop's history.

Tony continued: “My nan died, I think, in 1992 so it means she used to live here. This was her living room. She had a water telly in here. I think I even lived here for a bit back in the day.”

During the renovation, historical documentation was unearthed - the logs of the records that had been sold in the shop from the 1950s onwards. 27 books were found in total. This included logs of Beatles records that had been released on that day.

The family loaned several of these to the Liverpool Beatles Museum, detailing local sales of hits, including I Feel Fine, Penny Lane and The White Album.

The museum has exhibited these book to provide a unique insight into local reaction to the Fab Four's releases.

“We get kids coming in with their grandparents and parents buying LPs. And I think with LPs, you feel like you've got to listen to it all. You don't. Bit of foam, flip. I don't like this stuff. Don't like this stuff. But LPs, you put it on, you play side one, flip it over, play side two,” Tony said.

The museum on Mathew Street also helped the family solve a 60-year-old mystery. Dorothy, who ran the shop in the 60s, recalled a group of teenagers saying, ‘that was the Beatles’, as two young men exited the shop.

The family have wondered ever since who it might have been. Well, now the mystery has been solved. As Pete Best recalled, he and John Lennon often visited the shop to check out new record releases.

The shop's not far from Best's family home in West Derby, where Lennon would often stay overnight. But they're not the only famous faces who visited the shop over the years.

Tony said: “Mr Shankly came in and bought his copy of Amazing Grace by the Scots Dragoon Guards. He used to come in and talk to my granddad about football and my granddad couldn't understand a word he said, because he was this really broad Scottish accent.

“My granddad used to just nod his head. But my granddad used to take photographs of people. So he took pictures of Joe Royal, when he was a player for Everton, Jimmy Husbands. But he never took a photograph of Bill Shankly.”

Watch Emily’s full video above for more about The Musical Box.