I have made many purchases online from this store over the past two years. Each order is processed and shipped quickly and arrives in Texas very fast. I received on Thursday two LP's I order last weekend. The shipping is USPS luck, but getting it packaged and out the door is all them. They have a good eclectic selection. Highly recommended. read more

Really good record store. If you're a fan of hip hop or rap, it's the store for you. A little pricey, especially for novice collectors who aren't into vinyl colors, print locations, special editions, etc. but they have a great selection read more

Shuga is near Reckless Records so I stopped in. The selection is not as large as Reckless but that's OK. The prices are where they should be, not cheap but not overpriced. I found a record I wanted for the price I've seen elsewhere. The guy working the counter on the day I was there was very friendly and fun to talk to. I will stop here again whenever I'm in town record shopping. read more

I've been frequenting Shuga's since the opened a few years ago. At first, I was not a fan but I kept giving them a chance and they have far exceeded my expectations. The employees are incredibly friendly, helpful, and enthusiastic - it's pretty rare to have an employee at a record store get excited about whatever it is you are purchasing and I feel like they always have a comment about something. They are very welcoming. Price are mostly reasonable - it's pretty rare I see something that seems way out of line with prices I've seen it elsewhere. They've got a great soundtrack and electronic section which are my go - to music picks. My only wish is that there was more room in the aisles - you only need one person in a section to block your path and they run the length of the store. So, if it's a particularly large person (or you happen to be) you have to walk all the way around the aisle to get to the other side - cutting them in half and moving them about 3 feet apart would really help navigating the place - especially on something like record store day. It's my only minor complaint. Shuga is an excellent tenant on what has become Vinyl Row in Chicago. read more

I think Shuga is a worthy addition to the Chicago area's record landscape. While it has only been there for a few years, Shuga has a comfortable early 70s feel, complete with weed friendly t-shirts. There are no CDs, a few cassettes, and loads and loads of vinyl! While their prices may be a bit higher than other stores, the inventory is huge and well organized, as is their website. I recently went on a hunt for Bill Murray's New Worlds Record Store Day LP. After checking out four other stores, including one that showed they had it on their website but in reality was not there, Shuga did have it as it showed on their website. Yes it was a bit more (15%) than the other store would have been but at least they had it. There is also some vintage stereo equipment for sale. But the big draw is the huge, well organized vinyl selection. I hope to go back when I have more time. BTW, two days later the other store still shows they have the Murray LP. How reckless! read more

I bought a fair number of records online during a recent sale. They have a great selection of hard-to-find titles. Although there was a glitch with shipping, they responded immediately to my inquiry. The records arrived packaged like a fortress, in excellent condition. I am very pleased and wouldn't hesitate to buy again! read more

Shuga is one of my favorite record stores in Chicago. They have about 20 massive bins filled with 45's for only 50 cents a piece. I have found so many gems in those bins. They also have a huge collection of new and used records which are priced fairly. I recommend Shuga to anyone in the area. read more

We checked out the 4 record stores in and around Wicker Park: Shuga, Reckless, Dusty Groove, and Permanent - and Shuga was our least favorite. It was fine, and in another town they'd probably be a 5* shop, but prices were way higher here than the other 3 and quality wasn't any better (and worse than at Dusty Groove). It was the only store we didn't buy anything at. They were playing some great music though. read more

If you want people who are knowledgeable, nice, and enjoy music - go here. If you want people who are indifferent clock watchers who berate you with your eyes for the last hour of the work day - head to Reckless records. read more

I have been collecting records for about 10 years, in terms of selection, price, knowledgeable staff and ease to browse Shuga Records is the best record shop in Chicago. Adam is always willing to come chat about what's new, exclusives coming in and he takes the time to remember your go-to selection. If you're looking for ANY new album, exclusive prints, limited edition or record store day items you can find it all here. I am a big rap and hip hop fan this shop has a TON of exclusive limited prints as well as any and everything you could ever imagine out from this genre which is hard to find. Milwaukee Ave in wicker park Chicago has really turned into record store row, and honesty I wouldn't shop anywhere else. I've found the staff to ignore you and be very unknowledgeable at reckless not to mention it's very hard to find anything there. Shuga is easier to navigate and just overall a better experience. I would highly recommend Shuga to any real vinyl collector out there. Lastly they have a TON of used records from classics to traded in newer content and it's all priced fairly within the Discogs/vinyl market. read more

If you want a store with a great selection and great people to chat with, this is your store. I will definitely be back for more records. Came to buy a couple, left with six. Lol read more

Super dope store! So many records and the genre range is amazing! They have an eBay store as well! I wish i had more time to spend in the store because it's super cool! They're COVID friendly, provide sanitizer at the entrance and make sure you use it before you roam the store. read more

Stopped in to browse around and left with a couple records and a bag of record sleeves. They stay open fairly late, which makes for an easy visit during the week after work. Selection was good, well organized and clean. There was a nice selection of vintage stereo equipment in the back. Didn't see a listening station, not sure of their policy on that. The vibe was comfortable and relaxed, staff were hands-off but friendly. Prices were high on some things, but ok on others. Overall i'd make a point to stop here again if heading to Reckless. A smaller selection, but a different one, plus I hear they're expanding soon. read more

Shuga is my go to for vinyl! Not only is the selection impeccable, but the folks there are the very best!! They are also huge supporters of the local music community in Chicago. They go above and beyond creating a space that not only sells you great vinyl, but is a place where you feel like part of a community. read more

Love this place for so many reasons! The staff is always awesome and you feel as though your patronage is greatly appreciated, which matters to me when I'm a customer. The selection is top notch and their website spot on with their inventory. read more

Love this spot. Local Chicago artist's work on walls, the owners and employees are super helpful and friendly. This place has all of the indie, rock, EDM, rap records you want and even the obscure ones you didn't think anyone would carry. The storefront now provides the same services as their Ebay store did, face-to-face. Particularly useful when you're searching for that South Korean 70's rock vinyl that your dad has been listening to on cassette for decades and you want someone to help you! Another plus - sometimes they have a cute little puppy that comes to say hi! read more

Selection is decent but not as extensive as another store down the street (understand they have a warehouse of records available if it's not in the store). And pricing can be better than another store down the street, sometimes not. But... as nice as these guys are, their non-return policy (which was told to us at a Schuba's Pig Swig and Dig meet) doesn't cut the mustard. When asked what the policy was on buying a brand new record at the Schuba's thing, we were told there are no returns as "We don't know what happens to them after the records leave us." This is poor customer service. I have bought a few new records of late and that have been defective (warped, gouges, knicks, etc.) and needed to be returned or exchanged. Luckily, I had bought them somewhere else, who happily made good on the records. As a result, I will browse for some used records here, but will never buy a new piece from Shuga. Updated to four stars with clarification of return/exchange policy on new product. read more

Shuga Records is my favorite spot to buy records in Chicago! The new vinyl section is filled with sweet limited edition and hard to find albums, while the used section holds anything from a sweet Neil Young bootleg to an original pressing of your favorite Sabbath record. The staff is very friendly and often provide a good recommendation (if you're not sure what you're looking for). They also provide a non-pretentious vibe that most record stores lack. While the new section is quite reasonably priced, a used record that seems out of budget can usually be brought down if you talk with the staff. Shuga has also hosted cool events and brought some of my favorite bands in for signings and in-store performances. I now own signed albums from King Gizzard and Schoolboy Q AND I saw Kikagaku Moyo play an intense acoustic set. If you're hanging out around Wicker, I'd recommend stopping into Shuga because you're guaranteed to find something sweet. read more

The first time I walked in Shuga, I was delighted to see such a nice local section dedicated to Midwest and of course, Chicago artists. I was more elated to see a few records I produced in the store. But, it was their hip hop selection that really won my heart. It's twice as big as some other places. And that's just the NEW Vinyl. You could get lost digging here. I asked an employee about a pretty low key release and they started talking to me about their favorite track on the album! So here I am, at this brand new record store -- who has the gall to open up directly down the road from Chicago's synonym for wax, Reckless Records, -- being guided through their huge bin of rap and hip hop with new recommendations based on my personal Taste. Imagine that, a record store who has a staff that cares about records without being pretentious. Shuga has become my weekly pilgrimage. They'll even go out of their way to call or message me about releases they think they should hold aside for me. The short of it all is this: If Cheers were a record store, it would be Shuga. They throw amazing concerts, help inform newbies to what to buy, and how to maintain their vinyl and even helped me with repairing my turntable. This is a store that cares about its customers and it's community. read more

Great prices, I had previously gone to Reckless and they were overpriced- paid $40 for a record there that I found for under $10 here. Shuga definitely has reasonable prices and good selection, staff is super friendly and helpful. read more

Shuga Records - Vinyl Records Near Me - Chicago, Illinois

These folks r the real deal. Truly a gem of Chicago. Lots of fun events with local musicians too!

This place rocks! Vinyl game is on point. Lucky to have a spot like this in the city.

This place is phenomenal. I had visited some other local record stores and honestly most staff seems very uninterested in helping and just don't seem like they want to be there. I felt very different about this place. Everyone has been super nice and eager to help or make suggestions. Will definitely come back. read more

One of the coolest record stores I've been to! Friendly staff and a great selection. They (almost) only carry vinyl and have a massive online store as well. Good selection of hip hop, psych, indie, jazz, dance and more. They also have the new King Gizzard album, which is my all time favorite piece of music ever recorded. read more

Fantastic place. Lovely building design in a cool neighborhood. Great selection for their size and a great online selection as well if you can't get to the store. I was able to stop in on a random afternoon and see a live musical performance and pick up a new release. Will return every chance I get! read more

Shuga Records - Hello Ocho in store performance - Vinyl Records Near Me - Chicago, Illinois

Shuga Records has been a god send since moving to Chicago! The reason I found this record store came by Chance after wasting over $150 at Reckless, and realizing the "professionals" behind the counter didn't care one way or another that I, had initially, chose to spend my money there. I happened to walk down the street and noticed another record store. I started talking with the guy at the counter about what I had just purchased and he made a recommendation of another band to check out, who I am now obsessed with. Shuga Records has a great variety of genres, I'm surprised they actually have so much old and new folk music, plus usually have sweet random sales on used records. This has become my go-to store for music in Chicago. Definitely a must visit if you live in or visit the area! read more

This is the best record store in Chicago. Period. They always have the best selection of records, including rare and special records.The records are fairly priced. The staff are always nice and helpful. The store has a lot of cool events that happen all-year round like signings, acoustic gigs, release parties, all kinds of stuff. And the owner, Adam, is an awesome guy who cares a lot about customers. I always go out of my way to shop at this record store no matter where I live in the city because it's just the best, and I want to support a great local business. Shuga Records is my favorite place to go in Chicago. read more

Store is cool and has a bit of everything. Staff helpful and very knowledgeable. Picked some good house records there. They have listening station available, but it's a little process which is still cool. read more

Over priced. Bad service. You would think these folks are aiming to preserve physical music culture. They evidently want to mock you if you question their pricing, especially if you have a price guide or you are familiar with discogs and want to bargain against some of the apparent misguided prices. Kind of sad especially since discogs is directly competitive with this scene and easily topples the customer service experience i had and their cost. I wound up finding my selection for a fraction of their price via discogs, even though id rather give to this community! Rather unfortunate. read more

Went here for the first time on Sunday and it was probably the best record store for what I was looking for. Great selection of hip hop and trap albums. Was able to buy flower boy and the black panther album there. Staff was super friendly and helped me find what I was looking for easily. This is definitely my go to spot for next time. read more

What else can I say that hasn't been said by most other reviewers. This place truly has an exceptional collection with a friendly staff and exactly what you would hope for when visiting a record store. I always look forward to browsing the store and talking music with the staff. Keep up the great work!!! read more

Shuga Records - Beautiful Mungion record from Shuga Records!!! - Vinyl Records Near Me - Chicago, Illinois

I would avoid this shop, if I were you. I paid for an album online and went the following morning to retrieve it. I was told that it had been a crazy morning (their internet had cut out for a little while) and that it would take a minute to get the album from upstairs. That's fine. Everyone has weird days. As I waited, with a friend of mine, we perused albums from the back of the store to the front. After twenty minutes and reaching the front of the store and then end of the albums that were perusable we made a hint toward the clerk as to how long it would take to bring the album downstairs and he HAD IT THE WHOLE TIME and never said anything. He didn't even say anything when he held it up. I exclaimed "Is that it?!" to which he responded with a grunt. On top of that, they charged me $3 extra online for the inconvenience. Reckless Records is a block away, heading up MW northwest. Go there. read more

Finally got a chance to go to Shuga Records the other weekend and was more than pleasantly surprised. The girl at the front counter was super nice and as I walked around another guy came up and asked if I needed help finding anything. After we talked for a bit about different bands he recommended I check out this band Whitney. Holy hell!! Best recommendation of my life! Im glad I found such a personable place like Shuga Records in the city. Being interactive with and nice to customers goes such a long way. Can't wait to go back! read more

These guys are awesome! Awesome music playing, the selection is great, reasonable pricing for the quality of the product. Apparently their online stock is huge, something like 60,000 records not on the floor. I dig it. They were very helpful and I walked away with a few things to look up. One being the Studio One version of 99 Problems by Jay-Z. So great. read more

Shuga Records - Jay-Z and Bob Marley & the Wailers mashup album. So good. - Vinyl Records Near Me - Chicago, Illinois

It's one of those stores that mainly carries new releases which you can get online or elsewhere cheaper. The used records are ridiculously priced. They had 2 Kiss records priced 3 times higher than the exact same records were at Reckless Records (and in better condition). The owner also proceeded to harass me via private message and tried to have my review of his store removed. I'm not the only person to say this, read through the reviews, a lot of people complained about the prices. read more

Shuga Records - The owner didn't like my review so he decided to accuse me of lying and then tried to have my review taken down - Vinyl Records Near Me - Chicago, Illinois

Love this place, selection of old & new. Price is right... the guys are really great & helpful. I think it's my favorite record store in the city at the moment. Keep doing your thing Shuga! read more

This is the place to go if you are just getting into your vinyl collecting addiction and looking for that harder to find stuff you missed out on while downloading mp3s that other record store employees have already grabbed for themselves or are only available in your ebay follow feed. Plenty of well priced new and used records here as well. They really know there music and have the best selection. I always walk out of here with a few things on my list that I never see in person at other shops. They also have some solid used audio gear from the golden ere of home audio which is priced in the sweet spot between expensive brand new gear and that junker record carving first crosley turntable. read more

Awesome shop with even better employees. Akeem was patient and extremely helpful from the time I was loading in with my band's equipment, to the time I check out with the records he helped me find. read more

Shuga Records in person is a lot like Shuga Records on Ebay--overpriced and overhyped. Why do I say this? Because they have some pretty inflated ideas about pricing. Also, they oversell the rarity of the items they carry in the store in discussion with customers and on their website. For example, it may be the case that some Japanese collectors are willing to pay upwards of $120 dollars for a first pressing of Love Supreme or Ole Coltrane online in a bidding battle on Ebay. But one would not pay anywhere near that much at other Chicago record stores, where one can find these records offered for 1/2 what Shuga is charging or less, and much more often than you might think. But this is what they are charging for a first pressing of those records at Shuga in store. Pricing is not this badly out of whack just on the jazz records either. One regularly sees classical records on Shuga's web site that are, frankly, significantly overpriced for the current market, as well. Take a conductor like Bernstein, Ormandy, or Szell on Columbia. One should never pay more than 5-10 dollars for their LPs, depending on what the album is, unless something is truly rare and collectable--like say the 6 eye stereo pressing of Sibelius's Violin Concerto by Ormandy and Oistrakh. Yet you can routinely find records by these conductors on Columbia for much more than this, for upwards of $20 on the Shuga site, if not much, much more, including many you can find on clearance in VG+ for .50 cents or 1.00 at many area stores in the clearance bins, if you are just a little patient. They haven't brought as many "out of storage" into the store just yet, but if they follow their own lead in Jazz, one can only imagine what the prices will be like in store. Classic rock works the same way, the prices at Shuga tend to be 2 to 3 times higher than other places in town. Certain pressings will be even more, even though other places get them quite often, and for far less, too, if you hang on and are patient. Ask about getting added on waiting lists at other places (several have them--just ask), and see for yourself. Actually the same holds true generally for all genres of records offered by Shuga versus other places in town, be it rap, metal, r and b, or "fill in the blank." You can verify this for yourself by checking out competitor stores websites and comparing. Shuga says they have different records in the store than online, but thus far, the price on collectible records in store is quite similar, so their website appears to provide a good relative gauge on their pricing generally. In terms of rarity, the owner argues that he carries records one rarely (or ever) sees in the Chicago marketplace, and that this is one reason he has high prices (due to collectability of the items). That might have been the case in Minneapolis, the place the owner used to have shop set up in, but it's not so true in Chicago. While it might be true that one doesn't see these records every day, one does see them more often than "rarely" in the Chicago market. For instance, those first pressings of Ole Coltrane and Love Supreme I mentioned are found more commonly than "rarely" around here. I know because I've seen them in other shops around here over the years. Other sellers like Reckless, Dusty Groove, Dave's Records, Jazz Record Mart, Oak Park Records, Logan's Hardware, The Old School, and Hyde Park Records all have more realistic prices on LPs than Shuga on the items they sell that they share in common with Shuga. I know these details not because I work for any other store or am trying to promote anyone else*, but because I have personal experience in the Chicago market as a customer for years now. As my other reviews show, I've been to most others stores in the city a number of times and so know the market quite well--see my 60 reviews of other records stores for details. * My first review was taken down because it was read as "promotional" when I named Shuga's competitors who have lower prices even though I don't work for another store and stand to gain nothing from such a comparison. I'm a college professor for a living. I find that kind of odd and funny, because Fakespot's analysis of this page suggests some other reviews up here actually are a problem and should be taken down, but for another reason... **October 2016 Update**-I tried to give Shuga another chance, and I ordered something from them via Ebay. Rather than let me,the owner--Adam--decided to call me and spent 15 min berating me about my bad review here, in the process inventing a number of "bad facts" about me as an Ebay customer while doing so (Trump-style). He then forced me into demanding a refund (I'm assuming since he couldn't refuse to sell to a 100% feedback ebayer, so had to go this route instead). He claims not to care about reviews, but treatment of customers like this suggests otherwise. See other reviews for additional stories akin to this. read more

This is the best record shop in the city. The owner and all of the employees are extremely helpful and can find any record you need, even if it is not in stock. They always have a variety of in store performances and signings which set them apart from any other record store in the city. I'd give them 6 stars if I could! read more