Source: The Washington Post / Getty
Go-Go music, the homegrown sound of the streets of Washington, D.C., retained its relevancy and prominence by way of a corner store in the Shaw district. However, when complaints of noise came from new transplants in the swiftly gentrifying section of town (in the shadows of Howard University no less), the store was reportedly ordered to shut down the sounds but it appears it ain’t a thing because the store is back in the Go-Go swing.
Fox 5 DC reports:
For nearly 25 years the Metro PCS store on the corner of Florida Avenue and 7th Street Northwest in Shaw has played Go-Go music from a speaker outside the business, but the shop has been muted, reportedly by a complaint and threat to sue from a neighbor in a nearby luxury apartment.
The store’s owner, Donald Campbell, told FOX 5 he was asked two weeks ago by T-Mobile, which owns Metro PCS, to bring the speaker inside the store. Campbell says he was told a neighbor in a nearby luxury apartment who complained about the noise threatened the cell phone company with a lawsuit.
D.C. Police say they don’t have any recent record of noise complaints coming from the store. The Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs has just three since 2010, but each was investigated and it determined the volume did not violate the city’s noise ordinance, so no action was taken.
Since the news broke and the birth of the #DontMuteDC hashtag, area activists and longtime residents have flooded the Shaw streets in unison and caught the attention of outside supporters along with those who side with the new and decidedly richer neighbors.
See Also: Mya Proves She Knows All About DC Go-Go Music [EXCLUSIVE VIDEO]
But while Campbell said in early reports that T-Mobile itself told his store to turn the crank down to manageable levels, the telecommunications giant’s CEO John Legere tweeted in support of the store’s long-standing tradition.
A number of Twitter users are “cised” by the news and of course, we have all the reactions below.
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Aye Yung: D.C. Corner Store Go-Go Music Show Will Go On Thanks To T-Mobile, No Thanks To Colonizing Cretins was originally published on hiphopwired.com
