No More Virgins Left in Orange County

Virgin Megastores, that is. Just got back from a lunch break to find out how true today's report on the Register's retail blog is, and the answer is . . . very. The Virgin Megastore at the Block in Orange will indeed be closing. The plug gets pulled January 4. In the meantime: bargains! I grabbed a yellow flier loaded with exclamation points:

"Prices slashed up to 40% off the lowest ticketed price! Everything must go! Save now! Makes a great gift! Super selection! Tremendous savings! Twenty percent off all new releases! Nothing held back! Save now while selection is best! This location only!"

All that's missing is "Sunday, SUNDAY, SUUUUUNNNDAAAAAY!!!!"

If this closeout is anything like the slow, sad shuttering of Tower Records three years ago, the discounts will get deeper the closer 01/04/09 draws near, so the best meat on this decaying aural corpse will be gone fast.

The Orange Virgin was the second Megastore to open in OC, following the early-'90s opening of the VM at Costa Mesa's Triangle Square, which departed this mortal sonic coil several years back (but then, what at Triangle Square hasn't closed?).

As for reasons why, well . . . you know the answers already: shitty economy, downloading, $18.99 for a copy of Metallica's Death Magnetic. (Not only that, but the Orange Virgin today had an $18.99 sticker on a CD copy of Fleetwood Mac's Rumours, and not the 2004 remastered/reissued version with "Silver Springs" on it, either!)

If you still need your Virgin fix, though, the one at the Ontario Mills shopping center is still open . . . but I bet if you walk through the door, you can hear the sound of a clock ticking away the time it has left. May as well go straight to Amoeba, like everyone else . . .

Meanwhile, the Orange Virgin will live on forever at least in some fashion, having been immortalized in one of the final scenes in the Borat movie -- it's where Borat tried to put the sack over Pamela Anderson, and featured a foot chase out into the store's parking lot. Perhaps a plaque will be placed there someday, like the one outside Nixon's old La Habra law office. . . .