Music Depot has served Greeley for three decades. It’s the town’s independent music store, and the people behind the counter want it to be more than a place to buy strings. “We’re not just a store,” says general manager Tyler Smith. “We’re a community hub.”
Dave Dechant opened Music Depot in 1995 and later sold it to Mark Payne and Jess Redmon. Jess already ran a guitar shop on 16th Street, and the two combined their businesses into the Music Depot people know today. A lot of customers assumed Jess was the only owner. You could see why. To a generation of local players, Jess was the guy who sold them their first guitar and the first person they asked when they had a gear question.
The current era started with a joke. Jenni Sweet worked as Mark’s bookkeeper for about 10 years. In 2018 Mark joked that she should buy the store so he could retire. She took him at his word. Jenni became the owner in September 2019. Tyler started on Jan.1, 2020.
The pandemic hit about 10 weeks later. The new team had to rethink how the whole store operated, and they used the disruption to remodel the space into the shop you see now. Since then, Jenni and Tyler have worked to bring a decades old store into the 2020s.
Jess passed away in 2022. The shop still works to fill the role he played. “We try to keep being a community hub, an information hub,” Tyler says. “Not just where you go to buy your stuff, but where you go to connect with other musicians.”
IT’S IN THE NAME
Music Depot doesn’t focus on one corner of music. It isn’t only a guitar shop, a band and orchestra shop, a drum shop, or a recording store. “We try to encompass everything,” Tyler says.
You can see it in who walks in. Lawyers and doctors bring guitars in for repair or rent band instruments for their kids. Teenagers who’ve been playing for two years come in to outfit their first punk band. Some kids walk in having never held an instrument at all. The staff adjusts to each of them.
The shop works with local school music programs, so the staff often watch kids grow up. A 13-year-old who rented a saxophone comes back at 20 to hang flyers for their band’s next show.
Tyler came up in the punk, hardcore, and metal scene, where everyone knew everyone, and that background shapes how the shop runs. Staff go to local shows. One wall holds merch from local bands, and Music Depot keeps none of the money from those sales. “We know it’s kind of a struggle being a musician sometimes,” Tyler says, “and we’re not trying to add on to that.”
THE WIZARDS IN THE BACK
Most people in Greeley know Music Depot for band and orchestra. That reputation is built in the repair shop.
Kyra Hurlock is in about her 12th year as lead band and orchestra repair technician. Tyler says she “lives and breathes” the work. Lynn Fay joined right after graduating and learned on the job, fast. Tyler calls them wizards. “They can take any material and stick it to another material,” he says, “or get it unstuck from any kind of other material.”
A broken violin string, a cello that needs a new bridge, a trumpet with stuck valves: they handle all of it, and they’re cheerful about it. A sign on the repair wall tells customers roughly how long each job will take. Kyra in particular is, in Tyler’s words, “the sunshine of the shop.”
On the guitar side there’s Alan, a skilled guitar technician who also plays in the local band Jellyfish Farm. Tyler doesn’t hedge about any of them. They’re experts in their fields.
NO STUPID QUESTIONS
Music stores have a reputation, and Tyler knows it well. The gear is dated. The staff are grumpy. You’re afraid to take a guitar off the wall in case someone glares at you.
“We don’t play that game at Music Depot,” he says. “If you want to play an instrument, pick it up off the wall and play it. Even if you don’t know how to play it, just give it a shot.”
The shop wants that stereotype gone for good. The vibe is relaxed, and the work is done right. There are no stupid questions, because everyone at Music Depot is truly passionate about connecting people with the instruments and information they need to develop a long-lasting relationship with music.
WHAT YOU’LL FIND AT MUSIC DEPOT
Band and orchestra instruments, for sale or through a rent-to-own program: violins, cellos, trumpets, trombones, tubas, euphoniums, piccolos, and more. If a student sticks with it, the rental payments go toward owning the instrument. If not, they can return it and try something else. The floor also has guitars, drum kits, pianos, and even accordions. There are MIDI controllers and audio interfaces for people starting to make beats or record at home, along with help setting them up. Harmonicas. Kazoos too, because, as Tyler says, everyone can play the kazoo. Local merch and music from artists like The Burroughs and Socrates Garcia.
Repairs cover guitars and band and orchestra instruments. The store rents lesson rooms to instructors at a deliberately low rate, with no contract needed. Jim Dupre has taught guitar in Greeley for more than 30 years and teaches out of the shop now. His business cards sit on the counter, and people pick them up surprised to see he’s still teaching. There’s plenty of open time on the schedule for other instructors.
THE HUMAN FACTOR
Ask Tyler why the job is worth it, and the answer is people. He likes hearing who customers have played with, which venues they’ve played, and what gear they started on. He loves watching a nervous kid leave with their first guitar or first drum kit.
“Without the people, we have no store,” he says. “And without the people, I don’t have the coolest job in retail.” He sees that as more important now than before. “In a world that seems to be interested in taking the human aspect out of things like art,” he says, “we’re doubling down.”
In practice, that looks like this: Bring in a guitar for a restring and it gets cleaned and the fretboard oiled at no extra charge. A kid with a broken string usually leaves with a new one installed and the guitar in tune, no bill.
Even after more than 30 years, someone still walks in now and then who has lived in Greeley for 15 years and never knew the shop existed. Music Depot wants to change that. A lot of local musicians’ stories started here. Yours could too.
Stop by Small Business Saturday for storewide deals. Visit Music Depot at 2318 West 17th Street in Greeley. Learn more at MusicDepotGreeley.com.
Special thanks to Tyler Smith and Odalis Canchola for their assistance in gathering materials and information for this feature.
