I Hate Records

I Hate Records is a small record shop in San Francisco's Lower Haight, built by musicians active in the local DIY punk scene. It specializes in punk records and makes room for shows, hangouts, and other community events.

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Interview with I Hate Records

"I Hate Records" is a great bit of irony for a shop this sincere — and you built it in a former laundromat, sign and all, as a nonprofit for the SF punk scene. Where did the whole idea come from?

Both of the store "owners" (Cody and Pretty) have been playing music in the DIY scene for a while (since 2021), we both play in Surprise Privilege and False Flag respectively. We love our community and find a sense of purpose and fulfillment in contributing to the culture of our scene, whether that be throwing events or sharing music or whatever. The idea came from a desire to stay in SF and establish a place for the community to gather. We have a ton of retail and event-organizing experience between us and we thought we'd give it a shot to run a self-sustaining place of business. Originally we wanted to open a venue but we thought that opening a record store instead would be easier to sustain for us. Right now amidst the AI tech boom and rising gentrification we think it's important to keep the countercultural side of art alive as a balance. We don't want SF to be a soulless data center town.

You run it as a nonprofit and home base for DIY punk, with your own FYJFY label — what does "keeping punk alive in the Bay" actually look like day to day?

Keeping punk alive to us pretty much means doing whatever we can to make sure the raw, uncensored, aggressively authentic side of art has a place to thrive. We do this by always making sure we have some kind of event planned in the future - shows, open mics, hangouts, etc. We find it very important to stay active and always have something to look forward to and stay so that people who are new to the scene or have never been exposed to punk rock before can see what it's all about and decide for themselves if they're interested in being part of the community. Other than that we make the effort to specialize in keeping punk records as our main inventory so that we can share the music with anyone who comes in the store. Something we're working on right now is building enough capital to print and share physical releases from local punk bands in our scene.

You host shows and invite people to graffiti the walls — how did the shop become a community space as much as a store?

As mentioned before, we see our brick and mortar spot as a community space first before anything else. Even though the store is very small, we like when people stop by to say hi or hang out and listen to music or work on art or something. Without us playing music in the punk scene for years beforehand, we wouldn't even have the idea to establish a space like this. When we do host events in the store, we let people write whatever they want on the walls. For one thing, it's hilarious, but also it's cool to see the community leave a little piece of their personality on display.

The Haight has deep counterculture roots — who comes through I Hate Records, and how's the SF punk scene right now?

The Lower Haight is a very tight-knit community and we're very lucky to have been able to open our store in this neighborhood. A lot of our neighbors stop by who have lived here for a while and have ties to the countercultural roots that you've mentioned. Lots of people from the punk scene come through as well, people who attend shows or people from bands who play in our scene. Lots of people from out of town stop by who are interested in punk which is really cool to see. The SF punk scene is pretty healthy right now, it would seem. It's also a pretty tight-knit community and most people know each other. We've seen lots of new faces every time we have a show which is always great to see.

You specialize in punk but carry pretty much everything — for someone new to punk on vinyl, where should they start?

For anyone getting into collecting punk records, it's never a bad idea to start with bands that were renown within the culture (Black Flag, Dead Kennedys, Bad Brains, Dicks, MDC, Minor Threat, Crass, Operation Ivy). There's way too many to name here but if you walk into any punk record store, any staff member should be able to tell you the big names. We recommend also seeing if the store has a local bands section, punk is inherently an underground community and relies a lot on word of mouth from those who know to spread awareness of who's still active in the scene right now. Also asking a staff member at a store who's been into punk for longer for their recommendations is a good idea too. Everyone has different taste and there's a wide range of sounds that came from punk.

What's the most memorable record or moment the shop's seen so far?

The most memorable record was probably a copy of GG Allin's "Always Was, Is And Always Shall Be" from 1988 that was in incredibly great shape. GG Allin fans are notoriously unkempt (for lack of a better word) in everything they do so seeing an old pressing of that record in almost flawless shape from that age is quite rare. We almost kept the record for ourselves but unfortunately for us it got sold right before we all realized we wanted to keep it. The most memorable moment for us was probably some night where some of our friends randomly showed up after business hours just to hang out and the night turned into total anarchy, drinking a lot, playing loud ass music, doing flips off of shelves, making a total mess of the place without damaging the records (somehow). We're no strangers to partying but the spontaneity of that particular night made it special.

Punk and hardcore have a serious collector side — what do people most often misjudge about what those records are worth?

Since punk/hardcore are pretty niche genres to begin with it's not too uncommon for even a serious collector to overlook a valuable record from a band they'd never heard of. Also because of the aggressive nature of the music a lot of people are turned off to the genre and may not realize that a lot of punk record are valuable because they don't see how so many people could like the music. Another thing to consider is also the condition of the record, most people who got ahold of early pressings of punk records were probably not the type of person to take good care of their stuff so finding super clean copies of early punk records can be rare and drive up the value.

What do you hope someone who's never touched punk walks away understanding after a visit?

We hope they develop an appreciation for the resourcefulness of the DIY mentality. You don't have to rely on any establishment to produce and promote your art. Also question everything you are told by those who have power over you.

Last updated: 2026-08-28

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