Sister Anne’s Records and Coffee carries on the legacy of its namesake, former Recycled Sounds owner Anne Winter

Starting around the age of 15, Jim Oshel began volunteering at events put on by Recycled Sounds, the midtown record shop that operated at the corner of Westport Road and Main Street from 1988 to 2006. He applied for a job with frequency, writing the required essay to the shop’s owners, Anne Winter and Kurt Von Schlemmer, about why he wanted to work there. Oshel proudly recalls the day that Winter — a sort of mother figure to the entire Kansas City music scene during those years — finally offered him the gig. 

“I go up to the counter, I have some Latin jazz, some punk rock, some funk and soul, a country record,” Oshel says. “I had something from eight different corners of the store. [Winter says,] ‘You listen to all this stuff? C’mon, kid.’” 

Frank Alvarez came to Recycled Sounds via a different path. He ran his own record store, Abba Zappa, three blocks away, and was friends with Winter. One day, she walked into Alvarez’s shop and offered to buy him out — to bring him and his inventory to Recycled Sounds. Alvarez had been slowly souring on the idea of running his own store, so he accepted the offer. 

“At that point, I was about 10 years in the game already, and I thought, ‘I know everything,’” Alvarez says. “I went to work for her [Winter] and learned so much more.”

Despite her proclivities for the punk and garage rock she played on her “Orphan Annie” KKFI radio show, Alvarez remembers the wide variety of music that could be found in her store. “There was someone there that specialized in every kind of music,” he says. “There was the hip-hop person, the punk rock person, there was a person that knew classic rock. Every base was covered.”

Not long ago, Alvarez and Oshel opened Sister Anne’s, a record store and coffee shop inspired — in both name and philosophy — by Winter, who died in 2009. 

“I want to do what Anne taught us to do,” Alvarez says. “She taught us to just be good people, help people find the music they’re looking for, provide a space in Kansas City where they can find out about music, come in and talk about music, and just do what we can for the whole scene.”

This new venture, which is planted two blocks west of Troost, on 31st Street, has been baking for some time — Oshel and Alvarez talked about starting a record store together back when they were roommates and working together at Recycled Sounds. When the shop closed, in 2006, Alvarez went to work at Vinyl Renaissance, Oshel to Broadway Cafe. More than a decade later, Mark Galloway, the owner of Windhorse Tattoo, moved into new digs on 31st Street. Galloway had worked with Oshel at Mercy Seat Tattoo previously, and alerted him to some extra space in the building. Oshel and Alvarez decided it was finally time to open their own place — and to fill it to the brim with quality records and tasty roasts. 

“I started drinking coffee when I was five and never stopped,” Oshel says. He calls the new shop’s coffee and music offerings a “perfect synergy.”

At Sister Anne’s, the duo is already hard at work nourishing the city’s music scene. Its distance from the bustling retail destinations of the Crossroads and Westport — it’s two blocks west of Troost — sets it apart from much of the competition. And the shop is hosting shows as well: an opening-night party featuring sets from Hipshot Killer and Emmaline Twist, a tape release show for Devil’s Den. The shop’s spacious back room is a welcome addition to the city’s roster of all-ages venues, which has been fluctuating this past year. 

Most of all, though, Sister Anne’s is Winterlike — warm, friendly, knowledgeable. Walk in, and Oshel will probably be manning the coffee counter. If business is slow, Alvarez will be whipping around on his skateboard outside. “This is the only thing I’ve done since 1985,” Alvarez says. “I get up and come to a record store. That’s what I do.” 

Sister Anne’s is located at 901 E. 31st St., Kansas City, MO.