This Miami Vinyl Shop is the Gateway to the Americas
What began as an independent record store is now one of Miami's most beloved cultural institutions, where owner Lolo Reskin curates sounds from every corner of the globe.
Teen DJ-turned cultural curator Lolo Reskin has been building Miami’s most eclectic record shop for decades.
Now in its 21st year, Sweat Records is the rhythmic heart of Miami’s Little Haiti neighborhood, where the globally minded vinyl shop has thrived since Hurricane Wilma wiped out its original Edgewater location in 2005. Churchill’s Pub, the city’s rock’n’roll landmark, hosted the record store for a couple of years, but eventually the business moved to a 1,200-square-foot warehouse nearby.
“Miami changes constantly, there’s no pause button,” says Reskin, who co-founded the business with best friend Sara Yousuf. “She was in law school at the time, so she had all the admin skills that I, as a stoned, undiagnosed ADHD DJ, did not. But I did have the promotion, creative, curation, music stuff. We did it as two best friends who wanted to do something cool together.”
While Yousuf pursued a career as a public defender, Reskin stayed focused on Sweat, guiding it into an essential cultural hub where “every single day we get people in the store from minimum three continents.” Flamingo caught up with Reskin for a chat about life on the vinyl frontier.
What’s the Sweat Records origin story?
Lolo Reskin: My dad and his whole side of the family are classical musicians. Also, luckily, I grew up next door to the super cool Miami roller skating rink called Hot Wheels. Between those two influences, I was obsessed with a wide variety of music, and I always loved physical media. I had my parents’ records, I had my own tapes and then CDs. And I always loved going to different music stores and bookstores. And when I was 16, it was announced that there was going to be a Virgin Megastore opening in Miami—I was like, “I’m going to work there.” I persevered, and I worked there for six years. It was my high school work experience job. After six years at Virgin, I really wanted Miami to have a homegrown store of its own … that classic style of “Empire Records,” “High Fidelity,” right? So in March 2005, my best friend Sara and I opened Sweat Records, and we are still open.
We feel that vinyl is the enduring physical format of music, and fans know that their artists are getting screwed on streaming.
-Lolo Reskin
I’m struck by Sweat’s impressive array of global recordings, all kinds of genres beyond what someone might encounter in most neighborhood record shops.
LR: If you go to our site and click on the global sounds, you can browse by continent and region, so that’s really cool for people who are only interested in Japanese records or whatever. Being in Miami, we’re the gateway to the Americas. We have friends from every country in South and Central America. So we want to have records from all those places. A lot of people come here. They always make a stop at our store because they’re going to get their records for the next year. Because where they are in Bogotá or Chile, the records cost three times as much because they’re all imports.
How does Sweat fit into the greater Miami landscape?
LR: We represent a different side of Miami than you usually see. We call that the “shiny stuff.” It’s great that it exists, too. But (we) helped build a really cool scene full of awesome people who are in every artistic discipline, have every cultural background. I always feel that going out to shows down here can feel utopian, even, because it’s such an interesting, cool group of people from all over. We’ve thrown over 1,000 events because I was a DJ and club promoter before I opened Sweat and continued to do so afterward. We’re very focused on IRL experiences. We do live band shows. Almost every show we have is under $20, and most of them are between $5 and $15. We’ve also done cool workshops and talks and series like that. Last year was the centennial of the Harlem Renaissance, so we partnered with this amazing local group called Black Miami-Dade, run by my friend Nadege Green. And we did a three-part series about what was happening in Miami during the Harlem Renaissance, covering Josephine Baker being in Miami and cool things like that. Outside of the store, we partner on big shows. We just helped put on Peaches. For our anniversary last year, we brought Adrian Quesada from Black Pumas.
Everyone talks about the “vinyl explosion,” but is it really enough to float a business?
LR: There’s, like, 57 layers to that. 2025 was the 19th consecutive year of vinyl sales increases. A few years ago, it (retook) CDs as the dominant physical format in the country, which is wild. People younger than us, who never got to have physical music collections, feel robbed of that. It’s a really fun experience. It’s a ritual. And music is still one of the top industries in the world. We feel that vinyl is the enduring physical format of music, and fans know that their artists are getting screwed on streaming. They know that buying a record supports them better than not buying the record. It is one of the things that actually does retain its value in a lot of circumstances, more so than other things. But really, I think it’s more about the pleasure and the collection and about owning something you love. In this day and age where … I pay whatever a year to, like, unlock my car from a remote, everything’s nickel and diming us—a record, you buy it once, it’s yours.
I hear you have a famous neighbor, Iggy Pop.
LR: He’s a dear friend of the shop. We’ve been fortunate to have a relationship with him over the years—literally one of the wisest, smartest people I’ve ever met. When the documentary came out (on) him, and the (album with) Queens of the Stone Age—“Post Pop Depression”—we hosted the official screening (where) he was the guest of honor. I got to interview him for almost an hour before the show. I always say I’ve never studied harder for anything in my entire life, but I was so happy to be able to ask him some questions he hasn’t been asked 1,000 times. Our friend Ale (Campos), who worked at the store for years and still works here, she’s his touring guitarist now.
What’s on your personal turntable right now?
LR: I’ve been working in music retail for 25 years, but there is always cool new stuff. I curate what comes in. Every week, 300 to 800ish new vinyl releases are released worldwide. I love discovering all kinds of acts. But I really love chill music, especially after work. I love the albums of Swedish piano player Sven Wunder. He has one called “Eastern Flowers” I always recommend to people who want something different. It’s slinky, jazzy, relaxing, and beautiful. Most of the stuff I’m excited about I talk about on our Instagram and TikTok videos. I love the new Gorillaz album. I love that they went in a direction of Indian sound. Anoushka Shankar is on it, and all these incredible guests. I love Rosalía’s combination of genres, her voice and her point of view. There’s so many amazing, incredible artists making real stuff. I crave it, and it’s amazing that we get to put it in so many people’s hands.
Lolo Reskin’s Top 5 Miami Artists on Vinyl
- Las Nubes
- Nick León
- Richie Hell
- Sumo
- Palomino Blond
For more by Steve Dollar on Miami music, click here.
About the Author
Steve, a Tallahassee native and Flamingo contributor since 2017, has written about film, music, art and other popular culture for publications including The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, the Atlanta-Journal Constitution, GQ, and The Los Angeles Times. He is the artistic director for the Tallahassee Film Festival and writes a monthly film newsletter for Flamingo, Dollar Matinee.
