“It started last year in response to the economic downturn,” says Manom Slome, cofounder of No Longer Empty, a cooperative formed to stage site-specific exhibitions in vacant commercial spaces. “Walking on Madison one day, we counted about 15 empty storefronts,” Slome recalls. Confronted with all that unused square footage, the veteran curator, who spent seven years at the Guggenheim, and her colleague Asher Remy-Toledo saw an opportunity to put art in atypical places.

Since June, with space donated by various landlords, the group has put on shows in vacant storefronts beside the Chelsea Hotel, under the High Line and in a former belt factory in Brooklyn. (An artist from Italy transformed an abandoned freight elevator shaft into a version of Dante’s “Divine Comedy” that could take you up to heaven or down through the circles of hell). Through this Saturday, No Longer Empty, has taken up residence in the old Tower Records on Broadway and W. 4th Street, a venue that has been dark for going on three years. Dubbed “Never Can Say Goodbye,” the show re-imagines the old record store as, well, a record store, but rendered with a gallerist’s vivid imagination and a long time-East Villagers’ nostalgia. Upon entering the gallery, a Tower-yellow and -red kiosk recounts a little of the history of the spot. How it was a place where Mariah Carey, Tom Waits, The Talking Heads, Biggie Smalls, Metallica and Camper Van Beethoven all got equal time.

"Diaspora" by Paul Villinski, courtesy of Morgan Lehman Gallery.

One of the most prominently featured works in the gallery, Paul Villinski’s “Diaspora” (above) consists of birds made from vinyl records fluttering out from a turn table, and casting their shadows across a vast expanse of plain white wall. The elegiac tone of this piece is in keeping with the rest of the show. Along the walls, where record company promos once hung above racks of CDs, the artist Invader has created a series of reproductions of classic album covers, including “London Calling,” “Iron Maiden” and “Nevermind,” out of Rubik’s Cubes (below). Like a Seurat fed through an I Love The ‘80s, each image falls apart upon close inspection, but comes together as you back away.

"Rubik London Calling" by Invader, courtesy of Jonathan Levine Gallery.

A pimple-faced clerk greets you at the entrance to the No Longer Empty Never Records Shop (where, in fact, many items, including reproductions of some of the works on display, can be purchased), decked out in flannel, nerd-glasses and an expression that says he is silently judging you. Of course he’s made out of construction paper. (If you are hankering for the genuine scorn of living record store employees, Other Music is just around the block on w 4th.)

Some of the homages to yesteryear are a bit more tongue in cheek: A collection of Vanilla Ice teenie-bopper magazines are strewn on the floor, and run halfway up the ceiling. Upon seeing this display, The Roots’ ?uestlove, on site for a panel discussion about social media, told a story about running into the ur-white rapper on the street recently. “He greeted me like we were long lost brothers or something,” ?uest said incredulously. Then he mockingly flailed his arms across his chest, and intoned Ice-style, “‘Yo, ?uest. What’s up?’ Then I realized I was actually glad to see him. That’s how bad hip-hop is today.”

The show also contends with the effect of the digital age on music. For “The Song That Will Never Be Heard,” Paul Clement Williams wrote and recorded a song, made a compact disc of it and then destroyed the master and sealed the only copy CD in a glass box. It comes in a case emblazoned with a legalese-like warning stating that the owner of the work “solemnly vows never to deface the work by playing it or allowing others to hear it.” Another artist faithfully recreated her illegally downloaded MP3 collection by pasting downloaded album art on cardboard. Each of the handmade CD doppelgangers can be purchased for $9.99. This Saturday, the last day of the exhibition, at 3 p.m, Phony PPL, a group of teenagers from Brooklyn who play a blend of hip-hop, rock, jazz and won Bard college’s Battle of the Bands, will play. “They’re almost like a band from the ‘70s,” says Barbara Feldman of NLE. She came to Phony PPL through a mutual friend who knew the family of the band’s drummer, who happens to be the son of Def Jam pioneer DJ Jazzy Jay. “I just thought,” says Feldman of closing with a youthful act, “Let’s be optimistic at the end.” Those interested in attending any of the final performances at “Never Can Say Goodbye” should contact the show’s organizers. Look for the next NLE exhibition in West Harlem in April.

First Image: "Bling Box Orchestra" by Ryan Brennan. Photo by Jodie Dinapoli.