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Once Upon a Time…
Rectangle Triangle opened at the end of 2024 at 1288–1290 Atateken, in Montréal's Village: records, turntables, mixers, a bit of merch, and a coffee corner. We're a small shop built around the idea that a record store should be somewhere you stay a while — the listening station is there to be used, and most of what we carry is here because somebody who works here argued for it.
This address has a considerably louder past than we do. It's the first stop in Once Upon a Time, our series on Montréal nightlife — short version below, full story one click away.
Three clubs, one building
Rectangle Triangle has two doors — 1288 and 1290 Atateken — in a building that spent roughly two decades as one of Montréal's most dependable places to lose track of time: Playground, the after-hours that ran the basement through the mid-'90s; Groove Society, the plush house room with a curtain of falling water behind the dancefloor, 1996 to 2003; and Parking, the room that opened playing Top 40 in 2000 and ended up on the international techno circuit by 2004. Read the full history — the flyers, the footage, the sources, all three eras.
One building, three eras. Read the full history →
Same rooms, different tempo
The rooms are quieter now. We sell the records instead of playing them at peak volume — house, techno, disco and everything around them — along with the turntables, mixers and gear to play them on, and coffee that keeps more reasonable hours than Playground ever did. We ship worldwide, we speak both languages, and the shop is open six days a week.
We didn't have to go far for a relic, either: the original Parking sign is here in the store. Come stand under the name one more time.
The series
This building is one address out of hundreds. The rest of the story — how Montréal got from the disco era to the after-hours era, and back again — is at Once Upon a Time.
PROLOGUE
Quebec’s First Record
Berliner starts pressing on Peel Street in 1900, and a Montréal baritone sings into a horn in 1904. Where recorded sound in this city begins.
01
Three Clubs, One Building
Playground, Groove Society and Parking, at 1288–1296 Atateken.
02
Brothers and Sisters: How Rue Amherst Became Rue Atateken
The street outside. A British general, a postscript about smallpox blankets, and a Kanien’kéha word for brothers and sisters.
03
Nineteen Thousand Watts, No Limiter: The Sound System at Stereo
Six fourteen-foot stacks, a horn named after Larry Levan, and a deliberate refusal to put a limiter on any of it.
04
The Six A.M. Permit: How Limelight Invented Montréal After-Hours
1973–1990. A glassed-in booth, weekly flights to New York, and the liquor permit that every after-hours club in this city is downstream of.
COMING
Business, 3500 Saint-Laurent, and the club that brought house to Montréal
Where the name came from
Or: everything you need to know about this shop, in the form of definitions.
- RECTANGLE
- A four-sided geometric polygon shape with opposite sides that are equal in length and four right angles.
- TRIANGLE
- A three-sided geometric polygon shape with three angles that always add up to 180 degrees.
- When a triangle is placed on top of a rectangle, the two shapes form a house. The house can also be rotated 60 degrees to form a play button. A further 60 degrees forms a loudspeaker.
- HOUSE
- One of the twelve divisions of the celestial sphere, numbered counter-clockwise from the point of the eastern horizon. The twelfth house is responsible for dreams, the subconscious mind, deep fears and desires, and the unseen realms. It is a place of secrets, inner knowledge, and the psyche.
- PLAY
- The universal language of childhood. It is through play that we understand each other and make sense of the world around us — a process of observing, testing, trying, imitating, and enjoying the environment we are in and the people we are with.
- LOUD
- Sounds whose volume is above normal. A sound that is loud and low is sometimes referred to as booming.
- SPEAKER
- Someone who speaks on a subject to an audience. When speakers are talking at a high volume, they are usually referred to as loudspeakers.
- BEETS
- A nutrient-dense root vegetable, low in calories, fat and cholesterol, making them a heart-healthy choice. A single half-cup serving of cooked beets contains 37 calories.
- GROOVE
- An indentation or rut in something. Rooted in an old Dutch word for “furrow” or “ditch” — a carved-out line, like wheel ruts in a muddy road, or the narrow opening a sliding door moves in.
- VIBRATION
- Quickly moving back and forth, or up and down, about a point of equilibrium. The vibration may be periodic or random. If it vibrates in a regular way, it may produce a musical note, because it can make the air vibrate.
- TURNTABLE
- If someone turns the table, their situation changes from a weaker position to a stronger one.
- MIXER
- One whose work is mixing the ingredients of a product by operating a container, device or machine. A mixer can also be a game, stunt or dance used at a get-together to give members of a group the opportunity to meet one another in a friendly and informal atmosphere. Sometimes a mixer is a non-alcoholic beverage, such as ginger ale, used in a mixed drink.
A rectangle, a triangle, and about twenty years of people losing track of time upstairs.
Danced here? Playground, Storm, Groove Society, Parking, any era — read the full story or come tell us your own. We scan flyers and photos for free, on the spot, and you keep the originals.
