OXFORD’s Truck Store has a starring role in a film charting the resurgence of independent record shops.

Last Shop Standing features interviews with Truck Store owner Gary Smith alongside famous names such as Johnny Marr, Billy Bragg and Annie Mac about how the shop has opened and survived in a period when so many other music stores have gone to the wall.

The documentary is being shown in Oxfordshire at the Phoenix Picturehouse on December 17 and Witney’s Fat Lil’s on December 19.

It is based on the book of the same name by Liverpudlian Graham Jones, 52.

The book was subtitled Whatever happened to record shops?, and the documentary’s tagline is The Rise, Fall and Rebirth of the Independent Record Shop.

Mr Jones said: “In the 1980s there were more than 2,000 record shops in the UK, and by 2009 there were 269.

“But, since 2009, nine new shops have opened including Oxford’s Truck Store.

“Truck Store is fantastic at supporting the local community, it has local music for sale and local bands play.

“It is a great example of how modern record shops need to work. They also sell vinyl, sales of which rose 40 per cent last year.”

Mr Smith opened Rapture in Witney eight years ago, and Truck Store in February 2011.

The Truck Store recently hosted its 110th live band instore, it stocks CDs by 100 local bands and has a small cafe.

Mr Smith said that the key to his success was personalised customer service.

“People leave the shop with stuff they may not have heard before.

“A load of chains have gone but one thing is consistent, there is always great new music around.”

Matt Chapman, 24, who works in the Truck Store, confirmed the store’s ethos.

“We know our stuff,” he said.

“One of our regular customers is into rockabilly and psychobilly and we get him in stuff.

“He asked in HMV if they stocked psychobilly and they said ‘Is that music?’”

Local band manager and gig promoter Verity Hoper said: “Truck Store has got it right.

“Not only is it a veritable Aladdin’s cave of great music, they are friendly helpful people and their commitment to live instores is really impressive.”

The film premiered in Brixton in the summer.

The screening in Witney will be feature a live performance by the Dreaming Spires. Both Oxford screenings will feature question and answer sessions with Mr Jones and director Pip Piper.