Compulsive collectors of music CDs and DVDs are going to love Singapore. CDs cost $18 or $25 for imports – and you can sometimes pick them up on sale at Gramaphone for as little as $8. A movie DVD costs about $50. Music tastes here are fairly mainstream with a preference for American top 40 music. But you’ll be able to get a variety of worldwide music at HMV.

The three-storey HMV in The Heeren shopping mall is the biggest music and DVD shop in town. They claim to stock over 200,000 titles and they have plenty of listening posts, a full-time radio service and even sound-proof rooms for classical and jazz lovers. And if they don’t have what you want, you can order it – as long as it passes the censorship laws – at no extra cost. Vinyl record lovers might have a harder time in Singapore. HMV stocks a selection but it’s mostly geared to the club music DJs and wannabes. With censorship laws, some albums are unavailable here, although the censors sometimes allow an album to get away with a warning sticker that the music ‘may contain offensive lyrics’.

HMV also has a large DVD selection and it’s the place to go to for old BBC comedies and last year’s blockbusters.

Singapore is very strict about piracy so you’ll be hard-pressed to find pirated DVDs. You can ask around for ‘underground’ sources if you’re really desperate.

Videos are near impossible to find here. If they stock them at all, most stores will have only a very small selection.