The Art of the Hunt: Vinyl Edition

Regardless of what type of collector you are, everyone is after the same thing; quality at a bargain. Be it low prices or awesome treasures, we all want the same thing from our records. I thought I would share some tips with you; valuable strategies I use when I am on the hunt for vinyl.

TIP #1 - Discover New Music At A Bargain

If you are simply looking for good music at great prices, used records at local record shops, thrift stores, garage sales and antique malls are a great place to shop. Picking up a copy of an album for three dollars or cheaper is a steal.

While pickings can be thin from time to time, this method of hunting for vinyl is a really a great way pick music from bands you aren't familiar with for real cheap.

Consider this true story.

A while I back I was digging through my local second hand shop and came across two albums from the James Cotton Blues Band. I had never heard of the band before, but I like blues in general, so at six bucks for both, I was able to score some new blues that I ended up loving.

To find the same two albums on iTunes at $0.99 per song would have cost me nearly twenty dollars. And to buy the vinyl LPs from  Amazon would have cost me fifteen dollars each, plus shipping. So not only did I get some great music for less than one sixth the cost of iTunes and Amazon, I discovered new music that I love.

Or even more recently, I picked up three albums from the band Black Oak Arkansas, a band I never heard of before this time, but instantly fell in love with them, and one of the albums might be one of the best live albums ever captured on record and it cost me nine bucks to open that door to a new love.

Now, I will admit that I have scored some unknown music before that I haven't loved, but the beauty of it is, I only spent six dollars. I can give it to friend. Or, I can take it to a monthly vinyl trade event I attend and someone there will absolutely love this particular album and I can trade it for something else that I did love or something previously unknown to me.

So I still win.

TIP #2 - Relationships Matter

Develop a relationship or relationships with your local shop owners. I'm not talking about some chain store like FYE. I'm talking specifically about your local, independently owned record shop. Try to stop in at least every other week. You don't need to spend money each time you go in, but, of course, it doesn't hurt if you do. Instead make it a point to talk to the staff, ask about music, ask them how business is going.. hell even just ask them about who is playing on the store's sound system. If they have a pet in the shop... greet the pet, get to know it's name. Develop a relationship.

And it can't be fake. You have to care about them as much as you want them to care about you. This doesn't mean you will be best friends forever; invited to birthday parties and exchange Christmas cards each holiday season. Make no mistake, these are, more times than not, consumer/retailer relationships. But they are important relationships.

This is a great way to get the shop to learn what you like, dislike and garner a few favors and recommendations from the retailer. When I talk about favors I'm not talking about freebies. No, don't expect freebies or anything like that. That's just dumb. When I talk about favors, I am talking about favors like spotting something you have been looking for and getting it in the shop specifically for you, or a simple recommendation of a new band based on what you already like.

I was hunting for a particular album for my wife from Dinah Washington. I let the staff at my local shop know (they are also the owners). A few weeks later they called me and said they came across the album as a part of a collection they just bought and that I could come down and pick it up for five dollars.

If you have been hunting for particular band or album from a band and they see one come through; even if they wouldn't normally buy it, they will likely pick it for you knowing you are hunting for it. So not only are you getting a positive consumer/retailer relationship that is built around music, you get an awesome perk like the one I mentioned above to boot.

A bonus tip is to come into the shop educated. Don't ask about "that one album from that one band that does that one song about being a "Creep". Know what you are looking for. Google is your friend. This is especially important for events like record store day. You can find a list of records coming out on record store day... shhhhh... little secret... the list is online. Find the titles you are interested in, and write them down... [more about lists in the bonus tips].Go into your local record store and ask them if they ordered those titles then ask them when they open on record store day (many stores shift their hours on that day).

It shows you know how to research on your own, which shows a serious level of interest and this will garner some respect from the local record store staff.

Tip #3 - Inspect Before You Buy

Always check the condition of the vinyl and make sure the album matches the cover. This of course only applies to used, unopened (not factory sealed) albums.

Due to people buying a record, taking it home and recording it to MP3 (cassettes back in the day), before returning it for a refund, most stores these day don't allow open records to be returned. This makes it every important to look at the condition of a used record before you purchase it, because it is already opened; even if it is from your "friends" at your local record shop. If a store reseals its used albums and refuses to allow you to inspect the vinyl condition before buying...

...take your business elsewhere.

You are checking for two things when you inspect an album;

1. Is the vinyl in good condition (is it playable).
2. Does the vinyl match the cover.

So how do you inspect the condition of a vinyl record? Here is what I look for. 

• Are the grooves well pronounced; is there a luster to the album? If the record looks dull, this could one of two things, it is well worn or it is very dirty. The first of the two, well worn, will impact the sound quality, the second can be taken care of with a good cleaning; or two.
• Is there warping or a bubble? A minor warp in the record may not affect playback much other than subtle pitch change, if at all. But if it is pronounced warp, or bubble shape, I have found some records that actually catch the tone arm as they spin around, like a high-centered car, picking the needle up and dropping back onto the record. This is not a record you want to buy... even if it's your favorite album from your favorite band.
• Is there heat damage? Heat damage will present itself around the edges of a record first as they are most susceptible to heat. You will want to look for bubbly pockmarks or "foamy surface" look to the record. 
• Are there scratches or scuffs? Scratches don't always impact the ability of the vinyl to sound good and not skip. Surface scratches may or may no add a pop or click to the playback, where as a deeper scratch, one that will catch the corner of a piece of paper as it is pushed over the scratch to see if it catches on the scratch, will definitely affect playback and likely add a skip. A lot of people swear by using their finger for feeling scratches, but I found that using the paper technique is fairly fool proof and is my preferred method, as the finger can lose sensitivity in cold or warm weather. More so, longer running LPs, those over 20 minutes per side, tend to be cut with shallower grooves, so a slight scratch will likely be more audible than those with a run time of under 20 minutes per side. Also, the type of music matters when dealing with scratches. Acoustic albums will likely do little mask the clicks and pops of a scratch than a rock or metal album will. 

More about the matching of vinyl to the cover.

I'm not saying that your local record store would intentionally put a record from Madonna into a Red Hot Chili Peppers' sleeve but another customer of the store might. And who knows... I am sure there are some stores of disrepute that might do that as well, but their reputation usually puts them out of business in short order. I have found a copy Conway Twitty vinyl LP in the cover of a Led Zeppelin album before.

And if you are diving for vinyl at thrift stores or flea markets and garage sales; this is very important as many of these sellers do not look at the condition of the vinyl, let alone make sure the album in the sleeve is actually the right album before putting them out on the shelf. I can't tell you how many times I have found an album I have been looking for at a thrift store only to pull the vinyl out to see it is unplayable; scratches, warps and even once, actually broken in half, plus the number of albums in the wrong sleeves. 

Tip #4 - Manage Your Expectations

When you go digging into record bins, don't expect to find anything. The only expectation you should have going into a dig is that regardless of what you may find, you won't over spend. Sticking to a budget can be hard, but you won't need your collecting to bankrupt you. 

This is very important as hunting can hit some serious dry spells. I have gone as long as three months without a single find. Sure there were bands I found that I liked during the digs, but the albums were in poor shape (not playable) or I already owned that album from them. As your collection gets bigger and your ears desire higher quality sound from your albums these dry spells can become longer and drier, because you already have so many albums and may end up desiring less pops and clicks.

So don't expect to find anything. Just enjoy the experience of the hunt and if you come home with a treasure, cherish it for what it is; a SCORE! 

Tip #5 - Keep a list or two with you at all times.

This list, best kept as a spreadsheet, but even alphabetically sorted notepad list can work, contains two lists; wants and haves. 

Buying duplicates can be rewarding if you find a better copy of an a album you already own, but when it's unintentional it becomes a face-palm moment when you get home.

While it may be easy to manage your collection in your head when you only have a dozen bands in your collection, but when your collection consists of seven hundred or more albums and includes hundreds of artists, you may struggle to remember if you have Johnny Cash's Songs of Our Soil album, when you already own over twenty of his other albums.

I have only had one instance where I purchased a duplicate accidentally. Simply because I couldn't remember if I had Dan Fogelberg's Phoenix or not. Well I purchased a duplicate. At that time I wasn't expecting to go hunting, but my wife convinced me to stop in and do a little digging; it didn't take much convincing really. But, I had left my phone at home so didn't have my list with me. I didn't fret too much. The album was only two dollars... and I just gave it to a friend who had been looking for it.

The lists are simple to keep and simple to access. I use Discog to keep track of my collection and keep track of my wishlist. They have an awesome export function which allows you to quickly download your collection and wish lists to an excel or notepad format, which is important if you don't have enough cellphone signal to look directly at the Discog's site where your digging at the time... and I have been known to drive out into the wilderness to dig for vinyl, or even a basement, so a lot of times, I don't have signal.

Also... keeping a want list is important, especially if you have a limited budget and are struggling to cull the stack of records you are holding in the middle of your local record store or garage sale because you can't afford them all. Your want list will make sure you don't put down that one or two records you definitely wanted.

So there are five great tips for hunting that I have learned through my experiences. But we aren't done yet. Below are three bonus tips I thought I would throw in for good measure.

Bonus Tip #1 - Don't Be A Snob

You have been hunting for that copy of Atomic Heart Mother since you began collecting and you finally found one, but the cover is destroyed so you pass on it. Here is my advise; always check the condition of the vinyl. Even if the cover is destroyed, if the vinyl is playable consider picking up the album.

Here's why; you can easily find orphaned covers for an album pretty cheap and typically if the record's cover is in bad shape, you will get the record cheap. It's a great, albeit more timely way to score an otherwise expensive album on the cheap; cheap vinyl + cheap cover = cheap album.

Bonus Tip #2 - Negotiate
I can't say "Always attempt to negotiate on the price", because you won't want to be "THAT" customer for a retailer, but what I can say is when it comes to thrift stores and garage sales, it never hurts to ask. All they can ever say is "No."

This is something you can't do with online shopping at iTunes or Amazon as the price is the price online. And it's not something you want to do "all the time", and actually never with new pressing, when dealing with your local record shop, but when it comes to non-retailers, feel free to ask every single time.

Bonus Tip #3 - Be Smart And Prepared To Walk Away

This has to do with with flea markets and garage sale environments. Three strategies regarding these types of sales:

1. Arrive early
2. Ask for a lower price
3. Come back later

Rule number one is simple to grasp. Early bird gets the worm, or in this case, the vinyl. Get there early to score the best albums they have for sale. 

Rule number two is also a simple. See Bonus Tip #2.

Rule number three is a bit more of a calculated risk. The strategy here is to pick the items you definitely want, don't want to risk losing to another. But if the box(es) contain so much good stuff, you can always make an offer that is reasonable. But since you arrived early, they likely won't accept your offer, because someone or many someones might come in and buy many others at full price. So I will pick up the few must have albums, pay for them and walk away happy, thanking them.

Then at the end of the flea market or the garage sale, come back and make a ridiculously low offer on the whole box; like $0.20 a record. Chances are good that they will accept this offer or at least come way down on their asking price. 

Thanks to news articles, many sellers think that there are millions of people clambering to buy all the vinyl in world and thanks to misuse of Discog's site they think they are sitting on a gold mine, because everyone's record is in mint condition. So they put ridiculously high prices on their vinyl. By the end of sale, the seller realizes that there aren't as many vinyl geeks out there as they thought or that their collection doesn't contain all that gold. Let's face it, the brat pack isn't as popular as they were back in the 60s and 70s. 

Most sellers don't want to have to handle the heavy boxes of vinyl at the end of a sale. So chances are good that they will cut a great deal near the of their sale. And if you paid full price for a few albums and walked away happy earlier in the day the seller is likely to cut an even better deal than if you stomped off in a huff earlier in the day when they wouldn't lower their prices.

So that's all I have for now. I hope you find this useful.