For The Record

There are a lot anti-vinyl sentiments being scattered around the the web these days. From the concept that record collectors are doing nothing more than collecting a tsunami of toxic waste to the reports that the record industry has one foot in the grave; I am here to set the record straight on these two topics and toss my opinion in regarding a few bits of mis-information being thrown around.

1. The Record Industry Is In Decline.

And no I won't provide a link to the WSJ article as it is simply a fabrication from start to finish, used to feed a slanted narrative to generate ad revenue from clicks.

But, I will say that if you believed the WSJ article, you would be believing a series manufactured statistics, taken out of context, that indicated a "small dip" in vinyl sales spells the end of the world for the record industry. Much in the same the phrase "Blood is thicker than water." is today taken to mean family is more important than friends. When in reality, the context of the original phrase was "The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb." which is a reference to the bond of soldiers shedding blood together being more important and stronger than the bonds of families.

The fact is, the record industry is healthy and growing.

All industries experience swings, both up and down, in sales; from automobiles to food to diapers. The WSJ did not report that there was lack of growth in sales, but rather that the growth in 2016 had not been as high as it was the previous years and that this decline in growth was cause for us to throw in the towel.

It a commonly observed and respected that in any given industry, healthy growth is considered to be between 2% and 3% year to year. There is a boom of growth in any industry's growth as adoption is high, meaning consumers are clamoring for the product and this typically happens with new products showing a 10% or more growth during this boom. Vinyl sales experienced that as the number of millennials discovered vinyl and older generations found the love of the medium again. Depending on the size of the industry, this number can, of course, fluctuate, but a mature, large industry growth at a rate of 2% to 3% is considered good, especially in an industry as old as music. So 12% growth is far from the "death of vinyl' as the WSJ article would like you to think.

Now I did write a post a few weeks back regarding the possibility of the vinyl bubble bursting, but my post had more do with over-saturation in the manufacturing industry, repressings and the impact this could have in arena of used record sales (which sales numbers are not tracked). What my post did not analyze was market reports. It was focused on manufacturing saturation.

The fact remains: Records sales were still reporting 12% growth in 2016; way above the average for an industry of this size and maturity. This is considered in good health. Sony recently announced they were reopening their record pressing plants in Japan because of the success of records in the marketplace. Sony may screw a lot of things up, but Sony doesn't usually make a decision like this if the market is on a downward slide. There is a great retort to the WSJ article by the guy named Daniel Sanchez. I would suggest you check it out.

2. Your Record Collection Is Bad For The Environment

Well this is both true and false, but I am here to set the record straight on this subject.

It is cool today to shame anything that is popular. Be it body-shaming, salary-shaming or green-shaming. If it s popular, it appears to be shame worthy. Hell, I am openly opinion-shaming in this article and even admitted it, but at least I am admitting it.

The general nature of the current debate is that records are worse for the environment than digital or CD formats. This is being widely spread online. From articles claiming the environmental impacts being devastating to an essay from an artist claiming he would never release another album on vinyl because of the impact of the environment.

The environmental hysterics all stem from one little toxic compound...

Polyvinyl chloride, PVC, which is the material most records are made from, is a plastic compound that requires a stabilizer like barium, zinc and calcium carboxylates (and until recently, Lead). PVC is commonly regarded as the most toxic of the plastics in the family of plastics because one of the main ingredients; vinyl chloride as it is a known human carcinogen (cancer causing agent).

But what you may not hear in these doomsday articles is that PVC is also commonly found in the following products;  Pipes (including pipes delivering drinking water, approved in 2007 by California), electrical cables, siding for houses, decals, automobiles, clothing (Goth, Punk, fetish and other alternative fashion wear) as well as waterproof sportswear (ski gear, shoes, aprons and handbags), flooring materials and even in our healthcare (tubing used for blood work, catheters, heart-lung bypass sets, hemodialysis and even as an alternative to latex gloves)... and so much more... like greenhouses, home playgrounds, foam and other toys (action and inaction figures), custom truck toppers (tarpaulins), ceiling tiles... the list literally goes on and on and on.

Our lives are basically surrounded with PVC. So records are no worse for you than eating a burger, potato salad and chips off a reusable plastic plate at a BBQ, or reheating your lunch contained in a PVC plastic container in the microwave. Seriously.

But what many of these anti-vinyl stories aren't telling you is that the chemicals used in making your phone, MP3 player or other digital music device aren't any less toxic. Most electronics made today contain some, if not all of the following ingredients, or use them during the manufacturing process; Berylium, Cadmium, Chromium Hexavalent, Lead, Mercury, Brominated Flame Retardants (BFRs), and yes, even polyvinyl chloride (PVC).

And if you use a device that has a rechargeable battery, well let me tell you something about these things. Lithium batteries contain electrolytes called super-halogens, and majority of these super-halogens also happen to be toxic halogens. Oh and while we are on the topic of super-halogens, breathing some toxic super-halogens gases at a concentration of 0.1% for several minutes is actually lethal.

And the reality is, lithium-ion battery technology is not safe. Short circuits, overcharging, over-discharging, crushing, and high temperatures can lead to what is known as a thermal runaway; a fire that leads to an explosion. Even if your battery doesn't experience thermal runaway, one study found that Lithium batteries when heated up, during normal use of a device, leaked more than 100 toxic gases including carbon monoxide.

Have you ever heard of a record leaking toxic gases during normal use? Better yet, have you ever heard of a record experiencing thermal runaway? I mean Van Halen's 1984 was hot and all, but it never spontaneously burst into flames and exploded on me during playback. Has a record ever released a gas so toxic that exposure to even the smallest concentration of it for a mere few minutes could prove lethal?

And CDs aren't much better in the plastics toxicity arena. CDs are... plastic. Duh Dun Duuuuun. Their cases are... you guessed it, plastic. All plastics come from petroleum. Guess what petroleum is; toxic.

Another argument is that records weigh more than CDs and therefore use more fuel in the shipping process. You know what weighs as much or more than records that gets shipped? Cars, turkeys, hams, canned foods, frozen vegetables, Cards Against Humanity.

There is no perfectly green solution when it comes living. The worst thing to happen to this planet is humans. Sorry... that just happens to be a true statement.

And yes, the making of music has an environmental impact. Hell the music making process is filled with plastics; instruments have plastics, including PVC. Amps, tuners, guitar picks, mixing boards, microphones, cables, speakers... all have toxic materials used in their manufacturing process. A tree or two are cut down to make a single guitar. A baby llama is scarified every time Justin Beiber releases a new album. Just so we have full disclosure, the llama/Beiber reference was just a joke.

My point is, humans can't get away from having an environmental impact. And while I am not condoning the slash-burning millions of acres of rain forest, you know because I recycle, I am asking you to not let the uninformed chicken littles of the world tell you the sky is falling just because they have their own trend they're following. Be responsible, but enjoy life as much as you can, because life is too short to not enjoy it.

In Conclusion

Let's face it folks, nothing in this world is worse for the environment than humans.

But records are no more dangerous to us or the environment than CDs, digital music players or anything else for that matter. Yes there are risks. Yes, there are costs, but these can be and are being mitigated through the most modern green manufacturing processes. And as we learn more, the manufacturing processes get greener and safer every year.

I would argue that a good record collector, one that looks for a used pressing instead of buying a newly pressed reissue, which keeps the old pressing out of the landfills, is probably more environmentally friendly than the person that buys a digital music player/streamer that has to be disposed of after two years because the lithium battery doesn't hold a charge anymore and isn't replaceable by the consumer; that's right Apple I am calling you out for that starting that money grabbing trend called disposable consumer electronics.

See, just I just apple-shamed.

My turntable has been around since 1973 and it still works great. Show me any digital player (iPhone, iPod, Zune, Galaxy or other device) that can even come close to experiencing that much longevity; 44 years. Show me a CD that was made in the mid to late 80s that is still playable. I have a record that was pressed in 1923 that plays like it was new. When compared to the two to three year life span of a cellphone, or Black Friday television, old music formats and vintage electronics used to play them far better on the environment than anything made today.

Furthermore the record industry remains in good health; for the time being. If you're gonna have a heart attack every time you look at record sales numbers, I strongly recommend you don't ever track your weight or the stock market on a weekly basis, let along daily; the ups and downs on those measures would likely cause you the clutch your chest and fall over.

My advice, stop letting the fear mongering media scare you away from your passion. Quit clicking on the links that are obviously click-bait titles. I'm not saying that the toxic components used the manufacturing process of records haven't caused harm in this world, there is plenty of evidence that would contradict any claim like that. What I am saying though is that records have been relatively safe and around for longer than any of us have been alive; and I'm old, so that's saying a lot. And more importantly, records will likely remain around for decades to come and they will only become safer to manufacture in the future.

I Want It All, I Want It All, I Want It All, And I Want It Now

The mental health status of this collector... yeah that's the subtitle. This is a self analysis essay.

With the exception of my mom, who lives in a house that feels like a cross between a Class 10000 clean room and a museum, most of every single human being on the planet, are hoarders to some degree.

And you know what, it's okay. You're a hoarder. He's a hoarder. She's a hoarder. It is normal. Just because you keep some stuff, it doesn't mean you're going live on a property that looks like the one above or that you are going to be on a future episode of an exploitative television show.

There will be no judgments cast here, we are of the same ilk.

And yes, there a difference between a hoarder and a collector, but it may be difficult to see the differences at times, especially when you look at the psychology of collecting and hoarding; the line becomes very blurred, a true neutral gray region. And while I'm not a psychologist, I can share some basic definitions I use.

A collector is someone who collects things of a specific type or theme. Comic books, records, movies, plates, glassware, antiques, vintage cars; we all have our reason's or as I like to call it, passions for collecting these things. But typically a collector collects one, two or maybe three of these types of things.

A hoarder is someone who has a hard time letting go of things; with a deep neurological need to "save" them. Usually, but not always, these things a hoarder "saves" can have very little real world value (read garbage); but again not always, as the value of many things hoarders "save" could be shockingly high.

This means that a collector that "collects" more than one specific type of thing, could, technically speaking, be a clinical hoarder, especially if the "collecting" is impulsive.
 
Some record collectors are known as completion-ists. Completion-ists can be mild; must have all the songs from their senior year of high school, as an example. Or, Completion-ists can be extreme; must have every version of every record from a certain musician/band (including imports from various countries). Even though we, as record collectors, all have some form of completion-ist in us, the person who needs every version (imports, misprints, reissues, etc) of every album may be a step closer to being classified as a hoarder.

For me, I will give Van Halen as my personal example. I needed to have all of the Van Halen records in my collection, but that did not include the Van Hagar era starting with 5150 (I have taste, though you may think it is poor taste, we won't get into that argument here, as poor taste is still taste.)

So let's talk a little bit about records as a type of thing to collect versus hoard. You are a collector if you collect music you like and listen to. You might be a hoarder if your "collection" contains music that you don't like or music you have never and will never listened to.

For me in this instance, if my collection had one or more Van Hagar albums, it would be likely that my collection would contain albums I didn't like from other bands I otherwise liked, or even albums I didn't like from bands that I didn't like.

This alone could check off one the markers identifying me as a hoarder.

And this scenario can get really exaggerated. I know of people, ahem, a "friend", who takes car loads of records home with them regularly. I actually wrote a posting back in February, that talks a little bit about one man's obsession that led him to buy enough records over a 20+ year period to fill a single-car storage unit, front to back, top to bottom, with boxes and boxes and boxes of records. I don't know what his motivation was during that time, all I know is that I gained access to so much vinyl that I didn't know where to begin.

Record collectors, and collectors in general, tend to have mild versions of ICD. Not all collectors have ICD, Impulse Control Disorder, is very common in people with ADHD, but many collectors do suffer from it. ICD is characterized by a failure to resist a temptation, urge or impulse that may harm oneself or others.

Addicts of all types tend to have ICD; drugs, alcohol, sex, shoppers (shop-aholics), porn or Facebook. Addictions are two parts, a need to "feel good" or more than likely, the need to not "feel bad" and an inability to resist temptation when the opportunity to not feel bad presents itself.

When ICD becomes a problem for collectors is when we purchase or otherwise acquire records you don't have room for or don't have money to spend on... e.g. buying a new record or batch of records with your grocery money. If you are spending your grocery money on vinyl, you would be failing to resist a temptation, an urge or an impulse even if it may harm oneself or others.

And the funniest thing about ICD, it is often accompanied with feelings of guilt and remorse. So once you make the decision, you will feel guilty about it or regret that you did it. In the world of collectors, just as it is with addicts; remorse and guilt can lead to hiding purchases or having hiding places to conceal just how big your collection/problem is.

So, in my mind, my Van Halen collection was complete when I purchased Van Halen, Van Halen II, Women and Children First, Fair Warning, Diver Down and 1984. I didn't care if they were original pressing or reissues, I just needed them in my collection. When I saw one, and it was in my budget (meaning I could find a way to justify buying it when I saw it; and I always found that justification, even if I didn't have the spare cash to do so), I purchased it, usually making a small sacrifice in some other financial area of my life; some times this was accompanied with remorse, but rarely with guilt.

But once my Van Halen collection was complete, my record collection remained incomplete. So... I moved on to another; for me it was Led Zeppelin and then on to Red Hot Chili Peppers.

I realize that earlier I wrote that this posting was to be free from judgment, and it still is, I am not here to judge anyone for any mental health issues they may have, but I am using this image (right) of Henry Rollins to express my judgment of people who allow their collections to be damaged. I just don't understand that mentality.

If you collect something, you typically have a love of the thing you are collecting.

Regardless if it is comics, records, mugs, beanie babies, dashboard hula girls or bottle caps; if you aren't taking care of the collection, it shows a disconnect, a lack of love for the objects being collected; and that is not who a collector is at their core, typically.

This is a key sign of trouble as a collector; if you don't have room for the things you are bringing home and these things stack up, are disorganized and sometimes it gets to the point that things are getting damaged as a result. If your collection is causing problems with your marriage, relationship and/or finances, you may need to take some to evaluate some your priorities.

My ex-wife, along with so many other undesirable traits, was a hoarder/shop-aholic and remains one to this day. As an example of her hoarding, we would park $35,000 worth of cars in the driveway because she had so many things in the garage, floor to ceiling, things that were never-ever-ever used, we could barely walk around the garage, let alone park one or both of our cars in there. So she would literally put $35,000 worth of automobiles at risk of break in or outright theft to store things that were not used, ever and probably weren't worth five hundred dollars.

Whenever I attempted to talk to her about getting rid of much of the stuff, she would recite the emotional value of the items; "This was my grandpa's homemade shelf," or "We can't get rid of that, it was given to me by 'so-in-so'" or "priceless family heirloom. We would have "garage" sales once a year, that actually took place in our drive way, because our garage was still so full of junk.

Each sale would be full of brand new kids clothes, most of which still had the department store price tags on them. We would sell the clothes for twenty-five cents each, or five for a dollar. And each year we made nearly $1000 at our garage sales. That should give you a sense of the true scale of the issue.

Then after the divorce her hoarding got worse. She now has two single car garage sized storage units, across town from one another, in addition to her single car garage, all of which is filled to the brim.

And again, I am not throwing stones here. I have my things I hoard. I have two boxes filled with cables; chargers for old phones, power cords for computers, audio cables, coaxial cables, CAT-5 cables, speaker wire... and so on. It is something I can't let go of, but then again, my cable boxes are accessed multiple times a month to complete various projects I am working on.

Now I am not saying that if each and every little thing isn't in its rightful place, you are hoarder. I too have periods of acquisition where I come into a large quantity of stuff that I have to make room for. Like the time I was gifted over a thousand albums, which I culled down to three hundred albums.

Even after the culling, I was not prepared for an influx of three hundred albums into my collection. I didn't have storage, nor did have money to buy storage at that given moment. But again I didn't go out and buy three hundred albums. I couldn't say no to the opportunity.

But rather than store them in my garage for years on end, I culled the thousand albums down to three hundred must keeps and made a plan to expand my storage to accommodate the fact that I just tripled my album collection. The other seven hundred records, well I gave them all away.

And within a month, my plan was executed and my albums were all safely stored away in their permanent place in my home.

I never want my collection(s) to take over my life. I simply to enjoy the simple pleasures I find in this little insignificant life I have been blessed with. When will my collecting be done, probably the same time I retire from working; when I'm dead.

In conclusion, don't take anything I wrote here personal. This, as much of writing is, is more of an essay to myself; putting my own life in perspective. When you (read this as first person narrative as I am talking to you the reader at this time) read the word you, I am generally talking to myself in second person narrative. Nothing more.

Being a collector with a mental health condition like ICD or a tendency for hoarding can be a real challenge, especially from an outsiders perspective. While my wife asks from time to time, "So when is your record collection going to be complete?" My wife understands that my love of music runs deep and is very broad. But my wife is truly my reality check, for without my wife, I would likely have my garage filled with records, electronics, hulks and comics and would be very unhappy about all the clutter as I am minimalist regarding the world around me. But the minimalist in me can't suppress the fact that, deep down inside, I want it all, and I want it now.

Why all the hate?

I love music and love sharing music with others. I especially love music when it is spinning at thirty-three and one third revolutions per minute. I love the sound. I love the ritual. I love the experience.

And finding others who share that love is amazing.

But, do you ever find yourself feeling down, disengaged or even angry while engaging with social media to connect with others over that love? Have you lost interest in the things that you once had passion for? I experience these things from time to time... and I have a good idea why.

I am the type of individual who prefers to share my love of something rather than my hate of things. At 47 years old, I find there isn't enough time or energy in this life to spend any amount of it on hate. Hating something is like burning down your own home because you saw a rat.

Hate is such a waste of energy.

See I define hate as the dictionary does; intense hostility and aversion usually deriving from fear, anger, or sense of injury. There is very few things in life that evoke hostility and aversion for me and music definitely isn't one of those things.

I love music. It is that simple.

I love almost all music. Some music I love more, some less. The music I don't love, I also don't hate. At no time has a band or their music done or said anything to spurn hostility and aversion in me. They haven't made false claims about me, they haven't robbed me, killed my wife or kids, slashed my tires or even dropped a deuce in my yard.

So why would I hate them or their music? And from my view of the world, how could any rational person truly "hate" any music, musician or band?

As I surf the perceptually endless sea of opinions on social media, I find more and more hypocrisy in the world of twitter and the plethora of "fan" pages on Facebook. People and groups of people that claim to be "fans", and "lovers" of things like music, comics, movies, sports... just about anything that a fandom can be based on, are more focused on the negative aspects of their passion than on their love of something.

It's almost like it's trendy or cool to be a hater.

Random Post on a "Fan" Page

It is very common to see a group on Facebook that has a description that states; "... a group for music lovers...", yet much of the content in the group will include postings and comments that resemble this image of an actual post in a Musuc "Lovers" group on the left. It's not just random posts like the one on the left; there are some nasty, hateful comments to otherwise positive posts.

I can understand someone not liking a particular band, or not liking the personal habits of a particular member of a band, but to take the time it takes and spend the energy it takes to spread this hate is something I don't understand at all. A fan page, by definition, is supposed to be about the things you love. So if this is a fan page, why post hate or allow hate to be posted?

I don't get it.

But it is more than just posts and comments, some people carry their hate much further, going so far as to make social media accounts and groups dedicated to what they hate and they actually draw other like minded people in, like this person in a  Facebook group titled, " I hate the Red Hot Chili Peppers because they just Suck!"

Negativity Attracts Negativity

Now, this writing isn't just about all the negativity out there. I am here to share my strategy for dealing with the hate or more importantly, eliminating the hate.

Please, don't get me wrong, I am not some Dudley-Do-Right-Polyanna of person who only sees the silver lining in the world. I am a human being. But when it comes to my interactions with the world around me, I want to spread light. I want people, either in real life or via social media to leave an interaction with me feeling good about the interaction, and typically I want to leave feeling the same way, because what's the point of living in a negative space.

So how do I do it? How do I avoid the negativity it in the world of social media. Well, to be honest, I don't.

First and foremost... you can't avoid all the negativity on social media. It is that simple. If you are on social media, you can't avoid the negativity altogether, but you can minimize it by choosing to limit your exposure to it and you can choose how you deal with it.

My first hard and fast rule is to not engage with the negativity. I firmly believe the best way to let go of something that is not good for you is to just simply stop participating in its energy altogether. This can be difficult, because the act of denying or defending something actually affirms it because the act itself puts energy into it.

So when I come across a negative post or comment, I do not respond. I won't even put a positive response because any response, even a positive response is putting energy into the negativity.

The saying, "Don't Feed The Troll", while funny, it is also true is actually a pretty good rule to abide by.

One of my key strategies is I limit my contacts in the world of social media to people I have relationships with in real life; people I share common interests with and actually hang out with; again in real life. This doesn't mean I only hang out with people that all see the world through the same lens I do. I am not a lemming. My friends constantly challenge my view of the world, but they are not negative people.

I have friends who are into photography, some friends that are into comics, some that are into horror movies and some that are into collecting records. Hell, some are even into all of the above, but in total, I have a whopping 62 friends on Facebook.

And, I am a happier person for it.

This has been a difficult strategy to apply at times. As a person who has helped run state fair photography competition, managed a huge photography club, taught photography classes, hosted a weekly podcast about geek culture, had booths at comic cons, interviewed celebrities and (even made friends with some of them) and the various other world opening adventures, it is not a stretch of the truth to say that I have had thousands of friend requests across social media, most of which were complete strangers to me.

But, the key has been to decline all but 0.00000001% of them.

See just because I went to the same high school as someone, or attended the same comic con as someone or because they listened to me on the radio once or just because we both love the Popeye Movie Soundtrack doesn't grant them instant access to my life. Hell, I have been working with the same people for the last three years and I have not had any of my co-workers over for dinner. My co-workers aren't even friends on social media. So why would allow a complete stranger or even a casual acquaintance that level of access to my life?

This is just one way I keep the riff-raff out.

Another key element of my strategy is to investigate before I engage. When I join a new group, I read the postings and the comments to the postings in a group before I make any post beyond my obligatory "Thanks for the add" post.

I am looking at the general atmosphere of a group. Are people generally sharing information and insight? When people disagree, are they stating opinion and preference or are they putting down the opinions that don't align with their own; trolling.

I am also looking at how the admins moderate the discussions. Are they hard handed sensors, or are the facilitating positive conversations and debate. Are they moderating the discussions, keeping them related to subject of the group? A good admin or cluster of admins in a group can make all the difference.

Group of people, in real life or on social media all work the exact same way; the larger the group the bigger the chance that they won't all agree on everything or get along all the time. And that is fine. We don't all have to agree that Van Hagar was the biggest mistake in music history, but we can be civil in our stated opinions.

Just because a few individuals in a group are bad eggs, I won't let them spoil an otherwise great group for me. So the last key element of my strategy is a liberal use of the Block feature of a social media site. My Facebook account has a countless number of blocked individuals.

These people on my block list are not people I hate on social media, just people that are typically negative in their postings and interactions and as a result people I choose to eliminate from social media life.

This is a powerful way for me to remain engaged with a group without seeing the negative posts of these individuals or being at risk of them chiming in one something I share.

I love music and love sharing music with others. These are the strategies I used to protect myself so I can continue to do so.

Why I Can't Monetize My Vinyl Collection

A lot of people I know talk about their collection in monetary terms; "This album was 'this amount' " and "I scored this at a garage sale for 'x' dollars and it's worth 'this much more'". This is how a lot people valuate the vinyl collection... in dollars and cents... and that's okay... for them.

I see this in just about every collecting hobby known to me; comics, toys, sports cards. In every collectible market you have two basic types of collectors; those that are money motivated and those that are passionate about the subject of the collection.

I see a lot of comic book collectors that talk about their collection in terms of where they found a key issue, how much they paid for it and how much it's worth. They are obviously money motivated collectors. Then you have comic book collectors who talk about the same key issues, but instead of price/value, they talk about key elements of the story contained in the issues, how the stories relate to other stories and so on and so forth. These are people of love the books, not so much the money.

I can see where the money mentality comes from, but I don't understand it. This isn't me judging, but I don't see how someone can collect something, call themselves a collector, if they plan to sell some day.

While, I also associate a dollar value to my records, it's really only for insurance purposes. See if I want to get these cherished pieces of my life replaced if something were to happen to them, then I have to know how much would cost to replace. Other than that, the only other time I ever associate my collection with money is in the context of sharing with my friends where they can find vinyl and not pay through the nose for it.

So while I do, at some level, monetize my collection; I never look at my collections (yes, I have a collection of Hulk and horror figures, vinyl records as well as movies and comic books) as something that can be liquidated when times get tough or if something "better" comes along. I don't I see my record collection as dollar signs;  my collection is so much more than just "Benjamins" sitting in a milk crate.

Dick Clark nailed my view of music when he said, "Music is the soundtrack of our lives." That statement mirrors my view on how important and integrated music is to my life, even though, at the time I heard it, I lacked the words to express the sentiment as well as Mr. Clark did.

See, I remember the exact song that was playing when I experience my first slow dance with a girl I had "love" feelings for at a Junior High School dance; Journey's Open Arms. It was my first encounter with the feeling of romance.

I remember the song I fell asleep to every night the summer before my freshman year, identifying with the message of escaping the prison of a menial existence and moving on to something greater, more freedom; Styx: Mr. Roboto. Moving from junior high to high school was a big life event for me, as I am sure it was for many people; with huge changes to how social and institutional interactions operated. Mr. Roboto gave me the tools to understand that I didn't have to be the kid I was in junior high that I could grow, evolve. Mr. Roboto gave me permission to be myself, to choose my own path.

Yeah, at fourteen years old, I identified with a message of escapism and boredom; shocking isn't it.

I remember all the way back in kindergarten, as a part of show and tell, singing, unabashedly I might add, Helen Ready's Delta Dawn and not understanding why everyone else in the class didn't know the lyrics to the song when I asked them to sing along with me.

I remember in the fourth grade, when it rained, and living in pacific northwest, it was always raining, the two fourth grade classes getting together and playing Greased Lightning from the Grease soundtrack, dancing the moves from the movie. None of us any good, but each of feeling connected to one another through this song and the dance movies. My first feeling of belonging socially.

Music is a connection with my past, but it is also a connection with my present and future.

My collection is, for the most part, truly autobiographical. Even music from bands that I didn't get exposed to until much later in life, like, Led Zeppelin (age 19 when I knowingly heard my first Zeppelin Song) and Black Sabbath (age 18 when I heard my first Sabbath songs) remain my musical autobiography. They remain because they not only connect me with my past, they helped define my future.

See, music connected me with who I am today by connecting me with life lessons I might not have gotten anywhere else without getting into some pretty deep trouble.

Sammy Hagar's "Can't Drive 55" taught me that life was a series of choices and each choice presented me with a reward and a consequence. I could drive faster than 55 (for those of you not in the know, 55 was the national speed limit at the time) and get the thrill of speeding as a reward, but also lose my license and my freedom as the consequence. Sammy Hagar taught me that I had to look at each choice and ask myself, "Is the reward worth more than the consequence that comes with it."

For some, Sammy may have been singing about rock 'n roll rebellion, but for me Sammy was singing about choices.

I learned how to channel my rage into writing through listening to Metallica.

I learned how to understand and interpret foreign accents and broken English by listening to Ozzy Osbourne.

I learned how to accept and move beyond my own small town origins through Springsteen and Mellencamp.

I learned about friendship through the Popeye Movie soundtrack, even though I had not yet seen the movie.

Interpol and Radiohead taught me that it is okay to feel melancholy.

Bob Marley and Boston both taught me about thinking for myself and the importance of not be a lemming.

ZZ Top taught me what it meant to be cool.

Bobby McFerrin taught me the importance of learning to chill when things get tough.

I could go on and on with that list, but I won't bore you with every little detail of who taught me what, when and where. It is safe to say that every artist I have in my collection taught me a little something about myself, shaped a little part of who I am, or at a very minimum amplified a little trait in myself and allowed me, hell even gave me permission, to embrace that part of me.

For this reason alone, I can never view my record collection as currency.

I wanted to list the top five albums I would never let slip from my collection; records that truly shaped, in one way or another, the man I am today. But, five wasn't enough... it quickly turned into a list of a hundred albums... but to keep the list readable for you, I trimmed off the last 80 and present you with this list of 20 albums I hold near and dear to my heart.

1. Popeye: Movie Soundtrack
2. Red Hot Chili Peppers: Blood , Sex, Sugar, Magic
3. Otis Redding: The History of Otis Redding
4. Prince: 1999
5. Boston: Third Stage
6. Scorpions: Blackout
7. Bobby McFerrin: Simple Pleasures
8. Black Sabbath: Black Sabbath
9. Interpol: Interpol
10. High Fidelity: Soundtrack
11. White Zombie: La Sexorcisto: Devil Music Vol. 1
12. Stevie Ray Vaughan: Couldn't Stand The Weather
13. Pink Floyd: The Wall
14. Johnny Cash: Johnny Cash At San Quentin
15. The Rolling Stones: Sticky Fingers
16. Metallica: Master of Puppets
17. Stevie Wonder: Talking Book
18. Led Zeppelin: Led Zeppelin I
19. Carole King: Tapestry
20. Pink Floyd: Darkside of the Moon 

I don't think poorly of those that see nothing more than dollar signs in their collection. I just have a hard time connecting with that mentality. These albums, and every album I own, have no price tags associated to them in my heart, because their value runs deeper than a dollar sign. 

I can't monetize the value of my life, therefore I can't monetize my vinyl LPs. 

Is It Nostalgia Or Something Else?

I just read an article that explained the sole reason for the new found love and resurgence of vinyl is nostalgia. You know what?

The article kind of pissed me off.

Nostalgia is defined as:

"A sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past, typically for a period or place with happy personal associations."

Why is it that we have to make generalized statements about a group of people and then classify them in mostly disparaging ways? Saying someone is nostalgic, in the context of the article I read, is a passive aggressive way saying these people are living in the past, afraid of the future. It's like high school all over again. The Jocks, the Nerds, Band Geeks, etc.

If somebody loves vinyl, that should be enough. If it's not, then the fact that that love music should be enough.

I, like so many others have many different reasons for my love of vinyl. I get it a lot from acquaintances, "Ah you grew up in the 70s", meaning I am old, "so you long for old stuff again."

That simply isn't true.

Being as I grew up in the 70s I should, by that logic, enjoy John Carpenter's Halloween more than Rob Zombie's Halloween. That would be a false assumption. I actually enjoy the gritty new style and storytelling in today's horror overall. It doesn't mean I dislike the original either. I have a a deep appreciation of both, for different reasons.

While I love vinyl, I also enjoy the portability of digital music. I can't take my entire record collection with me to play on a road trip, but I can slip a 32GB SD card into my car's console and have enough music to run my gas tank dry 30 times over before hearing a repeated song.

But if I could listen to vinyl in the car, I would.

Being that I was born during the Summer of Love, that would be the Summer of '69, yes just like the Bryan Adams' song of the same name, I came of age in the 70s and 80s. But, my childhood wasn't remotely like That 70's Show, Dazed and Confused, The Wonder Years or even Almost Famous portrayed. I was raised by a strict single mother until I was six, when she then married an abusive, womanizing, alcoholic, blue-collar, mill worker, things went downhill from there.

I was a particularly precocious child with a natural curiosity for how things work and a wild imagination. That combination kept me in a lot of trouble throughout my childhood. As a result I spent a lot of time being punished by various means; of which, one punishment was being grounded, alone, to my room, for weeks at a time.

So to prevent this from being a recap of my crappy childhood, because that is not my intent, it's just easier for me to say, the "good ole days" aren't all that worthy of remembering them in fondness; no nostalgia is in my heart for that time in my life.

I have many friends who definitely collect things in the name of nostalgia; an attempt to hold on to their fond memories of the past. They do this openly, admitting that it's nostalgia. While I can understand why these friends do this, I don't really relate to it, but at the same time I also don't judge them as I can find a connection with them: We love some of the same things. Reason's aren't important.

If I am going to be honest here, I have to disclose that I didn't knowingly hear a Led Zeppelin song until I was nineteen years old. My first known memory of a Queen song, wasn't even Queen, but rather Weird Al's parody of Queen with "Another One Rides the Bus."

My own exposure to music was fairly narrow and it didn't broaden until I was into my late teens, early twenties. And this helps answer the question: So why vinyl?

When I started broadening my musical world, CDs were the "new" thing on the market. CD Players were expensive as was the CDs themselves. As a result, between 1987 and 1993, I could buy two, sometimes three, vinyl albums for the price of one CD. I could check out vinyl albums from the public library. I was able to explore so much more music for my limited (military) income.

But for me there are a few things about vinyl I learned to love from an early age and developed into my late teens and early twenties.

I love the tangibility of vinyl. I love the fact that I can touch it, hold it, smell it, see it, in its entirety, in detail; the liner notes, the cover art, the gate fold art, the inner sleeve art, the lyrics; it is a complete experience. There isn't a screen sitting between me and the experience of music; filtering it. Even CDs and Cassettes cannot replicate that experience like vinyl can.

I love the ritual of vinyl. Walking my fingers through a bin of vinyl to find that one gem I can add to my collection. Sliding the album out of its sleeve, gently laying it on the platter and dropping the needle (yes, I still call it a needle and always will).

I love the raw and stable nature of vinyl. With the proper care and handling, vinyl sounds the same today as it did when it was pressed. And the care and handling aren't all that complicated.

I love the discovery of new-to-me music that vinyl makes affordable. Because vinyl is still pretty inexpensive, I can discover new music at a rate that is unprecedented even in CDs.

I love the game I play as I flip through a bin of records; The game of "have it | need it | leave it".

I love that when I buy vinyl, I truly own it and I'm not just licensing it. I can play it, record it, play it back when and where I want. I can loan it out to friend. I can trade it, sell it, gift it. It is personal.

I love the mystery of vinyl hunting. Going to a garage sale or even my local record store and see what they got in their "Recently Arrived Used Section". Each dig through a new bin is new experience with new treasures to be found; new music to fall in love with.

I love that vinyl allows me to determine my favorite songs from an album. Vinyl allows me to discover what I like instead of being told via industry driven algorithms designed to push specific artists and songs to top of a searches or streaming playlists telling me what I should like.

My love of vinyl is not based in some "everything old is new again" movement.

My love of vinyl is not a nostalgia based desire to hold on to some part of the past.

My love of vinyl is not based on a monetary based profit motive.

My love of vinyl is my own, based on who I am.

Even though others may share some of my reasons for a love of vinyl, my love of vinyl is likely different than his love of vinyl and different than her love of vinyl. But the fact remains, we all love music.

Isn't that enough?

Do the formats, the motivations, the classifications of said motivations really matter? Is it really that important to break down, classify and divide something we find commonality in? Why can't we just find that one area of commonality and connect on the fact that we connect there. Embrace each other on the common love.

My love is music. My choice of medium is vinyl. The reason's don't really need to be classified. Can't we drop the labels and drop a needle instead.

Listen.

Connect.

Embrace.

Thrive.

Music.

Vinyl: The Reports of My Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated

Vinyl was never really dead, neither in the hearts of music lovers nor commercially. It may have been in critical condition and near comatose commercially for a few years, as new music was rarely pressed into vinyl; but vinyl was never truly dead.

There is a difference between the "vinyl revival" and it's commercial resurgence. Revival is defined as an instance of something becoming popular, active, or important again. Vinyl remained popular, active and important the for a large portion of the U.S. And more importantly, vinyl remained available in the marketplace the whole time between 1973 and 2017 via small, locally owned record stores.

While the RIAA tracks new record sales, what had never been tracked by the RIAA is the sale of used vinyl, or vinyl checkouts at local libraries, or sales at flea markets, swap meets, garage sales... which remained relatively strong throughout the "dead" period. Funnier still, new vinyl sales never went away entirely. Vinyl still had a pulse, but was being declared dead. What we would call that in the real world (the world outside the music industry)?

Malpractice.

Some may call it marketing, but I would definitely call it malpractice.

New Vinyl Sales as Reported by Nielsen.

Look at the chart on the left. Sometime between 1990 and 1993 vinyl as a music delivery format was officially declared dead in the media via an RIAA release. But the fact remains, new vinyl sales continued, and even saw growth above 1.5 million units between 1993 and 2003. That is not dead, but rather a sign that new vinyl sales were holding strong and continued to hold strong even as a second generation digital format, MP3, was taking hold.

If you look closely at the dip in vinyl sales between 2001 and 2007 (the height of digital sales), and compare it with CD sales during the same period; the sales for new vinyl sales are nearly flat, at around one million units while CD sales dropped from nearly four million units to one million units in the same period. MP3 didn't do a lot to hurt vinyl, but it wrecked havoc to the CD industry.

Last year marked the 33 1/3 anniversary of my local record store. Vinyl was a source of income that helped keep this shop open, especially as other retailers jumped the vinyl ship. Yes, CD sales were tops between 1988 and 2005, but vinyl, mostly used, and a relatively small amount of new vinyl was still being carried and sold.

While sales thinned out, even for CDs, during the dark years following the iPod release, my local record store is still in business and thriving today partially because of fact that they stuck it out.

While big stores like Camelot (now f.y.e.), Sam Goody (Bankruptcy 2006, now f.y.e.) and even the mega-store Tower Records (liquidated in 2006) all folded under or were bought out by Trans World Entertainment and  this was reported collapse brought on by the digital revolution.Now at f.y.e you find that less a quarter of the store is music or music related, while the rest of the store is dedicated to toys, clothes and knickknacks.

Even the big box and department stores, like Walmart, Costco, Kroger/Fred Meyer have dismal selections on music and a majority of it is CDs.

But the independently owned  record stores, they adapted as the "trend" shifted. They remained true to music, stores like Ranch Records, didn't abandon vinyl because they were told to. They didn't cave to the pressures of the times, although nobody would have blamed them if they did. It wasn't always easy, just ask one of the owners of your local record shop. During the dark days of digital, it was pretty dark, but they worked through the struggles and as a result deserve our utmost love and admiration for these are the people helped keep vinyl in it's rightful place. It is these people, the independent owners of local music stores that refused to allow vinyl to die in the market place.

2016 brought about a change. I am not here to argue whether vinyl is superior to digital, or vice versa, but I am here to point at a fact and to ask a question. Fact: For the first time, 2016 saw new vinyl out sell digital downloads. Question: If digital was truly a superior format like so many claim, would simple nostalgia or hipster-hype for vinyl allowed an inferior format to outsell a superior format in it's prime?

The music industry, through technology, tried it's damnedest to eradicate vinyl from the face of the earth, but the technology was never a match for the multi-layered experience vinyl brought to the music listening experience. The artwork, the liner notes, the feel of holding an album, opening a gate fold, the smell of new and old vinyl; the overall ritual of the vinyl experience is something that technology failed to replicate with its push button access to millions of songs.

We are creatures of multiple sensory capabilities. We experience the world with our eyes, our nose, our mouth, our skin and our ears and our brains. The more of these capabilities we use during an experience the more we "experience" it. The digital experience is one that we experience with only our ears.

Vinyl on the other hand is something we experience with most of our sensory capabilities; we smell the album and cover; we see the artwork and grooves in the record; we read the liner notes; we feel the album as a tangible object; we hear the music we think about the experience. We experience a vinyl album in a way that digital cannot deliver. We live the ritual that is vinyl.

Sure technology brought us real portability and ease of access across platforms, but at it's best, technology brought us a cold and callous listening experience that forced music into the background of lives; played while we were busy with other things. Digital was no different than radio, something we listed to while we were busy driving.

In the end, technology couldn't match the truly human experience of music, the ritual that vinyl brings to the listening experience.

Now, with all that said, there is definitely a resurgence in interest for vinyl. This resurgence has been arguably attributed to the hipsters' "Everything Old Is Cool Again" movement. And in reality, the hipsters can't even be given that much credit. Most hipsters likely got their love of vinyl from their parents and grandparents or friends who got their love it from their parents and grandparents; those parents and grandparents who held on to their own collections long enough for their kids/grand-kids to discover vinyl through their collections and fall in love with them.

But, this resurgence is nothing more than a commercial resurgence, meaning the industries involved feel that they can make money off of it so they declare it a resurgence. The commercial resurgence isn't a bad thing. It provides an opportunity for us to experience new music on vinyl that might not have been available in that format before. Lady Gaga, Jason Isabel, Amy Winehouse... all artists who launched their careers when vinyl was reportedly "dead" all have music available on vinyl and it is because of this resurgence.

Not everyone who pursues vinyl today is a hipster; hell, at nearly 50 years old, I am way to old to be considered a hipster. I don't drink iced tea from mason jars. I still find it funny that BCGs are a fad (big, black framed eyeglasses known as Birth Control Glasses, BCG, because you weren't going to be laid wearing a pair of them back in my day). I especially don't think a sushi-burrito should be a thing. Hell... I'm still suspect of Fish Tacos. Vinyl isn't a hipster thing. Vinyl isn't an old fart's thing. Vinyl isn't collector's thing. Vinyl is all these things, plus a whole lot more.

Vinyl lives on today because the love of the medium remains intact. Vinyl lives on because vinyl is a complete music experience. Vinyl is felt, it is smelled, it is held, it is heard. Vinyl is experienced. Vinyl delivers a unique listening experience that can't the replicated by an LCD screen and headphones; it the exposure to all your senses that makes the music experience special. And this experience has been passed down from one generation to another because, really, what's not to love about the vinyl experience? A few pops and clicks... oh no. 

  

For so many of us, this is not a revival of a format or the resurrection of a musical savior; this is just business as usual. And for those of us who know this about vinyl, vinyl will always be a part of our own personal listening ritual. 

Is it Worth It?

Is it worth it?

Regardless of what "IT" is, this is the question retailers and consumers should be asking every day. The question "Is it worth it?" is something we have to ask every time, it's just that sometimes we end up asking the question after the fact; "Was it worth it?" If we are asking "Was it worth it?", chances are the answer is already "No" because we are likely suffering from buyers remorse which is why we are asking the question.

Is it worth it?

Retailers need to ask the question, "Is it worth it to stock vinyl in my shop?"

Consumers need to ask the question, "Is this album worth x-dollars of my money?"

Now I have my haunts that I go digging in. A few second hand and antique shops, a local record shop and a specialty vintage shop. I go to these places because I can get great music that I love at a great price and I can discover great new music without breaking the bank. Add to this the fact that many people are just giving this stuff away, literally, and, from my view of the world, a consumer doesn't have to spend a fortune to build a large collection. This is how I have amassed a collection of over 800 LPs and only spent an average of $2.35 per record.

When I go into shops like F.Y.E., Guitar Center, Best Buy, or even a regional department/grocery store and see them selling reissues of albums for $20, $30 or even as high as $60 an album, I just shake my head as I know I either already have that album in my collection or can get it into my collection, and in both cases far cheaper than what they are asking.

Recently at Guitar Center I saw a re-issue of Black Sabbath's first album on their shelf for $26.99. I purchased an 80s reissue of the same album from that specialty vintage shop I mentioned earlier for $10.

I was at my regional department/grocery browsing the electronics section and saw a Bob Marley reissue for sale for $29.99, the same album, but an 80s release, I was able to pick up from my local record shop for $8.00.

Another issue with dealing with retailers; I go to my barber to get my hair cut. And no matter how fantastic a haircut might be, I would never go to my barber for a vasectomy. Most of the employees at retailers can't answer basic questions about the products, like the difference between 180g pressings and 200g pressings. "Uh, like the weight?"

The selections at these retailers are typically limited to only the most popular albums from the most popular artists to ensure sales, but it is still very limited audience, because those of us who aren't in the New Collector category of consumer, won't pay that much for a reissue; typically. Sure, the retailers likely move the reissued albums, but likely to the New Collector segment of consumers, those that, for the most part, don't know any better. And it should be noted that in the case of the Bob Marley example from above, the department store started carrying these albums in November in preparation for turntable sales during the Christmas holiday season. But come February, the retailer still had a handful of albums available that were steeply discounted, as in $13 each, or half off, so yeah, they weren't flying off the shelves.

One issue many retailers have in the used vinyl segment of their store, which is typically a secondary or tertiary segment (meaning it is not the primary or secondary focus of their store's sales), is that they don't know the true meaning of value when it comes to used vinyl. They see what stuff is listed for on Discogs or Ebay, then try and evaluate the condition of the vinyl based on their own "judgement" and they price accordingly. Many retailers don't get that the highest price listed is not the true value of the record, especially in the eye of the consumer.

As a result, many of the retailers, including some local record shops (like one in my hometown), have their prices on used vinyl typically set way too high. In the case of the one local record shop, I don't do business with, won't have a price on the album. Instead the owner will look each album up on Discog at the time of checkout. This particular behavior makes for a long checkout process and makes it difficult for the consumer to know what they can get when they're working within a budget.

This type of retailer pricing behavior is likely because, they don't truly understand the real market and the players in the market.

It's not like most of these retailers are carrying hard to find, exclusive releases. I have found some hard to find vinyl, in surprisingly great condition at my local second hand and thrift shops for uber-cheap, $3 or less. Stuff like a still sealed Foreigner 4 album or a copy of The Beatles white album for free from a service like Listia.

I have scored some great finds on a regular basis.

Alan Parson's Project, The Best of the Alan Parsons Project - Free - A Gift
Led Zeppelin, Led Zeppelin II - $1.00 - Garage Sale
Pink Floyd, Darkside of the Moon Original Pressing - $0.00 - A Gift
Rolling Stones, Sticky Fingers (Zipper Cover) - Free - Traded for a gifted Zeppelin 4 album that was a duplicate
Alice Cooper, Flush With Passion - $0.30 - Craigs List Lot
Bob Dylan, Highway 61 Revisted Original Pressing - Free - Storage Unit Giveaway
Stevie Wonder, Talking Book Original Pressing - $5.00 - Comic Con
Boston, Third Stage - $2.00 - Second Hand Store
Toto, Toto IV - $2.99 - Antique Shop
Tracy Chapman, Crossroads - $8.00 - Vintage Specialty Shop
Daft Punk, Discovery - $13.75 - Local Record Shop

The music is everywhere and it isn't typically expensive. I can buy a Led Zeppelin II re-issue album on amazon for about $20, but I was actually able to find it for $1 at a garage sale. As a consumer, why would I pay $20, unless I was a part of the New Collector segment of the collector's market. The answer to the question "Is it worth it?", in this case, is a resounding now.

This is what the my local market looks like on a regular basis and if a retailer doesn't know this market, it is hard to answer the question, "Is it worth it?" And if you don't understand your target consumer, the answer to "Is it worth it" become exponentially harder to answer.

If a retailer is going to carry vinyl, they really need to know how to answer, "Is it worth it?"

Is it worth the coveted sales floor space for a few sales a week?

Is it worth the effort of lugging, organizing, straightening, reorganizing all that heavy cumbersome vinyl in the hopes of selling a record or two a day. Let's face it, vinyl consumers will put an album back where ever they see fit if they change their minds.

Can I make my prices competitive enough to compete in the market for the targeted consumers?

In the end, vinyl, even just a few milk crates of it, takes a lot of coveted space and in the retail world; a world where space equals money. If a product can't sell enough to pay for the overhead of the space it is consuming, the retailer will lose in the end.

If the vinyl is too affordable for the consumer, it may sell a lot, but there isn't enough profit margin to cover the cost. If it's too expensive, nobody buys it and again there isn't enough profit margin to cover the cost. There is a fine line for a retailer to walk to ensure they are capable of generating enough money to pay the overhead. A retailer can't expect to sell an album, let's say Carole King's Tapestry as an example, for $40 (the price listed on Discog's website) when I have found three of them at one of my three local Goodwill stores for $2.99, in the last two months, two of which I purchased (one for myself and another for gift for a friend).

For the most part, people don't go to a fabric store to buy a gaming system the same way they don't typically go to grocery stores to by vinyl. Most consumers go to comic con to buy comics, art and action figures... not vinyl. If it's there, you may sell some, but that isn't your target audience.

As a retailer your decision to carry vinyl may seem to make logical business sense when you simply look at just how hot vinyl sales are right now; and they are hot. But, the retailer will find out soon enough that the profit margins on vinyl's aren't as lucrative as they may seem on the surface.

I will, on rare occasion, drive sixty miles to dig for vinyl at a record store because there is a "huge" volume vinyl for me to dig through. Conversely, I won't drive ten or even twenty miles just to dig through a couple of bins at a random shop. I am sure I am not alone in that. If I happen to be at the shop, sure I will take a look, but I likely won't make it a point to add it to my usual digging routine, especially if Boz Scaggs is the best album in the bin.

Sorry... Boz is a fine musical artist, but I had to use someone as an example. And Boz is a great example. He is everywhere. In every garage sale, every flea market, swap meet, second hand bin across the planet you will find Boz. So as a retailer you need to make sure you are stocking not only the music people want, but the music that people don't have such ready access to purchase.

There was the time that I came across six bins of vinyl in a little boutique shop in the downtown mall. My wife dragged me in there and I found Houses of the Holy for $5. We purchased like six albums that day and nothing else. Would this shop become a regular stop me on my digging adventures? Likely not, as I score the six best albums they had and they aren't likely refreshing their stock anytime soon, because they are a boutique shop, not a record store.

This just goes to show that from a consumer perspective, "Is it worth it" is a lot more complex to answer.

Depending on the type, or combination of types, of collector(s) you may be, the question, "Is it worth it?" may have a different answer for numerous reasons. For a Music Collector, a limited edition pressing of an album that is $60 may not be worth it, but for the Economist Collector, it may be.

And the answer to "Is it worth it?" may change depending on when it is asked. For example; the day after payday when disposable cash flow may be in abundance, the consumer might be more willing to answer yes to an album that is $30, where the answer may be no the very next day when you find out your roof needs replaced.

Hell, there are times when my own answer to "Is it worth it?" is no for a $2 album.

There are many reason for a purchase to be worth it or not for a consumer and this adds to the complexity of the answer for the retailer to answer their own question; "Is it worth it to carry vinyl".

Did you scroll to the bottom of this posting to see how long it is? Did you do so to determine if you had time to read the whole thing? Or maybe to see if it was worth it? Or did you just starting reading to end up asking yourself, "Was it worth it?"

Well, was it?

Collector Types

There are as many types of the collectors in the world as there are items to collect. We as human beings like a classify, quantify, organize and catalog things as a way of providing structure and making sense. Hell your own vinyl collection may be organized by genre, alphabetically or by release year or even, to quote the movie High Fidelity, Autobiographically.

But sometimes, the labels we use can be hurtful; race, sex, sexual orientation, religion, etc., etc., etc. In the vinyl world there are vast lists out there that try and catalog the types of vinyl collectors, many in sardonic attempt at a humorous list of classifications other time, the names used are just plain derogatory. And some of the labels used in these lists are derogatory enough to definitely show that the author of the list has a bias for and against many of the "types" in his or her list.

I am not here to throw stones as I live in a glass house and throwing stones is not worth it.

This is not meant to be derogatory? I am just using as a reference that I can point back to as I continue having discussions.

With that said, let me present my list of different types of collectors; no one type of collector is better or worse than the other, it is really just a classification based on my view of the differences in priorities from one collector to another. There are five basic types of collectors; The New Collector, The Music Collector, The DJ Collector, The Rarities Collector, The Economist Collector.

If I were to classify myself, I would say that I am a combination of a Music Collector and Rarities Collector, because sometimes I fall in love with the cover art or the unique colors of vinyl used in a pressing. But I definitely lean more towards the Music Collector.

Many of us are a mix of the five basic types, but we can all identify primarily with one of the five. Let me define what I mean by these five classifications of collectors so we can work from the same definition.

The New Collector is a person who is just now discovering/rediscovering vinyl. Since they may have only an entry level sound system, they can be torn between spending their money on music or better tech for playing their music. They are also typically focused on picking up the greatest hits from their life; music they know and love.

The Music Collector is a person that focuses on the acquisition of music. The Music Collector doesn't care if it's colored vinyl, bootleg, imports or limited pressings' hell even damaged albums and covers are attractive to the Music Collector because most of the tracks play fine even if the cover is damaged simply because they love music and typically love discovering new music. The music collector loves music.

The DJ Collector is typically looking for specific music to add to the rotation for events. Techno, Hip-Hop, 80's Dance... just about anything that can be considered party music. You won't find many DJ's looking for Nina Simone or Carole King.

The Rarities Collector is the person looking for unique albums; first pressings, bootlegs, obscure bands, colored vinyl, imports and limited editions. The typically take pride in the uniqueness of each piece in their collection. This can easily be confused with the Economist Collector, but there is a distinct difference between the two.

The Economist Collector is a person looking to fund some portion of their future life with their vinyl collection; kid's college, retirement, etc. The buy low, sell high type. Many retailers could be considered Economist Collectors, they just have shorter window for the flip. This type of collector will look for MINT only, typically sealed pressings, that can be sold in the future.

Even though there is nothing wrong with any reason you have for collecting I would warn you against the path of the Economist Collector. The past has shown that this type of collecting rarely pays off... Baseball Cards, Comic Books, Pokemon Cards, Action Figures, etc.

So that is the list. It is simple and complete from my perspective.

Which are you? Audiophile vs. Audiophool

I just read the best Facebook comment ever.

I know that this sounds like something a poor person would say about a rich person, like, "Good luck affording the gas for that Ferrari." But I get the true meaning behind this. An Audiophile's first love is music. An Audiophool's first loves is the technology.
And the sonic unicorn comment... well, that had my sides splitting with laughter, not just because it's funny, but it is so very true.
Here are a few examples of how to tell when you are talking to an Audiophile versus an Audiophool:
Audiophile: "Listen the deep rich tones of the bass line in Stevie Wonder's Superstition."
Audiophool: "Listen to the deep rich tones of my sub-woofer as I play this song."
Audiophile: "Listen to the screech of the string as Santana moves his hand up and down the neck of the guitar."
Audiophool: "Can you believe how my titanium cone tweeters sounded as Santana wailed on that solo."

For the Audiophile, the focus is on the music. For the Audiophool, the focus on the conversation only casually refers to the actual music and only as it relates to the technology.
Another sign of an Audiophool is that they begin explaining their sound system in dollar amounts, especially without first being asked how much things cost: "Yeah, these speakers only cost five thousand dollars, each."
This Audiophool concept isn't something new. I knew Audiophools back in the 70s and 80s. They have been around forever, but this name is a new way to describe them.
As an Audiophile, I have a hard time connecting with an Audiophool. I, as an Audiophile, want to talk about music; albums, bands, songs. And an Audiophool wants to talk about technology; amps, speakers, pre-amps, cables, etc..

Everyone has their passions, and I respect that, completely. Some people are into the high-end audio scene and I support their journey. But many times it seems to be more about the equipment than the actual music and in more times than I care to admit, it is perceived as "My toys are better than your toys."
I don't play the "My Toys Are Better..." game. If someone wants to talk music, as an Audiophile, I can totally connect with that. If someone wants to talk about how much better their system is; well I will just walk away because honestly... I am quite satisfied with the size of my penis and I don't need to measure it or anything else of mine against someone else's to make me feel better about myself.

My daughter's new boyfriend came over, for the first time, for dinner one night. He has a bunch of expensive DJ equipment (turntables, mixers, amps, speakers, etc.). When he came over he inquired about my system. He wanted to have a listen. While he is a very polite young man, he is still young and that means he is dumb and full of cum. So I lay a vinly on my turntable, Daft Punk's Discovery, aligned the needle to drop at the beginning of Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger, cranked the volume to -35db, sat him in my listening chair and dropped the needle.
About halfway through the song, I asked him to get up and walked him around the room to hear the difference of sound throughout the room; where the bass dropped off, where it overpowered, etc. After the song was over, I explained the importance of sound profiling a room (speaker placement, angling, prime listening location, etc.)
He was, to quote him, "Blown away". First thing he said was that I couldn't have picked a better song as he loved that song. Then he moved on to comment on the fact that he was surprised at the power and quality of sound and said it blew his own DJ setup away in both categories. He then inquired in depth about this concept of sound profiling. He wasn't as dumb as I thought I he was, he was asking important questions.
He then asked how much it was. When I told him, he was stunned.
A month later my daughter texted me saying that the two of them would like my help putting together a system for their home. That is a parenting win in my book.

So yes, I will freely share that I only spent $90 putting my whole system together to those that ask, but my explanation of price only comes after someone inquires about it, like my daughter's boyfriend did. Furthermore I share it only to inform them that a great sounding system does not have to cost a whole lot of money. In sharing, I also share how and where I bought my components and my negotiation techniques to get the sellers down from their asking price, so they can take that knowledge with them to begin their own journey.
When I talk about my sound system or my vinyl collection, it is because I like to let people know that you don't have to sell your car to raise money a single speaker. You don't have to spend a entire tax return on a turntable and a couple of vinyl albums. I share so they know if they have patience, and persistence, they can build a sound system that sounds great and plays the music they love. If they take the time to dig they can acquire all their favorite music on whatever medium they choose for very little money. I have, over the last eight years, spent roughly $17 a month, on average, to build my sound system and my vinyl collection.
Again, it is just a matter of patience and persistence.

If you are into "High-End Audio", that's great. It doesn't make you an Audiophool. I absolutely encourage you to continue pursuing that passion, but I will also encourage you to never forget it begins with and ends with music you love.
If you aren't into the "High-End Audio" scene, for whatever reason, but want a quality system, I want you to know that there is hope.