Tomorrow, April 19th, is the first annual Record Store Day–a celebration of vinyl, CDs, and the stores that sell them near you. Hundreds of retailers across the United States will be celebrating with sale pricing, live bands, DJ sets, cookouts, giveaways, and more. In that regard, our own Doug Mosurock starts a multi-chapter article about how to develop and maintain your own record collection. Despite his advice to the contrary, Record Store Day would be a great place for any of you to get started on such a project, or build out the collection you already have.
If you are reading this to learn how to start a vinyl record collection, you can stop right here. You are crazy for wanting to do this. You do not need a wall of records in your home, and you are likely going to attract the ire of people who are already too far gone in this pursuit, in deed and in action, to make it worth your while.
That being said, for some of you out there, a record collection will fill a void in your life with music, history, and a shared experience. It may steer your listening habits towards the more critical and appreciative ends of the attention span. It may also make you into somewhat of an exhibitionist, in that you’ll want to share your finds with friends and strangers alike, listen to music with others at home, and possibly want to ply your tastes on the public as a DJ in a bar, a club, a podcast or a college or community radio station. These can all be good things and worthwhile pursuits, but they are also ego-driven to varying degrees, so if you don’t think you can hang with that in any capacity, then this hobby is likely not for you.
So, where to start? Do you like music? How much? Go back in your mind to how your listening habits were formed. How much of a presence was music in your formative years? Did your parents have records of their own? Did you have a record player or cassette deck of your own? Early exposure to music, even outside of the spectrum of pop, can be fairly critical to how you feel about the medium today, to the point of digging through record stores to satisfy a yen for personal discovery. When you start caring about the differences between pressings, as well as discovering who played on what, and the sounds of different eras and producers, you’re on board, but even before such navel-gazing activities commence, you’ll have to have an understanding and a passion for knowledge of what music will make you feel the way you want to when you listen to it. How these tracks best augment your own personality will ultimately guide your listening habits and purchases as your record collection bulks up.
Does format matter to you? Are you still holding onto your CD collection, or are you reverting back to vinyl, the king of all formats? Are you content with MP3s? If you answered yes to the latter, you can stop right here. There is more recorded music available online, be it legitimately sold or illegally procured, than you will ever have cause to listen to in the course of your entire life. So if you just want to listen to things and make the connections in your head, by all means, go this route. You will save money, back pain, and grief. You’re also missing out on what can be a truly rewarding experience: going to your local record store, digging through the bins, talking to the employees about music, listening and learning about things that, once revealed, will make your lives feel incomplete until you own them.
Also, take this time to be honest with yourself about how much room you can dedicate to building a record collection in your home. I’ve got an entire room dedicated to mine, with 21 shelves of LPs from the floor to the ceiling, with boxes of 45s stacked above them, an additional unit’s worth of vinyl (compilation LPs and hip-hop) stacked below my listening post, and a closet filled with dance records. I need to use a stepladder to get to the highest shelf. I’ve also got a fiancée who is understanding of this need for space, and I do my best to keep the peace around our apartment by keeping the music to the confines of this space. If you don’t want this to be your life, you can back out right now, and not worry about it anymore. If I haven’t dissuaded you yet, then by all means get started. I’ll be back with tips soon.