Collectors: How do you collect?

I'll never rest till I have everything ever mastered by Ed Feinblatt in absolutely STUNNING!!! condition. Seriously, I look for the best sounding
version I can find, and afford, of mainly the Beatles, but all Rock & Roll from about 1955-1990 or so. I do tend to fixate on the period of '63-'75 primarily. Guess those were my years in school. I will buy about anything I see done by this Steve Hoffman guy. Gives me an excuse to try other things. I just picked up a Louvin Bros. comp this weekend.

 

I suppose, as the reason the thread started, I should perhaps clarify just a bit. Yes, I collect A&M Records, but not to exclusion of everything else, and not everything on the label. It so happens that I was a teenager about the time of the great birth of that label in the '60s. So many of my favorites from that era appeared on A&M, and I've since discovered that there were many more that I DIDN'T know about. Thus, it's been a never-ending relationship with that label, particularly the classic stuff from the '60s and early '70s, with some forays into the '80s and '90s, but not many.

My whole point in the Poppy Family thread was that - since I rediscovered that old group's London albums, I became even more enamored of them after discovering an obscure release of a Poppy Family Greatest Hits CD on A&M in Canada, as the culmination of a relationship that Terry Jacks had with that label in the '80s. I just found the whole concept fascinating: I rediscover an old forgotten group and find out that they released something on my favorite label. Naturally this is something I'd like to find.

There are plenty of records released on A&M that I'll likely have no interest in. The current day hip-hop and rap stuff, as well as some of the harder rock titles in the '70s and punk stuff in the '80s.

So yeah, I collect A&M, but only what I really want on A&M. My collection of CDs and records are filled with other artists and other labels, Simon & Garfunkel, Beatles, and even Rupert Holmes. Current day faves are The Corrs - and none of those have ANYTHING to do with A&M. (Well, OK, George Harrison DID have his Dark Horse relationship with A&M for about five minutes one summer!)

 

I buy what I like (budget permitting). My whole CD collection could be classified as a "Jimbo Snack".

 

Collectors: How do you collect?

By appreciating the value of the music. I hope, I think, I mean....

Dollars or sense?

 

I don't think anyone here has noticed, but I tend to gravitate towards music with the BIG BEAT ala rockabilly and garage. I also like to grab stuff mastered by particular folks (and avoid others like the plague). Don't forget magazines - I have the whole run of Kicks magazine (which explains the RAB/garage urges pretty well)...

 

By label.ieCC, Bluenote,etc. By artist, and if i hear it and like it.

 

I responded with the more than one above option as I collect first of all because I like what I hear. That is my main reason for buying it. My other reason would be due to the rarity of the release. There are also some artists that I collect everything of as well.

 

If I really like a group, I tend to collect their entire commercially released output, including both mono and stereo mixes (where applicable), single mixes and other alternative versions. I'm more interested in the music than the label or artwork. I just try to get the best sounding version, whether it be an LP or CD issue.

I collect material by The Beatles, Stones, Floyd, The Who, Zeppelin, The Kinks, The Police and several other artists.

However, I'm much more discriminating, when it comes to solo material.

 

Well, there are certain artists I collect everything for... I've got to have every edit, mix, etc. for certain artists... Madonna, Michael Jackson, Billy Joel, Elton John, Bing Crosby.

Then I have my Billboard collections. I started out collecting all the #1 hits back in the early 90s, just for the 90s, intially, then going back to... forever.

Then, as I learned more through Joel Whitburn's books, I eventually became dissatisfied with his straight yearly ranking of the charts by chart position and started totalling up points for each song's chart run, using an inverse exponential points system, where each week's chart position is worth double the points of the previous chart position. (I tried straight reverse points, but they're unfair, since two weeks at #50 would be equal to one week at #1. Two weeks at #2 should be equal to a week at #1.)

So I eventually spent a couple hundred dollars, I'll guess, making microfilm copies of all the original Billboard singles charts from the 1940s. I chose to ignore the airplay and juke box charts, which didn't come along till the mid-forties anyway -- another reason I disagree with Whitburn's methodology. To Whitburn, if it's #1 on the jukebox chart, it's a #1 hit, even if it barely cracked the top ten in sales and airplay. IMO, for the pre-LP era, the only important gauge of a song's success was the sales charts, which I continued to use exclusively until the sales chart ceased to exist.

1940 was a problem, as the sales chart did not debut until July of that year, and all that existed was Billboard's Record Buying Guide, a jukebox chart that not only listed all artists together for each song, but was NOT in rank order. It had been in rank order at one time, but from Sept. 1939 on the Record Buying Guide was ranked in order of how LONG each song had been on the chart. Songs were removed when they lost their bullet, leaving other songs to rise through attrition -- a top ranking did NOT mean the song was #1 that week. It simply meant it was the oldest song remaining on the chart.

Because of this, for the first half of 1940 I used the song rankings from the Your Hit Parade radio show, which, although they did not list artists, at least were in rank order. YHP was a combination of weekly sales, airplay, jukebox, sheet music sales, and orchestras "most requested numbers." I included info from Billboard's Record Buying Guide for the few songs that did not make Your Hit Parade at all (mainly instrumentals... YHP tended to shun them). I took the artist info for each song from the Record Buying Guide, which DID list the artist info in rank order... though the most popular artist in jukeboxes was not always the most popular in sales. But what can you do?

Thankfully, Whitburn's books list each song's chart progress for the top five starting in 1955, making the task a lot easier.

But interesting results. For example, in 1943, the Jacques Renard version of "As Time Goes By" ranks substantially higher than the Rudy Vallee recording, even though Vallee's peaked at #2 and Renard's at #3. And in the late '50s, the Charlie Gracie "Butterfly" comes out miles ahead of the Andy Williams version.

I really just wanted to have enough songs to make a CD for each year, which I've done for almost every year from 1938 through 1959. (Still missing two tracks from the '40s.) I'm working on the '60s, '70s, and '80s. I collected all the big hits of the 90s many years ago.

Do you think I have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder?

 

Wow, I am totally impressed. These must be some great compilations!

FFF

 

I don't consider myself a collector, because I associate that term with "completist," or basically, someone who purchases music for any reason other than enjoyment of the music itself.

I don't understand the stamp collector satisfaction of owning everything, regardless of the criteria: artist, label, chart. Why would I want the MFSL of an album I don't even like? Who cares about the different European cover? Yeah, they're my favorite band, but GOT LIVE IF YOU WANT IT sucks.

And while some outtakes and alternates are fascinating (like the spate of unreleased material from Elvis Presley and Bob Dylan), I find most unreleased material, even The Beatles's ANTHOLOGY series, academically interesting at best. And after a while, even favorites can reach a point of diminishing returns: I looked at THE LAST D.J. and asked myself, just how much more Tom Petty do I need? Not this one, I decided.

That's not to say I don't use non-musical factors when making a purchaing decision -- obviously I haven't heard everything in advance. Of course I favor new or archival material from favorite artists, trust certain labels to maintain a level of quality, give any 50s, 60s, or 70s R&B label comp a second look, and await word on catalog overhauls. Favorable press (and forum) notices are helpful.

 

I tend to go through periods of being enamoured of certain artists, and collect their stuff at least for a while. Todd Rundgren and Mike Oldfield were in that camp for a while, but they both lost me. Bruce Cockburn, on the other hand, came close to losing me once, (I don't think I'll ever like World of Wonders much) but hasn't quite managed it yet.

Other than that I generally just buy what I (think I will) like.

Of course sometimes I"m tempted by an audiophile label or remastering. (Sometimes?? How many times???) I'm trying to curb that tendency, as I'm disappointed as often as not. But I did just buy STeve's Mamas & Pappas CD and one of the CCR SACDs, and the DSOTM SACD as well. (I was tempted by the Stones SACDs - which is how I ended up here in the first place! - but I really don't like them that much.)

To be honest, I'm trying not to buy much music at all these days, unless perhaps a multichannel disk, as I have more than I have time to listen to. It's nice to have a "deep library", but it can rather take over. (See, I'm sinking into old fuddy-duddy-ism (gracefullY?))

 

I've got a whole bunch of genres in my collection (I am not a "completist" on any artist - I buy what I like, and, in a few cases that does happen to be everything an artist recorded). So I've got 50 and 60's doo-wop and R&R, 60's soul, ska and reggae, Brazilian samba, South African mbqanga, calypso, Tex-Mex, surf, classical, etc. About all I don't include in my library are opera and free-form jazz.

If there's anything I've learned in life's musical journey, it's this: Don't stick to hits and charted records. In the case of 50's and 60's rock/doo-wop especially, some of the hands-down best (and. as it turns out, most valuable) records either charted briefly or not at all.

 

Ditto, Ron. Well said.

 

For the most part, I collect stuff that I like. The real challenge is finding things, even if they're common as dirt, in as pristine condition as possible. My current thing is collecting 45's and 12" singles. Sometimes I'll look for clean copies of things I may have bought long ago and have worn out, or stuff I might have missed at the time. To me there's nothing quite as satisfying as finding a long sought after record in great sonic and cosmetic shape.

 

My collection consists of lots of country from all eras and subgenres, Gordon Lightfoot LPs and CDs, John Denver LPs and a few CDs, pop vocal/easy listening/MOR standards, lots of collections of hymns/gospel music, lots of patriotic albums, some jazz, classical and lots of rock and roll from the 50s-early 1980s but especially country. I've even bought LPs I don't even like because of the price.

 

1 - If I hear something I like, I buy it.

2 - By mastering engineer.

If Steve Hoffman, Dennis Drake etc. mastered a 10 CD set of Montavani from the session tapes on gold discs and autographed each disc they couldn't give it to me.

 

That would take all the fun out of it for you right? You're all about the hunt. You'll be scrambling for them on eBay in a few years and bragging to us about your 'kills". Typical Nauga-hunter behavior.

 

I only buy music I like, period. If any of the other poll answers applies to me, I guess it's "artist," because when I really like an artist I do tend to be a completist as far as wanting every note they recorded ... but then again, if I'm quite sure I won't like something by an artist I love, I avoid it (The Beach Boys are one of my four or five favorite acts ever, but I don't think I'll ever need to check out most of their post-Love You output ... and I still refuse to buy Dylan and the Dead, the only official Dylan album I do not, and probably never will, own).

I'm always bemused by people like the guy in Alan Zweig's Vinyl film who described some of the LPs he'd collected with music that is "just awful" and "not for listening." I also couldn't relate to the other guy in the same film who had every song Elvis Presley ever recorded 10 times over. I certainly do have several copies of certain albums and songs, but in my collection those are actually a small minority.

(My favorite guy in that movie was the one who said he was trying to collect every song ever recorded, in any language, and who claimed to have more than 1 million records. He was both amusing and disturbing to watch and listen to ...)

 

I am in the "More Than One" catagory.

I collect by Billboard top 40s, what I like, sound quality, hit versions, and sound quality.

My main goal is to get all of the CORRECT hit versions, meaning edits, mixes.... For 60s and early 70s, this means having to track down mono 45s, which is a real pain in the ass because all CD producers care about are album length versions and stereo. Good or bad, I want the hits. Since I love 70s soul music, this is especially frustrating!

 

Mainly I collect what I like , but I also collect by label (MFSL, DCC, and Original Japanese Black Triangle Toshiba CD's.

Thanks,
Aaron

 

I used to collect brand new releases by artists I liked or new bands I'd be interested in. This policy was supported by purchasing a selection of reissues/remasters of classics.

Since discovering the SH Forums though, I've been trying to catch up on the the best of the DCC Golds and MFSL releases, supported by high quality classic CD's and a selection of SACD's thrown in the mix as well.

What this has meant is that I've actually bought relatively little new music over the last 18 months or so than would have been the case in the past.

The upside is that I'm really learning to appreciate good quality music and recordings. The downside is that there is much in my collection that I find really difficult to listen to now...and I need to catch up with some new music again at some point!