Vintage Vinyl Record Collecting

For me, One of the best places to find good quality records for a good price is at Half Price Books, A chain of retail stores that specialize in books at low prices, people can bring in old books, CD's, DVDs and vinyl records and convert them to cash, most records are priced in the 1.98 to 4.98 range, ( in the Cincinnati and Dayton Ohio areas) each store is its own story, so prices can vary wildly, but always reasonable.

The next best place is your local thrift store, this is where you can really score big, just today I found an early pressing of a Blue Note record of the jazz pianist Horace Silver, that amazingly enough suffered only from minor sleeve scuffs, as well as a record of the jazz arranger Johnny Richard from 1956 in near mint condition, both of these records are selling on eBay at just below 100 bucks a piece, I paid 2 dollars for both, the main problem with the thrift stores is, you need great patience, they are hit and miss, today I went to 5 stores in my area of Dayton Ohio, found 12 records at one, and ten at another, but nothing at the other 3, also I would say 2 out of every 3 records are in such poor condition, that I just leave it behind.also independent thrift stores and junk stores can offer some treasure finding. if they are charging more than a dollar piece, I don't bother looking.

Some times you run in to a Know it all , who thinks they are the inventor of the Goldmine standard to grading records. They will have crazy prices on records that are pure junk, Scratches everywhere, and Even one place actually wrote the prices in permanent marker right on the cover. That was my cue to leave fast.

You can find an extended essay on this topic at Where to buy cheap vinyl records.

#1) I love the original full size art work, No CD booklet can match the detail of Vintage Covers.

#2) The sound of analog tends to have a warmer more natural sound to me.

#3) Vinyl records really need attention, You can't drive around in your car with them, It puts the focus on the music. I love just sitting down with the music and paying close uninterrupted attention to the music.

#4) Even though vinyl has made a huge comeback, Particularly with the under 30 crowd, You can still find Vinyl at very cheap prices, if you hunt them down, Also many Records have never been issued on CD and may never be.

#5) A connection with your past, Especially if you are 40 and over, I love the nostalgia of returning to the first format i ever used for enjoying music, I laugh now when I think about how excited I was about the CD, When it was first introduced in mass in the mid 80's. and Now I am actually selling CD's to get more vinyl.

#1) Space, This is the biggie, I have a collection of over 5,000 records, I am swimming in them, That doesn't include the Vinyl I have for sale, No way around the fact that you need plenty of space to store them, Even a modest collection will require sturdy shelving.

#2) Vinyl care, You have to clean your records before every use, At least a dry clean with an anti static brush, all records, even new ones, need at least one good wet clean, and even after that some noise will be heard.

#3) Vinyl, especially vintage vinyl with some wear will have surface noise of some sort, and if you are real picky about this fact, stay away from vintage vinyl, and buy only new issues, or mint or sealed vintage vinyl. Headphone usage will highlight this issue, Records with light wear and some surface noise won't be so noisy, not to enjoy on a good system. Heavy Metal and hard rock albums tend to play best for low noise, because of the nature of that music, the music hides surface noise quite well.

One thing that surprised me when I began collecting records was the nice little niche market for new vinyl, not just reissues, many alternative rock and indie bands are pressing vinyl for new releases, Jazz has its own cottage industry with vinyl reissues, 180 gram ,200 gram and heavier, the thicker the LP, the deeper the grooves and and the more detail in sound the turntable can produce, the key is to get it the close as possible to the way it sounded in the studio .many of these reissues are quite expensive for limited editions, but most can be had for about the same cost as a compact disc. eBay and Amazon are great places to find these as well. You should be careful when buying vintage records, because some dealers may try to pass a reissue off as original, or they don't know the difference, always ask questions if there is some doubt.