Record auction. Rare records & Record collectingRare records and CDs for sale and auction.

If you collect rare records you don’t have to ask yourself why you do it, you just do. I’ve been a record collector for pretty much all my life. I started off just hoarding regular 7″ singles (45s to you ‘mericans) and albums which I played to death, manhandled, treated badly, wrote my school class and initials on when I took them to school discos in my teens in a vein attempt to have my tastes aired in public – it never really worked and watching an empty floor and a look of disgust on the DJ’s face (the metalwork teacher) didn’t do a lot to give me confidence in my musical tastes…. However, what is surprising to me is how many of those records I still have, and the fact that they are pretty much all in the same condition that they were when I suddenly realised that records were supposed to be cherished and looked after! In other words, most of them play great. They have marks, writing, scuffs and so on, but they are playing copies and little chunks of my past. I can hold one in my hands or play one on my deck and it takes me back to certain times and places. I was a big computer gamer in my teens, and certain albums actually remind me directly of certain video games that I must have been getting into at the time I got a particular album.

This is really my dansette though I bought it in the early 1980s not the 1960s!

So this got me thinking, why is it that people collect rare records, or just records for that matter. And I suppose the first reason is the one above – though that “deja vu” experience doesn’t happen at the time to collect them – it comes many years later. Many of these memories are buried so deep that I doubt if I could go into a record shop and actively find records that might trigger memories of my youth. It’s either sheer luck or genius that I didn’t throw my records away in the first place though, so I’ve got them like little memory sticks. I think the reason why we collect records in the first place is simply because we identify with an artist or a style of music in our teens when we are starting to try to define ourselves and make ourselves stand out from the crowd. How many of you used to sit in your bedroom playing your favorite record by your favorite artist and actually dream about him/her driving by your house, breaking down and knocking on your door. Ok, just me then. By buying all of your heroes output you sort of made yourself closer to them, and showed your committment. By then going on and tracking down their foreign picture sleeve releases, promos, coloured vinyl and maybe even acetates if you were very lucky you showed yourself to be a hardcore fan. One who was truly dedicated and committed to whatever you identified in your musical idol.

For certain types of collectable records, for example promo or demo copies, there is a real sense of history about them in knowing that these copies would have been sent out to radio DJs in an attempt to get airplay. It seems strange now to think that bands like The Beatles had to go through this process in order to get their music on the airwaves when millions of people were clamouring for it!

I know it’s a boring middle-aged thing to say, but I do feel sorry for todays digital generation who have a hard drive full of bytes instead of a record collection. Personally I hate CDs but even a CD collection would be better than a hard drive. At least you still got some decent information, photos, track listings and even lyrics. I think another reason why people collect records is because they love to collect things full stop. They need something to collect and if they didn’t collect rare records, maybe they’d collect stamps or coins. There’s something primal in us that makes us comfortable when we are surrounded by plenty of something we value. It raises our self-esteem and makes us feel that we have in some way succeeded. A bit like a squirrel sitting back and admiring a large pile of acorns in the tree trunk. Only a bit, unless you have edible records.

I still collect records now, and I still get excited when I find something I never had before – or something I had and sold off long ago. What I really like, and I think I like it because I rarely do it, is buying a record that I actually don’t know and sitting down and playing it over and over until I do know it like I did when I was 12 or so. I used to buy an album and put it on while I had an afternoon doze even, because I knew that I just had to get used to it in order to like it. By this token I’m convinced that you can get into any sort of music if you just decide that you will and you put the time in to repeat listens so you get to know it well.

Despite the fact that MP3s are a bit soulless, the good news is that the record companies are stilll pumping out lots of interesting and collectable records. Not just records now of course, but CDs and even digital media like limited edition memory sticks have all added to the rare record collecting stockpile making collecting music even more varied and interesting. I’m not sure if we still get as many foreign picture sleeve variations as we did in, say, the 1980’s when a single might have 25 different picture sleeves worldwide, but you still get promos, acetate CDs, white labels for club use and proper promotional items and packs. Then there are also some record clubs still putting out insteresting indie music as well. You can see this by checking some of the pages here at Record Auction.co.uk. We have some very intersting items popping up from massive current chart artists like Rihanna, Arctic Monkeys, Kanye West to name but three and these are artists who haven’t been around for that long (well compared to the Beatles or the Rolling Stones!).

Whatever your reason for record collecting, it is clear that the thirst to collect the material of your heroes will never die. And we’ll drink the that!

Find records promos and collectable memorabillia for your collection – just choose your favorite artist from the list on the right!

This original article is Copyright. However, it may be reproduced as long as it contains a link back and a clear attribution to http://www.recordauction.co.uk .