How Would You Describe Your Music Collecting

[Dan Gould]

As my buying/collecting/listening habits have changed markedly (not to mention how I've shrunk the collection lately (thanks again, Stefan!)), I'm curious where people stand, especially now that the golden age of reissues is long gone (but you can find more music than ever before online).

For me, even before I started selling off my collection, I had moved away from gotta-find-everything-gotta-have-it-all mad collecting (except for a brief time where I was exploring blues and it was a lot like it was when I first discovered jazz).

What about you?

[Chuck Nessa]

Hit Dusty Groove today and bought cds by Marion Brown, Larry Young, Johnny Griffin and Gene Shaw. All of these happen to be replacements for long lost lps (sold the bulk of my vinyl to finance the Art Ensemble box). I have around 8000 cds, 2000 lps (remaining) and a few hundred 78s. The disease began around 1958 and lingers.

[Spontooneous]

A few months ago, I was perusing the discs at Half Price Books and didn't even notice the blues collector friend standing next to me doing the same thing. "You DO got the disease, don't you?" he said in his inimitable twang.

[Big Al]

Well, I never really was a wild music collector, despite the fact that I'm moving away from, or have moved away from, mad collecting, but I'll be a mad buyer of music until the day I die. Or at least I still am right now.

Especially since I've been buying so much of your old vinyl latety!

[rostasi]

I began to feel claustrophobic being surrounded by all of this,

so when I hit 50 it was a good time to start going backwards.

[ejp626]

I would say the fever is ebbing. I pulled out my favorite or the "most important" CDs (generally the same) and put them on a special shelving unit, and this is pretty much all I listen to (just about 400 CDs). It is slowly sinking in how foolish it is to have hundreds of other CDs that I never listen to, so my musical purchases are slowly winding down.

[papsrus]

About 700 titles (counting box sets as one title). And still just scratching the surface after beginning collecting music semi-seriously about 7 years ago.

I try to be somewhat selective when adding to the shelves. That's partly an economic thing, partly just a preference for being a little bit focused in my listening, especially when encountering something that is new to me. Wasn't always that way.

Sales here periodically cull the herd. And there are very few titles I've sold that I regret not having now.

So I guess I'd describe my music collecting generally as "so far so good."

[David]

I never really got into the whole got to have everything (though I say that somewhat tongue in cheek as I look at my 1500 CDs), but after several years I've learned my listening habits really favor meat & potatoes jazz (read: 30s-60s inside stuff) and some of the newer more inside funky stuff (read: medeski/charlie hunter/etc). Accordingly, I've sold the free/ecm free type stuff and mostly explore within my more narrow boundaries.

I hate to say my horizons have narrowed, but I found I just never listened to the more 'adventurous' music, despite initially being curious. And my enjoyment of stuff like the Bill Evans Riverside, Miles Plugged Nickel, Horace Silver Blue Note, and Gene Ammons Prestige seems to never fade.

[mjzee]

I've always been a good shopper, so when I see something priced very attractively, the fever hits. That's tempered by the knowledge that:

1) Money that goes here cannot go towards something else (family considerations intrude).

2) I have far too many still-unheard CDs and mp3's.

3) I have no place to put more CDs.

Those considerations are then balanced by:

a) There's so much music out there I still haven't heard.

b) Some knowledge that the music business is in hard times and what can I do to help.

Balancing that is:

* I'm not sure how buying cut-outs helps the music industry or artists.

/ The ambiguous moral status of buying titles from labels such as Proper.

This fetid stew of emotions results in furtive purchases and feeling somewhat guilty. Not sure what to do about that. But the buying nonetheless continues. Tonight, I bought The Wardell Gray Story (Proper) from Amazon, $12.37 (+ $2.98 s/h). Such a bargain!

[JSngry]

As long as you maintain a strong sense of ethics, an iPod & the internet means never having to say you're sorry (to anybody, for anything).

Or finished.

[jlhoots]

It's the economy, stupid!

[GA Russell]

Maybe three years ago I had a convergence of a number of things. BMG/Your Music stopped offering a ton of stuff I wanted. My collection of unopened CDs grew to a mile high. I ran out of money.

Also, I found that I had a few albums of just about everybody I was interested in. When you listen to an album only once or twice a year, that is not too much different from getting a new one. I found that I was spending my time listening to what I had already opened instead of hungering for something new.

I checked choice #1, but if three years is a long time, then I should have checked choice #3.

[Dave James]

On the CD side of the fence, I've slowed way down. On the vinyl side, not as much since i've only recently gotten back into LP's. However, I can already tell you that there is no way vinyl is ever going to create the level of intensity that CD's generated for so many years. That intensity was a function of two things. An irresistible force (getting seriously into jazz music for the first time) meeting an immovable object (the initial availability of music on compact disc). Also, the fact that, as Dan so aptly puts it, the golden age of reissues is long gone has a significant effect. There just isn't much out there that still falls into the "gotta have it at any cost" category like so many things used to. That was sure fun while it lasted, but I haven't felt that tug in years. I can still remember the rush I'd get when a new batch of Connoisseurs would show up unannounced at my local Tower Records. I'd squirrel them all away in my plastic basket and then walk around the store trying to figure out (or rationalize) how I was going to be able to get them all at once. Not going to happen again. Not ever. As Bruce Hornsby likes to say, "that's just the way it is."

[Free For All]

Anyone ever hide stuff in another section so you could come back later for it? I will admit to having done that a few times back in the day.

My favorite hiding place was in smooth jazz- it would always be there when I'd return.

[John L]

I have certainly started to slow down. One realization was a particular motivation. I already have close to complete discographies of whats available for a number of my favorite artists. I was acquiring so many new recordings that I spent 95 percent of my listening time only with them. As a result, I was hardly ever taking the time any more to enjoy my favorite artists and recordings. That is a counterproductive way to collect.

[Jazzmoose]

Anyone ever hide stuff in another section so you could come back later for it? I will admit to having done that a few times back in the day.

My favorite hiding place was in smooth jazz- it would always be there when I'd return.

I tried that once; I think it was a Donald Byrd CD that I hid in the Kenny G. section. It was actually gone the next day!

As for the collecting, after my forced sale of much of my stuff a couple of years ago, the bug hasn't returned in any form. Ignore those stacks of SF paperbacks over there...

[JohnS]

I've basically stopped buying new stuff. Nothing much that comes along now hits the spot and it seems that it's mostly rehashing what I've heard before. I maybe buy six or eight reissues a year now, mainly to fill gaps in the collection or to replace vinyl.

I'm also conscious that at my age I have too much stuff and odd bits and pieces of vinyl especially are having to go. Some difficult choices too make but I convert the occasional track to mp3, that makes parting with some discs a little easier.

[porcy62]

I stopped to buy CD, a part some new stuff I am really interested for, usually ECM, World Music or 'strange stuff' that really intrigues me, (that means less then 10 cd per year). I still buy cd at concerts, if I liked the concert.

With the euro at this level, and the original pressings at ludicruos prices, I am going to stop buying these as well.

Still buy some vinyl, mostly japan pressings and cheaper stuff. Definitely not at the level of some times ago.

Though I could be a compulsive buyer now and then and spend way too much on 'bargain' records, that means a 'not a bargain at all' total at the end of the purchase!

Overall I already own thousands of records worth of relistening. Too much music I own, too poor knowledge of it I have. Time to dig in it.

[David Ayers]

I'm now only an occasional buyer.

I buy mostly classical.

I buy mainly new releases, in order to support artists whose work I actually get to enjoy in concert. I never buy classical remasters and I now rarely buy any jazz reissues. With jazz it's partly saturation and partly dislike of most remasters.

I may occasionally, uh, borrow music but I don't dress that up to myself as anything other than it is. Which is, borrowing.

I never have music as background, I listen to just one CD a day if I'm lucky, and I will give any disc a few listens over time, so I am massively behind even at a low rate of purchase.

I have a price point - I won't pay more than £10 per disk. Since I rarely buy other than new releases that's an effective cap. Apologies to all those out there still over-charging. In this country you can buy the Lord of the Rings trilogy on DVD for £15. I did the math, so to speak.

And finally, my streaming service takes care of any curiosity I may have about stuff I don't 'own', so that makes life simpler.

[BillF]

Between 1957 and 1990 I bought perhaps 350 jazz LPs and still have 250 of those. In the last 20 years I've bought 500 jazz CDs. This looks like the picture of moderation, doesn't it?

[David Ayers]

Between 1957 and 1990 I bought perhaps 350 jazz LPs and still have 250 of those. In the last 20 years I've bought 500 jazz CDs. This looks like the picture of moderation, doesn't it?

Are you sure you are qualified to even read this board - let alone contribute??

Edited May 17, 2010 by David Ayers

[jazzbo]

I'm moving away from mad collecting. Slowly.

[BillF]

Between 1957 and 1990 I bought perhaps 350 jazz LPs and still have 250 of those. In the last 20 years I've bought 500 jazz CDs. This looks like the picture of moderation, doesn't it?

Are you sure you are qualified to even read this board - let alone contribute??

[Ken Dryden]

As unheard review copies pile up (I'm planning to make a photo soon) and purchases also add to my 36+ year old collection, I'm still interested in acquiring additional music, though I'm still trying to find suitable shelving for the overflow.

I'm sure by the time I put another 3000 CDs on new shelves, my wife will say it is time for a new house.

I still have interest in bluegrass, classical and blues, though I rarely buy rock anymore, as few artists interest me these days.

[Van Basten II]

Still roaming the used CD stores around my place, buy about 3 to 4 titles in average by week (it used to be around 7 to 8 titles a week !), without counting the titles I get from buying the web when there is a great deal around.(the only thing that prevents me from buying more are the silly shipping fees) Will on rare times buy music from new cd store if it's on sale, mostly pop music because Jazz music is rarely sold cheaply.

My collection is all over the place, jazz remains the main constituent whether it is current or "old time" but other genres (French music, pop, rock, indie , country/folk World music and soundtracks) are about 50 % of the population.

As I am getting older, have less and less interest for pop music but on the other hand I take more time in the World music section.

I don't really have a have it all fetish, but if music is available at a good price I will pick it up.