"From Pittsburgh George's Collection..."

[rostasi]

Got an email saying these were freshly dropped jazz titles,
so you may be interested.

HERE

[Rooster_Ties]

https://www.discogs.com/digs/features/a-jazz-archive-comes-to-discogs

A Pittsburgh Collector’s 70,000-Record Jazz Archive Comes to Discogs

George spent decades building a 70,000-record jazz archive, and now it’s up for grabs.

If you spent any time sifting through records around Pittsburgh in the last several decades, you likely brushed shoulders with George, a quiet fixture of the western Pennsylvania scene. Inside his home, he lived a modest life as a family man with a career, taking the bus everywhere rather than the car, but behind closed doors he curated a 70,000-record archive.

George was primarily a jazz collector. During the 1970s and ’80s, when the genre’s popularity waned and Blue Note, Prestige, Strata-East, and Impulse! Records were relegated to the bargain bin, George thrived. He hunted mint copies with relentless dedication, stacking them in his listening room over decades.

In his later years…

(…continues at link up above, with a few pictures too!)

 

[Kevin Bresnahan]

I don't get how they can list a sealed record with absolute certainty of what is inside of the shrinkwrap. There are a couple of sealed Blue Note records with cut corners and the release page lists particulars you could not know unless the record was opened.

[Brad]

18 hours ago, Kevin Bresnahan said:

I don't get how they can list a sealed record with absolute certainty of what is inside of the shrinkwrap. There are a couple of sealed Blue Note records with cut corners and the release page lists particulars you could not know unless the record was opened.

Whenever I sell or buy a sealed record (from someone other than the manufacturer), the record is described as presumed mint. You can never know for sure obviously. 

[B. Clugston]

"Sealed Mint Blue Note" = UA blue/white b label, warped vinyl.

[Kevin Bresnahan]

I get that a sealed vintage record is an unknown LP. I also get that discogs doesn't allow you to post a record for sale unless you link it to one of the LPs released. But when the LP is listed with specifics like Van Gelder in the dead wax, then it's just not right.

For instance, they're selling this: https://www.discogs.com/shop/item/4135184193

Clicking the "View Release" button brings you to an LP described as having:

• Matrix / Runout (Side A runout): BST-84058-A LW RVG STEREO
• Matrix / Runout (Side B runout): BST-84058-B · LW RVG STEREO

If this were the actual record inside that sealed jacket, it would be a good deal at $90. But when you open and find that it's not a Van Gelder cut, can you return it? Unlikely.

Stereo Jack's used to sell vintage sealed records for pretty cheap for this reason. I bought quite a few of them over the years and I never lucked into a Van Gelder Blue Note LP.

It's like buying sealed packs of baseball cards and hoping it contains a rare card.  

[Brad]

They’re probably going by another record. I imagine that’s pretty common info. 

[Kevin Bresnahan]

It doesn't really matter at this point as most of the LPs I was talking about have already been bought, so some thought it was worth the gamble.  

[Pim]

21 hours ago, Brad said:

Whenever I sell or buy a sealed record (from someone other than the manufacturer), the record is described as presumed mint. You can never know for sure obviously. 

Yeah I bought a Inner City pressing of Monnette Sudler’s Time for a Change on a fair last year that was sealed. Never gonna do it again. Multiple scratches and even worse audible defects. 

[Brad]

7 minutes ago, Pim said:

Yeah I bought an Inner City pressing of Monnette Sudler’s Time for a Change on a fair last year that was sealed. Never gonna do it again. Multiple scratches and even worse audible defects. 

Sounds like a Xanadu Barry Harris I purchased a few years ago. Horrible. I was going to toss it but never did. I recently purchased a Vevor ultrasonic cleaning machine so I may see if that improves the sound at all. 

[Big Beat Steve]

2 hours ago, Brad said:

I recently purchased a Vevor ultrasonic cleaning machine so I may see if that improves the sound at all. 

Vevor isn't bad, particularly for that price, but don't expect miracles. In my experience it does improve the sonics if the problems are primarily caused by dust and dirt that CAN be shifted by the ultrasonic bath (with distilled water and a few drops of dishwashing liquid). One recent case I remember was "much-loved" 2-LP set that had lots and lots of scuffs and light scratches (and certainly the dirt that goes with this kind of wear) that caused quite a lot of pops and crackles that I sometimes found intrusive. But after the Vevor cure the disc sounded much better on 3 of the 4 sides of the set. 

But there have been cases where I've lucked better (before using the Vevor machine) by gently wiping the (rotating) vinyl first with a pad (like your better half uses to remove makeup) imbibed with methylated spirit. In some cases the pad took a yellow-brownish hue from all-the grit removed from the grooves that way. And the Vevor machine won't remove all too clearly visible (and therefore grime-laden) fingerprints either. Methylated spirits helps here as a pretreatment too.  

As for that "sealed" problem, similar experiences here. I picked up a handful of LPs at a recent clearout sale that were in shrink wrap with a "Factory-sealed. Do not open" sticker. Judging from the dirt particles on the vinyl surfaces and even scuffs in one case at least two of the "sealed" records clearly were not new but had been resealed. But at a purchase price of 1 EUR each it did not matter. Yer pays yer money and yer takes yer chance ... 

Edited 44 minutes ago by Big Beat Steve