A Story of a Man and His Records

There comes a time in every record collectors “career” when you must decide what your relationship to your collection is.  It actually makes a BIG difference once you define this relationship, because it will also define the relationship that you have with your family and their ultimate relationship to your collection as with friends, house visitors, admirers…even utility people that find their way into your house to help clean it up or repair some plumbing.

A long time ago I made a decision to treat my records as I did when I was in junior high school.  While I actually do not remember a time that I did not collect, junior high…along with my first allowance and ability to take a bus alone…was my first surge into the glorious world of having a record library.  My brother had the Harmony Guide to Rock and Roll and I would troll its pages looking for cool covers.  Then it was off to Revolver Records on Clement to see if they had any of the titles I was looking for (The Jam’s first record, The Who’s Sell Out, London Calling), seeing if Billy behind the counter had any recommendations, and just taking in the scene (note to younger self: the first Kraftwerk  Pylon-cover record…original pressing…selling for $5 and not moving…BUY IT).

When I got home I would tear the LP out of the sleeve and throw it on the table.  Sit on my bed. Stare out the window at the alley behind the house…focus on the horizon and be blown away.  When both sides were played, throw the record on top of it’s cover, pull out another, put the new cover on top of the just-played platter and throw the new slab onto the table. Repeat. Repeat. Dinner. Homework. Sneak Repeat. Homework. Repeat. Bed.  By the time I woke up in the morning I had to excavate the pile to get to whichever record I woke up thinking about so I could get it on and get my morning soundtrack rolling.  Care for the record’s health and well-being? Enough not to sit on it, or use it as a Frisbee….but truth be told, scratches happened, ripped covers were part of it…and it all felt wild and glorious (and maybe it was a good thing I DIDN’T buy that Kraftwerk treasure).

It was after a faithful night at Geoffrey Weiss’s house in Los Angeles, where I solidified my relationship with my collection. Geoffrey had just bought a turntable where you had to literally screw in the record to play it.  He would take out some genius record…probably from the late 60s (by my request) and probably one of ten known copies….. take it out of the plastic sleeve, gracefully hydroplane it out the cover, screw the fucker in, and then I think there was some other warm-up measure that the player needed to coax it to spew a little audio.  And it sounded great. And the music was brilliant…and yet I wanted start scratching the grooves like a DJ or throw another LP on top of the first  or grab the sleeve with both hands and lick it…something tactile to make me feel involved aside from the eardrum hit. 

I got home that night, poured a glass of whisky, and started listening to and making piles of records until the sun came up.  Inner sleeves? Had no time for them.

And so I intentionally grew my collection with passion mixed with a little recklessness.  Right now I have piles of LPs next to the turntable in the living room, including some naked discs of rare titles…and while there will be a moment in which to clean them up and alphabetize them back into the thick of it, to me those messy piles represent the remnants of a good time. 

My son Asher took my Congos vinyl and used is as a disc to slide accross the floor like a weighted shuffleboard puck. Completely ruined it.  Unplayable even by noise enthusiasts. Unacceptable completely.  But truth be told, I admire the fun and am just glad he is interacting.  Being of mortal flesh, I am going to get older and wither and die. There is no reason for my collection to age along with me.  Look down upon my as you will, we shall see who ends up smiling.  Records are meant to have fun with.

The fact is, like with everything else, we are all different.  There are people who have a fairly decent collection, and who only own a Crosley turntable with a needle just above the quality of a dull nail.  There are those who DJ often enough to wear their records down to the bone.  There are those who stopped caring a long time ago, and forgot to check if there was too much moisture in the basement where their collection ended up.  There are those born-again types who got into collecting late in life, and have more enthusiasm for the sport than can be comprehended.  There are those who brag about how much they paid for a record, and those who brag at the incredible deal they found at a garage sale.  There are those who never take off the plastic wrapper, as a grandparent does to a couch.

There are those who have horrible taste and super high-end equipment.  They have the kind of stereo set-up where the music only sounds good in one part of the room.  And yes, David Hyman, there are those who have good taste but for some reason still buy records by Kenny G and Patricia Barber, records that have been recorded and mixed and mastered in some beyond high-definition-audiophile process, but whose music is truly dreadful.  Supposedly, Barber recordings seep from every crevice of the annual NAMM convention, used to show off the newest high-end receiver/headphone/speaker. 

To me…it is all about middle-range fidelity.  Give me a 70s solid-state Pioneer receiver. Give me the Techniques turntable I bought with my Bar Mitzvah money…give me some ugly fake wood-looking 70s furniture speakers…and let me ride.  That is, of course , as long as you are listening to 12 inch, 33 and a third post-Dave-Brubeck-Take-Five items…or 45s for that matter.  For 78s…all tube, bigger furniture pieces with a built-in bar is needed. I think I still own one of those Cadillacs in Los Angeles somewhere.  Through their use, your Fats Domino selections will sound best, presenting the true, warm low-end sound of the time. 

Records should be listened to on the format and that apparatus that was most commonly used when the music was recorded.

Records are the language I use to communicate with some of my closest friends and going record shopping with them is like going to Shangri-La (sometimes literally).  We suggest records to each other…get excited when a great title is being sold cheap.  Whatever I buy gets tested out immediately, and whatever passes my completely subjective test gets added to my collection and makes the collection more powerful.  Oh yes, my record collection is power.  And it gets stronger all of the time.

I love my records like I have loved my dogs.  Hell, I love my records like I love myself…I could treat myself a whole lot better, but that might occasionally hinder the good time.  I love the healthy relationship I have developed with my collection.

And as for my kids’ less-healthy attitudes, destroying my collection as they grow, hunt, evolve, prank? I still have to figure that out.  Records behind bars feels like William Blake’s fenced off church. What is the need? But if they destroy my original pressing of the Heartbreakers LAMF—and yes, I don’t mind the production or the mix—what then?  What then….