Are you collector scum?

http://www.laweekly.com/westcoastsound/2012/01/19/henry-rollins-the-column-are-you-collector-scum?page=2

Some faith in Rollins restored. I saw him at a spoken word gig prior to the last election and it was pandering so hard that I was embarassed for the audience.

That was awesome.

...and no, I'm not collector scum...at least, I don't think I am, not anymore anyway.

There was a time, though, when I was definitely exhibiting some serious Collector Scum tendencies. When I first started seriously collecting CDs in the early 90s I had a "circuit" of monthly record shows/swaps that I hit on a regular basis, and of course I constantly scrounged in a bunch of local CD stores, too... for a while I seriously thought that it might be possible for me to own every single note of music ever recorded by every single artist I have ever liked...so I was making myself nuts lookin' for imports w/bonus tracks, promotional CDs with non-album stuff, movie soundtracks with exclusive songs by bands I liked, decent quality live bootlegs, etc., etc.... eventually financial restraints (not to mention storage issues) led to me abandoning that mindset by the mid 1990s... and I ended up purging a whole lotta sh*t that was just taking up too much damn space.

Nowadays my collection is much more manageable and when it comes to bands/albums/CDs I want, I really don't much care if it's a first press, last press, reissue, re-re-issue, North American, South American, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Koosbanian, whatever. If it's an album I don't have (and the price is right), then it's mine.

There's an album by Poison Idea whose title pretty much sums up the whole "Collector Scum" mindset for me...

Kind of, but getting less so

I went through a phase of this kind of thing, starting with replacing my '80s collection, I wanted what I had sold off, not represses and i did buy into the artificial scarcity thing that labels like Rise Above do so well these days, but i definitely have my limits. I've recently bought 2nd pressings of the first 7" singles made by Jess & the Ancient ones, The Oath and Beastmilk for about £8 each, first pressings now go for £50-100 on each of these and I have no intention of paying it, I just want copies of the record.

Autographs only mean anything to me if I have met the band otherwise it's just graffiti on my record.

There are exceptions, when it comes to Hellhammer, Celtic Frost or Triptykon, yeah total nerd/collector scum!! Guilty as charged.   

No I do tend to buy bootleg DVD's but I do not buy singles, or 7 inch vinyl pressing, never did

I do tend to try to buy a discography of an artist I like but I do not include every comp or bootleg or single, I have my limits.

I think I have one of the larger collections of the people on this board and even I don't do this. There are bands that I want to have all the songs from, but I don't care about the pressings, colors of vinyl, etc...  I am more focused on the songs themselves.  That did lead me to buying many Japanese imports for their exclusive bonus tracks, but even that has waned in the last several years.  

As far as vinyl is concerned, originals or represses are fine with me.  I am just looking for vinyl copies of albums I like.

I'm a collector, but I have never done this. There was a time I would buy different promo items and whatnot if I saw them, but as I got older the pointlessness of it all was too obvious, so I stopped.

Although some of those promos could be very cool. I found a promo of System Of A Down's debut in Boston prior to its release. Three songs on it are different from the album versions. Back then I used to talk with their manager, Beno, online, and he told me there were only 10 of those pressed and he has no idea how a copy ended up in Boston.

Did I get pleasure from owning one of those 10? Sure did. But not in a way that made me feel superior; I just thought it was f*cking cool.

I've never had a need for any other edition aside from the one with bonus tracks. I always tried to get the edition with the most tracks for the least amount of money. Rarely would I buy the Japanese and European versions for the different bonus tracks, you know. These days, however, I'm fully content with buying the regular album and just downloading (illegally and legally) the bonus material if the import/deluxe edition is too much money.

I am also aware that my collection has value and it is possible that in the future I might need to make some quick money, so if I can get a collectable at a good price, I'm likely to do it, at the end of the day, I'm not so precious that I'd starve to keep my collection, I've got most of it on my PC and push comes to shove that's all I need.

I do enjoy collecting records though, it's a good hobby   

I would consider myself a collector but not to that extent. I want to have all the songs by an artist on cd (and try to get them cheapest way possible) but I don't buy anything superfluous that has all the songs readily available elsewhere (usually on greatest hits releases). I also ignore any and all promos. Not sure why but that's the way I've always been.It's also quite a chore getting import editions with the bonus tracks at a decent price especially nowadays since my disposable income is practically nil.

Eyesore wrote:

These days, however, I'm fully content with buying the regular album and just downloading (illegally and legally) the bonus material if the import/deluxe edition is too much money.

I just did this not too long ago with Grave Digger's Rheingold and Liberty Or Death. Those editions with the extra tracks Hero and Ship Of Hope were almost impossible to find. And when they did turn up, they were ususally in the $30 plus range. No way I'm paying that much so I ended up getting both of those tunes of Itunes for .99 each and just bought the domestic release of Rheingold (I still need Liberty Or Death).

Buying imports was easier when we were younger. First, less responsibility. We could blow money like crazy. Second, our collections were small. In 20+ years of collecting, I've amassed a collection of over 10,000 albums. The amount of bands I dig is ridiculous, therefore the amount of imports I would like to own is also ridiculous. At 38 years old, however, I no longer have crazy amounts of disposable cash. Actually, I didn't when I was younger; I just thought I did. Haha.

Either way, at my age it just makes no sense to be this guy:



 

The other thing for me is that, like Eyesore, i dig a lot of stuff and there are a hell of a lot of bands out there. One copy of each record is enough (bearing in mind my previous Tom Warrior disclaimer!   )

I am sort of. I prefer to have the first pressing of an album, however if it is unattainable, I will settle for a re-issue. I don't have to have every pressing made. Now that said, I am 2 albums away from every Sabbath album, first US pressing and once I complete that, I wanna try to do the UK versions.

If it's a band that I like, I pick up everything that I can on vinyl. Currently trying to to get everything by Clutch. Some stuff I will pass on though. I have first pressings of everything by Orchid, but I didn't buy the Zodiac Sessions, as it's just a re-issue.

I collect for my enjoyment and I couldn't care less about value or perceived future value. I have some stuff worth a lot and some stuff that isn't worth a thing, but it's priceless to me.

Eyesore wrote:

Guys with THAT many copies of the same album creep me out a little. Haha.

...and yet, I betcha if you asked him "So how's the album?" he'd say "I dunno, I haven't played any of them."

I belong to this Facebook group called the Vinyl Community and dudes and chics are completely out of hand. They will buy albums simply because they are 'rare' or go to Goodwill and clean them out, and they admit they rebuy the same album simply because the copy was so just sooooo cheap.

manny wrote:

I belong to this Facebook group called the Vinyl Community and dudes and chics are completely out of hand. They will buy albums simply because they are 'rare' or go to Goodwill and clean them out, and they admit they rebuy the same album simply because the copy was so just sooooo cheap.

My cousin has been doing this for years and has made very good money doing it. If you have that kind of knowledge that allows you to buy a record for 50p and sell it for £50-200 (which he has done from car boot sales on numerous occasions) I don't see a problem. It's the guys who think that owning mint condition first presses in every available format makes them any more of a fan of that band than a guy who has it all on CD, it doesn't, particularly if you never play them

From what I can tell they are not buying them to resell them but to stare at them

manny wrote:

From what I can tell they are not buying them to resell them but to stare at them

  

Funny thing is though, these guys are actually keeping the physical product market growing.

http://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2014/apr/16/why-buy-music-you-never-intend-to-play

I'm a collector. I go to record shows, scrounge through second hand shops and record stores. I have multiple pressings of some albums. If that makes me a scum, then so be it. I don't have to have every color vinyl or pressing of ever record by my favorite bands, but there are some that I like to have for different cover art, or different track listings, etc. It just depends on the artists I guess. Scum!

manny wrote:

I belong to this Facebook group called the Vinyl Community and dudes and chics are completely out of hand. They will buy albums simply because they are 'rare' or go to Goodwill and clean them out, and they admit they rebuy the same album simply because the copy was so just sooooo cheap.

I have a friend who is like this.

I'm a collector but not to the extent that Rollins described.

I'm a collector, but the music is the thing. I'll own two versions of an album if a different mix or master were involved and there's a tangible difference in sound quality or contents. Barring that, I'll just pick the one I like (probably the newest issue) and stick to it.

Far from "collector scum" classification, but it was a good read nonetheless. I enjoy Henry's opinion on things, even when I disagree with 'em.

I will admit to having lists and contacts at various record stores looking for certain things.  But nothing scummy about that IMO.  In fact I think there is nothing wrong with wanting every version of something.  Even obsessively pursuing it.  I'm not one of those people, but if you have the means then more power to you - buy away.  Personally these days I hold off on a lot of new releases since I'm always fearful a deluxe version is forth coming.  And those deluxe versions only interest me if I can find them cheap and they contain bonus tracks.  The ones with DVDs lost my interest long ago.

The only real scum in my view are the people who show up on things like Record Store Day and buy up everything in order to re-sell.  Of course part of this falls on the stores for letting folks buy multiple copies of the same title.  Have never understood why they allow that (looking at you Zia Records).

jstate wrote:

The only real scum in my view are the people who show up on things like Record Store Day and buy up everything in order to re-sell.  Of course part of this falls on the stores for letting folks buy multiple copies of the same title.  Have never understood why they allow that (looking at you Zia Records).

I've made my thoughts on this pretty plain in the past. Nuclear Blast are major culprits for this because of their stupid Gold/Silver/Bronze system where once you have bought plenty from them, you get access to the most limited and sought after versions. So if you are just a fan of a particular band, you have no chance, but if you buy up every NB release and sell them on, you are going to get to Gold status pretty quickly. I understand that it's a loyalty thing but one version of the new Blues Pills record is already being offered on eBay for £99.99 (more than three times what the buyer has paid) and the record isn't even out till July. I admit I did buy an equally limited version myself but only because I could, I got in early enough to get it for the retail price. My days of paying stupid money to guys like this for new releases is well and truly over!   

Henry Rollins always rules. But that's not the point.

When I was younger and into collecting hardcore records, I was *ideally* this collector scum. I didn't have enough money to actually be there, though. I had a want list of a ton of rare pressings/colors of 80s hardcore records, but I couldn't really do anything about it. Ha.

Now, though, I am not. I could care less about what press or color it is (although if the limited pressing/color is available to me for normal price, I will certainly get that one). And I barely even care about owning everything by a band any more. If I can get those random songs from comps or soundtracks by way of iTunes, I will do that, but otherwise, I'm not worried about it. Alice Cooper is really the only artist I try and make sure I own everything I can find from (and I have toyed with being Collector Scum for his records, but I've never taken the plunge--I own like 3 pieces of AC vinyl).