How many albums do you own?

[Doghouse Riley]

How many albums have you in your collections are those to which you hang on simply because you think they ought to be there?

As an example of this, my two jukeboxes contain a diverse selection of 130 tunes (not counting "B" sides) that I or my wife like from all eras, from the Andrews Sisters' Bugle Boy/Rum & Coca Cola and Artie Shaw's Begin the Beguine/Frenesi, to Crowded House's Hey now, Hey now. These aren't records I've accumulated over a lifetime, but since I got into jukeboxes, I stopped buying singles in my teens or early twenties.

But when I look at the popularity meters, they tell me that some of what I consider to be essential parts of my collections are hardly ever played.

in this modern age, with more affluence, many people have several hobbies, (I've five, err... that's not including playing records or posting on several message boards), so the importance of any has less significance.

My "record collection" includes over 3,000 mp3s assembled over more than a decade which has been shunted to successive computers, each time I upgraded. I've not bought a CD in over five years. If there's something I've heard or been told about, that I might think I'd like, I can usually find it on YouTube.
When you look on eBay, "everyone" is trying to sell their LPs and CDs. Like it or not, we're in the digital age. The quality of the tracks uploaded from CDs, or mp3s I've on my iPods that I play through my 1980 tuner amp, is good enough for me. I have actually had a bit of a clear out and dumped a couple of dozen CDs, I've kept only the 150 which will fit in the rack I built for the top shelf of our front room wall unit. However, my LP collection of around 200 albums I store in three places, I can't bring myself to throw any of these out. Strange that.

[Vaughan]

It's NOT "irrelevant" if we enjoy it. It's just like any other hobby; there's no real "right or wrong" here. It all comes down to what we enjoy, what puts a smile on our face.

Oh, I think you've taken a phrase out of context, and drawn an incorrect conclusion. I in no way think a collection is irrelevant par se. What I'm saying is a collection in terms of the number of albums in the collection, is now irrelevant - in the digital age.

I have lots of recordings. I love them. They're not irrelevant to me at all.

What I'm saying is - if you just consider numbers, then there's no point. I could expand my collection numerically this evening by downloading a 1000 new tracks without leaving my armchair or spending any money. Without actually knowing if I'm ever going to listen to them - let alone like them. Whereas in yesteryear, I could explain why everything was in my collection, since I had to make a conscious choice to seek it out, and fork over my cash. I can now be much more indiscriminate, and "collect" for the sake of it. As hard disks get ever bigger (I have 5Tb of storage myself) there is rarely a need to ever delete anything, and the space it takes up is simply virtual, it doesn't really matter.

That was my point.

[Vaughan]

During my nightly searches of the net for things of interest, I came upon this release. The cover reminded me of this thread.



[Click for Amazon page and larger image]

[Doghouse Riley]

Originally Posted by Vaughan

During my nightly searches of the net for things of interest, I came upon this release. The cover reminded me of this thread.



[Click for Amazon page and larger image]

Nice Seeburg 100 he has there. I wouldn't let anyone monkey around with mine, if I had one.

[chazro]

How'd I miss this thread!? Music's been one of my greatest passions my whole life. I've been into the audiophile end of it (if ya love it, why not hear it at it's best!?) for close to 30 yrs. Currently I own over 3000+ albums and over a 1000+ CD's. I've been dragged kicking and screaming into MP3's the last few years and own 3-400 songs. My Ipod's got over 3000 tunes in it, the majority downloaded from my LP/CD collection. Of course it's impossible to listen to everything at once but like someone else mentioned, it's a personal pride of ownership thing. I LOVE my music collection AND my gear, going thru it is akin to going thru old family photo albums, different recordings strike up all sorts of different emotions. A sure sign 'o' the times is I haven't been to a good record (LP) or CD shop in years. I've sold and traded 100's upon hundreds of CD's at used CD shops, haven't done that in over 3 yrs. The times they are a changin' brothers! I have a stand-alone CD recorder that functions much like my old Nakamichi cassette deck used to. Within the system I record LP compilations plus recordings of rare records. I also have never been able to wrap my head around PAYING for a recording and not physically owning a copy so EVERY MP3 I buy is recorded onto CD. Yeah, I'll cop to being old-fashioned, even anal, so what's yr point?!

[Tenorman]

Surprised that no-one picked up on my insurance comments

If you have more than around 100 albums, it is likely that your household insurance will not cover the replacement value.

Anyone here got special insurance on their albums?

[HutchFan]

Originally Posted by Tenorman

Anyone here got special insurance on their albums?

I checked with my agent, and he told me that my current policy would cover my entire collection.

However, insurance was one of several reasons that I documented all my CDs, LPs, and DLs in a spreadsheet. I've got a "virtual' copy saved, just in case.

[Tenorman]

Not sure what insurance is like in the US, but in the UK they do anything they can to get out of a claim.

The wording here, buried in the small print, is that where there are more than one item of a similar type that they will be bulked together to form a single item.

There will be wording elsewhere to mention that, any extarordinary items must be listed separately.

My camera equipment is under a special photographic isnurance and not included in the house insurance. One idiot company offered to insure my camera equipment at my specified value provided I did not take it out of the house. Yeah? thanks for nothing

I have a large number of vintage prints on the wall at around £100 to £150 -- I have to catalogue them as well!

[Vaughan]

I would define "Insurance" thus: An agreement whereby you gain the illusion of security.

[DraperiesOfNight]

I have a couple hundred vinyl records mostly classic rock and country cus jazz vinyl is outrageous. And probly about a hundred CDs, and I'm building a collection more in CDs now threw amazon. Your know what it is with me, I get one cd, and it urkes me I don't have the rest by an artist. And that's how I've been ever since a child. So I just try to buy there whole catalog and it takes me a while. Steely Dan and Alice cooper are top picks in CD right now. Along with miles Davis.

[Tenorman]

Originally Posted by Tenorman

Currently listing and valuing my collection estimate 3500 CDs and LPs. This is to get a value for Insurance -- last valuation was £25k which is now too low

Check your house insurance. You may find that your albums are bulked as a single item with a maximum value of £1000 in the UK. That is only 100 albums or less at replacement cost.

OK the listing goes on apace -- just past the confirmed 2500 mark -- my estimate now is probably nearer 3000 albums (read discs)