I was discussing with a fellow hifi nerd (sorry audiophile) the merits of CD over vinyl and during the discourse he happened to mention that he was firmly in the digital hi-fi camp and had sold all his vinyl, 400 albums or so, about 10 years ago. This reminded me and caused a certain melancholy to descend as I thought back to the day I sold my beloved record collection.
There’s a saying that there comes a point in any man’s life when he must leave childish things behind and that’s partly the reason I sold my collection. I was Djing at the time, owned a record shop and had around 3000 bits of personal vinyl, a similar collection of second hand vinyl in the shop that was mine and a shed load of new stuff to boot. Our first child had just been born, we needed to leave the town we were living in and I needed to move on to a point where I took a bit more responsibility for my life and that of my partner and our son. I suppose then that selling the records marked a right of passage for me: It signified in a very real way the transition from childhood (I was twenty seven) to adulthood. I also sold at the same time the shop and any means of playing vinyl and was left with just CDs and tapes.
I used to occasionally search online for records I used to own and I could buy a very nice car for what they are now worth, but it’s not the monetary value, nor the pittance that I sold them for, that makes me overcome with nostalgia and regret. Records aren’t just bits of plastic with a couple of grooves printed on them. They are much more than this. More »
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Old Records or Old Friends?
I was discussing with a fellow hifi nerd (sorry audiophile) the merits of CD over vinyl and during the discourse he happened to mention that he was firmly in the digital hi-fi camp and had sold all his vinyl, 400 albums or so, about 10 years ago. This reminded me and caused a certain melancholy to descend as I thought back to the day I sold my beloved record collection.
There’s a saying that there comes a point in any man’s life when he must leave childish things behind and that’s partly the reason I sold my collection. I was Djing at the time, owned a record shop and had around 3000 bits of personal vinyl, a similar collection of second hand vinyl in the shop that was mine and a shed load of new stuff to boot. Our first child had just been born, we needed to leave the town we were living in and I needed to move on to a point where I took a bit more responsibility for my life and that of my partner and our son. I suppose then that selling the records marked a right of passage for me: It signified in a very real way the transition from childhood (I was twenty seven) to adulthood. I also sold at the same time the shop and any means of playing vinyl and was left with just CDs and tapes.
I used to occasionally search online for records I used to own and I could buy a very nice car for what they are now worth, but it’s not the monetary value, nor the pittance that I sold them for, that makes me overcome with nostalgia and regret. Records aren’t just bits of plastic with a couple of grooves printed on them. They are much more than this. More »