More fool them, I always find money is a motivatorProviding they don't just hoof it into the nearest skip!
Cos that's what I think my pair will do
It won’t be my problem anyway.
Vinyl prices
- Thread starter matt j
- Start date
It won’t be my problem anyway.
Tony L
Administrator
That’s a question I can’t answer until a lot later in life if I’m forced to really downsize. I can imagine a day where I streamed as a main source due to space and just had say 500 of my absolute favourite albums on vinyl to feed the TD-124. At present the ‘core collection’ is everything in the front room (the record shop is upstairs). It is a very good collection by any standard, no junk in it at all, so if I do slim it down in retirement my bank balance should grow very substantially! Good CD collection too, lots of valuable stuff there, even now in what I suspect is the bottom of that market.
Tony L
Administrator
I suspect we are good for a while as so much brand new stuff is being released. New generations are coming in and both buying current stuff and also digging backwards with far more knowledge than we ever had thanks to the democratisation of information the internet has brought. Lots of younger folk buying great jazz albums etc, many of which were recorded before their parents or even grandparents were born. These are the future collectors. As ever the really good stuff will always be collectable, the mass market junk won’t.
From my perspective it will be interesting to see if the musical generation prior to mine (e.g. Beatles, Stones, Hendrix, Led Zep etc) starts radically dropping in value as the people who bought them new start to downsize or die. So far I see no evidence of this beyond say Elvis, and the jazz market certainly suggests music jumps generations, I own many jazz albums from before I was even born.
PS I’m curious to see how Tone Poets etc hold up as say a 20 year investment. Good jazz pressings have a very good past record here, e.g. Classic Records, DCC, Alto, Music Matters, Japanese pressings etc, though the Tone Poets are not ‘limited’ as such. My bet is some will be reissued in higher numbers due to high demand, others won’t be and will go through the roof due to scarcity, but given enough time they will all at least hold value. The titles will never get old, nor I suspect will the notion that jazz is a vinyl format. If nothing else they have normalised spending £30+ on a new LP!
gavreid
Pretty Words...
I only have one Tone Poet (One Flight Up) but the vinyl is far and away the quietest I have, and the quality of the sleeve is really something else. Given that they're US imports I don't begrudge £30 for the odd record. With the current pressure on the pressing plants, and perhaps the relative shortage of expertise and equipment at the quality end of the industry, I don't see these being available in high numbers. These reissues will create new interest and demand without any doubt.
paulfromcamden
Baffled
I wonder about this too. Lots of other collectibles have fads and fashions - though something like a nice copy of Amazing Fantasy #15 never seems to lose value.
Are there records that were really sought after in the 70s/80s that are worthless now?
Seeker_UK
Feelin' nearly faded as my jeans
Not worthless but perhaps not worth as much.
Tony L
Administrator
It is never wise to view art markets (or I guess any others) as constant growth. The vinyl market reflects trends in music and every new generation finds their own influences. My ‘80s new-wave/indie generation were heavily influenced by VU, MC5, Stooges, Can, Electric Prunes, West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band, Silver Apples etc that had largely been neglected until that point. The current London jazz scene are deep-diving George Duke, CTI, Fela Kuti etc, records that were similarly neglected for a fair while, likewise some modern indie, e.g. Dry Cleaning, Idles etc look to be finding influences in late-70s-early-80s new wave etc. Genuinely good and innovative music is never dead, it may just sit below the surface at times, but it will unquestionably be rediscovered. The one pattern I do recognise is it is the periphery, not the mainstream, that tends to become ultra-cool and collectable, often the stuff that was missed in its own timeframe.
Joe Hutch
Mate of the bloke
People are literally fighting in the charity shops to get their mitts on Paul Young's records.
Nagraboy
Ausculta fili
I don’t like old records really, they’re often a bit shabby or worse. I tend to buy and prefer nice shiny reissues. The whole ‘collecting valuable vinyl’ seems a bit silly to me unless you’re hoping to sell them on to even sillier people later on. Like an earlier poster, I just buy vinyl to listen to.
paulfromcamden
Baffled
Horses for courses really isn't it. Some people will prefer a new build house where everything is shiny and new, some will prefer something with a bit of history even if it has a few rough edges.
I don't really collect 'valuable' vinyl so much as I accumulate lots of old records. If you're a jazz fan there's a ton of stuff that never got reissued and there's plenty of great records that are still cheap. I guess I could stream a lot of it but I prefer rooting around in the pound boxes and seeing what I can find - it's fun!
Tony L
Administrator
I’m of the view that in the vast majority of cases the first pressing from country of artist origin is by far the best sounding cut. There are some exceptions, but to my ears this is correct in more than 8/10 times. As such those are what I and most collectors seek out.
PS I have no ‘shabby or worn’ records in my collection!
PS I have no ‘shabby or worn’ records in my collection!
Big Tabs
looking backwards, going forwards
Discogs informs me that of the stuff I have bothered to list has a minimum value of about 8k
(I try to remember to list as I play them, or buy them, or I just list to find out which copy I have)
I know that all of my kids have their eye on different sections of my record collection. I know that it will not be long before the granddaughters start eyeing up stuff, eldest G-kid definitely wants the Queen and Missy Elliott records & c.d’s.
The value of stuff is interesting, but it was never why I have bought something. I have to want to hear it, otherwise there is no point.
(I try to remember to list as I play them, or buy them, or I just list to find out which copy I have)
I know that all of my kids have their eye on different sections of my record collection. I know that it will not be long before the granddaughters start eyeing up stuff, eldest G-kid definitely wants the Queen and Missy Elliott records & c.d’s.
The value of stuff is interesting, but it was never why I have bought something. I have to want to hear it, otherwise there is no point.
My vinyl collection is kind of in two halves, the stuff I bought purely to listen to and the stuff I bought to listen to with one eye on it potentially becoming valuable. Then there is the small amount of stuff that has become valuable by chance that was just bought with no thought to future value.
I must admit, some of these prices are tempting as I do own stuff bought donkeys years ago that I'm no longer interested in but just hung on to, but then I think if it is worth this now is it worth hanging on to it for another 10 years or so and seeing where we are then?
I have a feeling that as the world gets ever more technologically advanced that the demand for 'old world' tech with a more hands on approach may become even more niche and valuable.
I must admit, some of these prices are tempting as I do own stuff bought donkeys years ago that I'm no longer interested in but just hung on to, but then I think if it is worth this now is it worth hanging on to it for another 10 years or so and seeing where we are then?
I have a feeling that as the world gets ever more technologically advanced that the demand for 'old world' tech with a more hands on approach may become even more niche and valuable.
Tony L
Administrator
This is what I mean about my own collection being fluid. If I’m certain something is unlikely ever to be played again then I do shift it into the shop, I try very hard not to keep any ‘filler’. I do usually have a small ‘ripening pile’ in the shop of some stuff that is gone from my own collection but I don’t think is at the right time to sell on. It is usually recent stuff that didn’t quite hit the spot or I ended up buying two of (e.g. later found a signed or more limited copy and kept that one myself). I tend to sit on these until they are deleted and worth at least what I paid and only then filter them into the shop listing. I don’t see the point in losing money on stuff! I seldom think longer term than that and there are countless items I’ve sold way, way under today’s value. Just ludicrously so in some cases, but the whole point of a shop is to sell stuff! You can’t sit on it all in case it eventually goes up!
I'm wary now of any potential future RSD re-press devaluing something that is quite rare, it's hard to gauge if these things have an effect on the original.
Two of mine I have in mind are:
https://www.discogs.com/Oasis-Familiar-To-Millions/release/1596828
https://www.discogs.com/Blur-Crazy-Beat/release/1332713
Paul L
coffee lounge for me
That’s a very fair point of course and well publicised that to make serious money these days it’s all about touring. I remember reading that young Ted Sheeran had made something like £350 million from this approach.
Tony L
Administrator
They can take the edge off the price slightly IME, but they certainly don’t kill it. Not by any stretch. Collectors almost always want the first pressing. Even the real top-tier stuff, e.g. KoB, Beatles, DSOTM, it doesn’t matter how good or how limited the audiophile reissue is the real money will almost always be on the first press from country of origin. I actually think there is a risk of ‘audiophile fatigue’ as there is just a never ending stream of fancy reissues of KoB etc. If anything that will drive the price of a mint 6-eye up. I’d swap both my Classic Records 2xLP and Nimbus copies for a genuinely mint US stereo 6-eye, and to be honest I suspect most people would. Some audiophile stuff can be great investments though, I can’t think of any in my collection (and I have quite a lot) that are worth less than twice what they cost, mostly way more than that, but I do tend to only buy audiophile cuts of things where I just can’t find a mint 1st press, i.e. they are reissues of already very collectable stuff.
tldr; I think your Oasis & Blur is safe!