De-Acquisition: Leaving Records on the Porch
melancholyWell, Spring is already nigh, and my record collection has been asking me whether I even care about it. The answer is, of course, but honestly, not as much as I used to. At least, for some of you that don’t get listened to, having you does not bring me as much joy as buying you did.
A lot of new stuff is coming in. There’s a few new Jewish summer camp records I found on eBay, including one from Blue Star Camps in North Carolina in 1979 and Brandeis-Bardin Institute, where I grew up at (I’ve been deep in a Max Helfman rabbit hole). There’s a box of 250 Jewish CD’s of various sorts that were donated to me by a dear friend from her synagogue that had them sitting in a closet, gathering dust and are awaiting cataloging, ripping, scanning, and writing metadata into MusicBrainz/Archive.org.
And another unknown amount of records and a mandolin and a couple of other string instruments that were willed to me by my Uncle Mickey, my Grandfather’s brother, who died last month with a treasure trove of 33’s, analog recording gear, instruments of all sorts, and an incredible legacy. Uncle Mickey was my first exposure to Old Time music. He played in a banjo orchestra for decades. He taught music all around Southern California, including at Cal State Los Angeles.
I was able to see Mickey a couple of months ago when he was in recovery in Claremont after a near-fatal hospital stay. I had been on the West Coast for a few weeks and seeing Mickey was a priority. My mom and I drove out to the long-term facility he was at with my Aunt Bea and I told my mom we had to stop at the Folk Music Center on the way over.
My mom was totally floored by the shop, just as I had been the first time I went 10 years ago—an institution, a living museum, a legendary hub of accessible music-making. We saw a nice melodica on sale, nicer than the one I’d been bringing to the bluegrass jams lately, and she offered to buy me it for Chanukah. I was sheepish about it, but decided it really would be a nice upgrade. I ended up donating my other melodica to the Abayudaya community in Uganda when I traveled there a month later. A story for another day.
Anyway, I saw some old banjo magazines from the 70’s at the Folk Music Center, and I picked up a copy to give to Uncle Mickey. We headed over and got to chat for an hour or so. He was in good spirits as a nurse came by to take him around for some exercises, monitoring his blood pressure, and advising on next visits.
I didn’t mean to wander into those memories, I had intended this post to be about what records I was getting rid of.
I started collecting when I was 14 or 15, spending a dollar or two on records at Goodwill, close enough to my house to carry home. If it had a super cool cover or was an artist I’d heard on the classic rock station, that was cool enough for me to want to buy it. I got frames for my records and arranged them 4 rows of 3 on my wall and swapped out covers that I thought were interesting. That’s how I ended up with Jethro Tull’s “Passion Play” or Grand Funk Railroad’s “We’re An American Band” or In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida.
I wish that I had bought more of the albums I loved at the time and less of the albums that were available because now I feel in the unenviable position of wishing I had Bright Eyes’ “I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning” or Dashboard Confessionals “Places I Have Come to Fear the Most” instead of these Jefferson Starship records.
So, de-acquisition time. I suspect I’m at around 500-600 records and my goal this year is to reduce by about half. I’m making sure that everything that I do actually somewhat love is available on my server, and pretty much everything I’m getting rid of is worth less than $15.
It helps that I have my Little Free Record Library right on my porch. It is a somewhat dynamic location, with new stuff popping in every few days. I’ve taken and kept some records that others have donated, and I’ve given out about 50 records so far. This will be my largest donation to date, and I’ll probably do it in a few waves because the stack is a bit too big to go in at once.
So it’s so long to the old old and in with the new old, and I bid adieu and acknowledge these records for their years (or months) of good service. Here’s what’s on it’s way out. 52 records, from the D thru J section of the collection:
