If you haven’t already thought of me as an overly-emotional hipster or an old lady stuck in a 21-year-old’s body, this will be the article that puts you over the edge. I have a few collections, such as movies, books and the paper slips that you get from fortune cookies, but I think my favorite one has to be my vinyl record collection.
I have an emotional attachment to each of my 28 vinyl records and I remember how I got each of them specifically. Earlier this week, I bought the album “Reflektor” by Arcade Fire on vinyl from a friend. Arcade Fire was a huge contributor to the score of my favorite movie, “Her,” and the band wrote the song “Supersymmetry” for the movie and this album. I bought my first vinyl record, Sleater-Kinney’s “No Cities to Love,” at Barnes and Noble with guitarist Carrie Brownstein’s memoir about a year ago. This band and this album revitalized my passion for all types of punk music.
Is my moderately-sized collection pointless? Are vinyl records antiquated and irrelevant? No, trends recycle. Some recent pop albums like Justin Beiber’s “Purpose,” Taylor Swift’s “1989,” and Justin Timberlake’s “The 20/20 Experience” have even been pressed on vinyl. Vinyl records are no longer just for the guy with the man bun and messenger bag that you always see in the coffee shop or your crazy uncle Dave who can’t just let go of his childhood. In fact, according to the Recording Industry Association of America, vinyl record sales in 2015 were up 32 percent to $416 million, the highest level since 1988. Older generations are nostalgic, gathering huge collections and bringing them to flea markets and swap meets to share what they’ve compiled over the years. Younger generations have sparked interest, patronizing the struggling record stores and building a collection of their own with both old and new genres of music.
I’ve found that vinyl is much more communal in nature than digital. They’re large enough for many people to look at them at once, decide what to listen to and enjoy together. For example, my dad gave me lots of his old albums this summer, and one of them was Blackout by the Scorpions. While we were listening to it I looked at the album sleeve and thought the guitarist’s name, Rudolf Schenker, was familiar. He told me that Rudolf was the brother of one of the best guitarists of all time, Michael Schenker, who has been a part of the Scorpions previously and went on to form the Michael Schenker Group. I love learning little snippets of music history, even if they are mainly from my dad who listens to mostly classic heavy metal.
Vinyl records have a richer, fuller, inexplicably warmer sound than digital files. Everyone that I’ve talked to who owns and regularly spins records will agree to this point. Digital files are technically clearer in sound and are definitely cheaper and quicker to produce, however I don’t think the goal of any type of art is perfection or convenience. You make art or consume art for the sake of expression, for the joy or sadness, exhilaration or heartbreak found within the creation.
There’s just something very special about interacting with art in a physical space that immerses all of the senses. You pick up the record and carefully slide it out of its sleeve, touching only the smooth edges. You watch the needle bounce up and down on the grooves, spinning round and round. You listen to the melodies, harmonies, crescendos and diminuendos. If your records are old, you can smell the dust and paper that may be older than yourself, akin to the smell of your grandparent’s study filled with hardbound books or the VHS tape you haven’t watched since you were a child. I try to explain it in words, but I don’t think I could ever accurately and fairly describe the extraordinary experience of listening to and collecting vinyl records.
