The Detours

I grew up in the seventies and eighties, so the music I grew up listening to first came in the form of vinyl and then cassette and finally CDs before the world became digital. Because of all these transitions from one format to another, my record collection never approached the size of my father's. It probably peaked at about fifty records, but unfortunately only ten or so remain. I don't really remember what happened to the rest, but they were probably sold at a garage sale or donated to Goodwill. When I got rid of my record player when I went off to college, I couldn't imagine that I'd ever again have the ability, let alone the desire, to listen to them. With all the music ever recorded instantly available with nothing more than an internet connection, why bother keeping dozens of antiques?

There's no way I could've known what would happen. As I dig through my father's collection thirty years later, with each record I pull out of the stack I find myself missing my own collection all the more. There weren't really any classics, and some titles are even embarrassing to think back on all these years later with their razor sharp depiction of narrow slices of time in the life of a teenage fanboy, but they were mine. (Few who read this, for example, will remember the band Scritti Politti, and if you do it's only because of a hit they had in 1985, "Perfect Way." I owned the 12-inch single of that song, a disappointing admission only slightly tempered by the fact that Miles Davis -- Miles Davis! -- covered that tune a year later.)

I don't remember how I chose what to keep and what to scrap. One of my first favorite bands was Genesis, and they made the cut, but my Police records -- favorites to this day -- are all gone. U2’s The Joshua Tree is nowhere to be found.

The music is never lost, but the history is gone. I wish I could flip through my old collection and wait for the memories to wash over me, and it would be fun to watch my children explore them, recognizing some albums but being completely bewildered by others. 

When I first committed to this project and bought my new turntable, I didn't think I'd ever want to add any new vinyl to my collection, but I've changed my mind. Recent trips to local record stores and to the Southern California mecca, Amoeba Music, have reminded me how much I've always loved the search for music. Once upon a time a trip to the record or CD store was about possibility, about finding an unexpected album and then coming back the next weekend hoping to see something you might've missed. I can still hear the click-clacking of CD cases, and I still remember that jolt of excitement from finding a hidden gem. It was intoxicating.

And so I'm back in the game, but with some limitations. I'm not terribly interested in discovering new artists, and while I wouldn't mind buying my daughter a vinyl Olivia Rodrigo,¹ I'll limit my own search to the reconstruction of my former collection along with any fun collectibles that pop up along the way. While my writing here will still mainly be dedicated to the exploration of my father's jazz collection, there will be occasional detours -- posts here and there about records of my own and the stories behind them. I hope you don't mind.

1. * I don’t think she’ll ever read this, so I can confess something here. I originally wrote this piece several weeks ago; last week I bought the new Olivia Rodrigo record for her. It’ll be under the tree this year.