Record collecting versus hoarding


At what point does "collecting" records become hoarding? Unless you are in the business of selling records either primarily or even secondarily, why do so many people here talk about having 2,3,4,6,10,000 records and CDs? It's not stamps or coins.

Let's say you listen to records 15 hours a week (a good estimate for me) that equates to about 750 hours a year or 1000 records a year. I like to listen to mine at least once every three months - I have 300 records and change. In the rare instance when I replace one for a better sounding one (I've done it maybe 4-5 times), I immediately sell the old one - with only one exception. The Sgt Pepper UHQR. I already had it on the Beatles Collection and do occasionally listen to it when I want a treat. It does sound better than the regular Mofi one, which sounds great to me.

Why would you have multiple copies of the same record and not just listen to the best sounding one and sell the rest?

Why would you want records you listen to less than once a year?

Maybe some people listen a lot more than me (and replace cartridges/styli pretty ofter or have a bunch of them)?

The reason I bring this up is because Acoustic Sounds is releasing Steely Dan's studio albums from the 1970s on their UHQR brand (not sure how they now own the name and not Mofi, but that is not the point), I am a huge fan and will be getting a few of these overpriced (IMHO) records, which will replace a few of my non-audiophile (except the Aja Mofi) records. I plan to sell the Aja Mofi immediately after getting the UHQR, which I am sure will sound much better. That is worth a few bucks, but the others I sell should be worth $10-15 in trade at a record store.

Anyone with records they play less than once a year or keep multiple pressings of a single album, please let me know your rationale.

Are you a hoarder? Too lazy to get rid of them? Like the way they decorate your room?

sokogear

I am fine with keeping LPs I do not play, because of the possibility that I will want to listen to them some day. What I don’t tolerate are bad sounding LPs (meaning poor quality recordings) or LPs that have noise causing surface damage that resists a good cleaning on my RCM (if I otherwise enjoy the music recorded on them).  LPs in either of those two categories go to the recycling bin immediately.

There’s really no difference between the two for most.

Those folks who have a “nice, neat, perfect amount of records” (by the way, according to whom?) can enjoy their lives just like the rest of us.

If there’s no harm, no foul.

Agree Lew. The only problem is there are some records I really like that sound crappy that have never been reissued, and I refuse to pay Better Records prices, so unfortunately, they are in the rotation. Luckily there are not too many of these.

@mijostyn I had earlier copied the following quote from your earlier post above, “Nobody I know has a photograph of the first time they had sexual intercourse but I sure do remember what was playing at the time and my mind will do the rest. I have an audio record of all the important times of my life. Is this hording or collecting? I could give a rat's -ss” opined that I was LMAO (which I spelled out). If you check above where I posted three comments back-to-back, you can see where one has been deleted. I guess it doesn’t pay to be unambiguous with one’s language on this site. I can’t see how your comments were unobjectionable while mine were, unless the alarm was triggered by a machine reading of my post. 
To all, if this post passes scrutiny, enjoyed the conversation. I’m tending toward hoarder, don’t want to burden my heirs, but hate making decisions about what to let go and what to keep, I see value in everything and everyone, but the mess I’m willing to tolerate limits my association with others who can’t tolerate it. I feel I must learn to live ‘unattached.’ Although, I must say that streaming is for background ‘entertainment’ and no replacement for playing back physical media. 

Soko, I trash unplayable LPs, even if I like the music on them, and then I search for a better copy.  If it's a really special performance, in my own mind, I try to replace the bad sounding copy with a better one almost immediately.