Obsessive Compulsive Collecting

As a child I used to collect coins. Mainly this was a case of collecting old pre-decimal currency that would occasionally turn up down the back of sofas or occasionally in loose change (an old halfpenny was remarkably similar to a new 2p coin). I also used to pick up odd coins from around the world – usually from a family member who had served with the forces or worked on the ships overseas. I seem to recall that my elder brother collected stamps at one point. I think he eventually lost interest in philately about the same time that I worked out that more entertainment could be experienced by spending coins rather than collecting them.

I think it’s a general human trait to collect and categorise things and there is nothing wrong with that as a pastime. I now collect CDs. There seems to be a revival in vinyl record collecting, and I can see the attraction of that with the glorious 12” artwork that goes with them, but for me it is actually the music that goes with them that is the greater attraction and a CD is a nice compromise between useful portability (you can’t play vinyl in the car) whilst still retaining the delight of the booklet and sleeve notes.

However, it’s not just about the music. I do collect and part of the reason that I can tell that I collect is that I buy recordings that I don’t reasonably expect to play more than once or twice but they do fill an irritating hole in my collection. I’ve recently bought a few second hand CDs that have filled gaps in my collection, several of which I already had on vinyl. I recently bought the last three core CDs that were missing from my Beatles collection: With The Beatles, The Beatles for Sale and Yellow Submarine. The Beatles didn’t make a bad album but these three did contain substantial amounts of filler: either hastily written B-sides, lower quality covers or, in the case of Yellow Submarine, a whole side of film score orchestration that they neither wrote nor performed. Actually, having listened to these three for the first time in years they are perfectly listenable but my main reason in buying them is really to fill in the “missing teeth” on my CD shelf.

I’m sure many other people have done the same. How many Lou Reed fans bought Metal Machine Music simply because they had everything else. No self-respecting Queen fan would be without the Flash Gordon soundtrack even if it did only contain 2 new songs (like the mere 4 new songs on Yellow Submarine). However, I think I can just about justify that my hobby is on the right side of sane. There are a couple of gaps in my collection of David Bowie CDs. One of those is the album Tin Machine II which is currently only available 2nd hand. At the time of writing this sells for anything between £26 to £300. I think I can survive without it. It still annoys me that I don’t have it, though!