A Sonic Heirloom: Celebrating the beauty of vinyl this Record Store Day
With Record Store Day each year, there comes a chance to celebrate the physical format. People still pitch up their tents, set their alarms early and head down to the local dealer trying to get their mitts on a limited release or the long-awaited return of a lost record. It’s a day set out to celebrate the collection, with the grand vision being that the purchased pick will be taken home, listened to eagerly and on repeat, placed into the rack with the rest and kept there, gathering new scratches and singularities that one day some new ears will hear. As with all physical mementoes, they’re made to be passed down.
But then, every year, when the event rolls around, that feels lost. The camps end up split. On the one hand, there are the people who go along, buy the most limited release, and never, ever open that shrink wrap. They’ll let that album sit unheard on a shelf, waiting for its worth to collect with the dusk they carefully brush away to protect it. On the other side, there are those that fill up their basket, scrambling for some new picture disc version of an album they already own two times over, or pick any title off the list just to buy something to mark the date. I’m not sure which is worse.
“I can’t even express to you how wasteful it is,” Billie Eilish said recently, talking about the influx of artists “making fucking 40 different vinyl packages that have a different unique thing just to get you to keep buying more.” Her point on sustainability is valid in the short term. No fan needs to be buying any new album in four different colour variants before they even hear it. But what that comment, and what a lot of consideration over physical formats lacks, is real future thinking. Generational thinking. Precious, protective thought processes find the ideal medium between those two opposing negative camps.
The golden middle ground is care and consideration. When it comes to my own record collection, I’ve been governing it under strict rules that hold those two words as holy law. I don’t rush out to buy new releases or jump at marketing ploys. I won’t be in the record store day queue picking out something I sort of want. I’m trying to build a collection that will last beyond a lifetime, one that could nearly act as a memoir to honour the tight and beautiful ties between music and memory and the way that’s always worth more than £150 on Discogs.
Here are the essentials…
The Legacy Acts
I have a vision for a dream day in a dream future. I’ll hear punk float out of my daughter’s room, or she’ll mention poetry in some fleeting way. That’s when I’ll know it’s time. I’ll dig out my underlined and battered copy of Just Kids, head to the shelf and reach for my Curated By Record Store Day compilation vinyl I queued up for in 2022, and I’ll say, “Meet Patti Smith.” I’ll say a prayer she’ll like it and hand them over to pass the torch.
Switch the artist to whoever you like. Switch daughter for nieces, nephews, friends, godchildren, whoever. But keep in the sense of honourable responsibility. Just as how we all have stories of when we first heard or were told about legacy acts like The Beatles, Sex Pistols, or Fleetwood Mac, often already a few decades passed or over, one day it’ll be our turn to keep their names alive. The classics are classics for a reason.
They’re an essential cornerstone of any good record collection purely for their foundational sound. But on an emotional level, they’re a vital paving stone keeping their lineage going on. So, while the countless rereleases of old albums might feel overdone, pick the names you care about the most, buy your favourite album from them, and keep it as a reminder to tell someone about them one day in the future.
New Heroes
But remember that one day in the future, your present will be the past, too. It’s a strange thought to think that in a few short decades, hyped modern artists like The Last Dinner Party, Boygenius, or Lana Del Rey will all be ‘vintage’. The new albums you might buy on release day could someday be classics, getting their 50th-anniversary rerelease, with your future heirs in line on record store day to get them.
I like to see vinyl as a bet. When purchasing modern or new releases, it’s fun to think that you might be getting in there early with a first batch of vinyl that will one day earn you major cool points from your next generation.
Mementoes of Now
But even if they don’t, mementoes of the albums that soundtracked your life, from the artists you loved at the time, will make a time capsule that doesn’t just celebrate music heroes but celebrates you, your life and the times you lived through.
In that vision of myself and some potential future daughter, I always want her to know me. Really, isn’t that what everyone wants in some small way, whether it be through family, career or art – don’t we all want to be known and remembered? A vinyl collection can be seen just the same as a photo album or diary, capturing moments of your life in a different sensory way. They’re reminders of moments, either to personally relive or tell others about.
Orla Gartland’s Woman On The Internet will always sound like being 22 in Manchester. When playing Amyl And The Sniffer’s Comfort To Me, I’ll always talk about dancing in the rain to ‘Security’ at All Points East when I was 24. Keaton Henson’s House Party will always be a token of my career and the pitch-me interviews I got to do. Whether the artists are remembered 50 years down the line is regardless because I want these moments to be.
When I remember to do so, I put a little note into the gatefold of all my records. All of these are addressed to my future self with reminders of good memories, such as why I love the artist or where I was when I made the purchase. I have every intention of revisiting them again and again to listen, revisit and recount. I have every intention of keeping these albums forever and passing them on as an heirloom, honouring the positive permanence of the physical format.
