People with Large Music Collections: How much would it take for you to sell it all?

Everyone has their price... Tell us what your collection is made of (formats, quantity, Cliff Notes description) and what it would take for you to get rid of all of it.

For the purposes of this thread, you do not have to put in extra effort. No selling individual items. In this thread, someone gives you a check and takes it all. What will it take?

Anyone who did sell off their collections can also say what it took for you to do so.

I had 158 7" singles I picked up along the way that I rarely ever listened to. It was a strange hodge-podge of things.

I had someone appraising my (larger) CD collection (more on that in a moment) and he gave me half of the Discogs value (I had for some reason added it all there) which seemed fair since he was a store that needed to resell it all.

I also had about 500 cassettes that he game me $200 for.

He looked over my CD collection that probably is over 10,000 at this point. I might have been tempted had he offered $10,000 for it all but he said it would be more like $7,000 so I passed. I place more personal value on the CDs (and practical value since I listen to them more than anything else) and am not broke so it would likely take a lot more for me to part with it all now.

Nobody asked but I had a decent LP collection, probably 500 or so, that all died in a basement flood. I have since managed to rebuild it organically (as in I didn't try and buy what I lost, it's all just new things I like only available on wax, used store purchases, and someone gave me a bunch of classic rock stuff he was gonna throw out) and maybe have 100 or so now. It would take more than they are worth to part with at this point, probably $1,000 would do it).

kind of a weird question, obviously I've noticed my median value on Discogs going way up these last couple years to the point where it's a significant amount of cash but I guess I am privileged enough where even if I got the offer I couldn't refuse the first thing I'd do is buy 80% of it again

I don't know how many I have (if you can count them, you obviously need more!) My collection's not huge, say 1,000 albums and 1,000 CDs. And most of it is probably streamable if I chose to go that route. But what do I do with the B-52s debut autographed by all 5? The Suicide Commandos numbered live album, 1,000 pressed? 45s by beloved local punk/wave bands that I saw every show by? The cassette that accompanied a modern dance performance friends of mine staged? Those are all the prized artifacts I'm never getting rid of, so if I can't sell individual items I'll have to keep them all, and keep adding more.

Dan do you have the NNB 7" if so, please YSI the B-side ;)

is there anything else from NNB that's been issued or in bootlegs?

"New World?" I certainly do, but I don't have a way to rip vinyl to a file. I also have the "Well Oh Well" flexi that came in No Magazine. xp

M@tt, a buddy of mine was their drummer. I've heard tales of things in the vault, but that vault is guarded like Fort Knox and I've never been able to hear them. The single, the flexi and the cuts on Big Hits III are all I know of.

If you just want to hear them immediately:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fYkPx-Qf9U
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HQES_nbFlE

thank you!! yeah those are the ones on my waitlist

WANTLIST

is there anything else from NNB that's been issued or in bootlegs?

Big Hits of Mid-America, Volume 3 has Listen and Uruguay 1983. Was going to say that should be reasonable, but no, nothing is reasonable anymore ($80 on discogs).

A friend took guitar lessons in Faribault from Mark Freeman, when the friend was at Carleton. Freeman used to show up at Yo La Tengo shows to hang out with Ira and Georgia..

^ re NNB

discogs suggests my collection is worth a lot more than our house is. good thing it's (the collection) uninsured.

cool awesome info dan and bulb

i have big hits of midamerica bought in back in college in the 90s when it was still pretty easy to find around minneapolis - did not know about the flexi disc, obv slack is a classic single

i was hoping that they might have an unreleased album or EP in the vaults, but sounds like it won't come out either way. do you know why they are so secretive?

also "Land of the Free" off Midamerica by Curtiss A & the Commandos as Buzz Barker is one of the great Minneapolis songs.

I've just heard that Mark is an extreme perfectionist, and most of what they recorded did not meet his exacting standards for release. Plus, it created a mystique!

There is an NNB bootleg from the Longhorn that has made the rounds. I've never heard it.

http://luckypsychichut.blogspot.com/2009/12/nnb-taste-of-nnb.html

That matches what I've heard about Mark. IIRC he also has attached big dollar expectations when people have inquired about issuing stuff.

He also had Red House, who put out a good single:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cnSNEymcd_8

Curious question and one that feels difficult to answer. It would depend on how much I needed cash at any given time. Selling the whole collection also feels a bit abstract. I would guess that every CD I own has a "price", mind?

GREAT single! Since this thread has derailed to an NNB thread I'll post this (again, I'm sure I've done this elsewhere.) I would kill for more of this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUSTH7qMwb4

Good question. I'd probably take $400,000. My collection isn't worth nearly that much in monetary terms (according to Discogs, probably less than a quarter of that), but that'd probably be enough to live on, frugally, for the rest of my life. The only fair trade for me for all of the LPs, cassettes and CDs I've amassed over the last 40+ years, which still bring me a very particular kind of joy, would be to be able pay off my mountains of debt and never have to work a full time job ever again. I'd probably still work part time or volunteer so as not to atrophy. But I'd probably never buy another record or CD.

Then again, if an actual person walked in here right now and dropped a briefcase on my desk containing, say, $75,000 in cash in exchange for the whole shebang, I'd be lying if I said I wouldn't be tempted.

Once after going to too many estate sales and obsessing about death and the image of a bunch of rubes pawing through my precious possessions for pennies on the dollar, I sat my wife down and urgently tried to give her a thumbnail idea of what to do with the collection if I should unexpectedly predecease her - who to call, whos honest, whos not, how to sell it as a lot for the most money & the least effort. She found the conversation extremely creepy and depressing & I'm pretty sure tuned me out immediately. She was right to.

the last time I asked this, my store-owner friends gave me an estimate that was around 10 cents to the dollar in terms of Discogs median. that's a hard pass from me.

lol my wife would cart it all to Savers in a heartbeat. Luckily one of our best friends runs a record store. xp

just heard from friend this morning that I'd fallen out of touch with. he's ill and wants to give friends his various possessions, including his record collection (he was a key influence on my jazz listening). tough day.

my daughters have the bug, to some extent, but they'd only want a small part of the collection. I've let my wife know which friends to go to (though I have to always remind her not to go to one friend who's a record shark).

NYCNative's pitch catches the key detail: would never want to deal with the work of selling piece by piece.

(sorry, too embarrassed to get into numbers)

My version of Big Hits is for sale on discogs for a c-note