Time to Get Organized (Part 2)

The Taming of the 45’s

In my quest to collect the Top 100 songs from each year in mp3 form for my iPod, I began to buy old 45 rpm records as an inexpensive way to get content. At the time I began buying them, 45’s could be obtained at garage sales and flea markets for around 50 cents apiece or less. I would check my “reference book” to see if I needed that particular title, take it home, convert it to mp3 form and toss it into a box or bin to be dealt with later.

Sometimes I would buy many records at one time and occasionally I would take a chance and buy a batch of records in bulk in the hope that there would be titles I needed hidden within. Usually the cost, per record, would be very cheap if I could negotiate a price for an entire lot, rather than just buy a few. Sure, by buying in bulk I was taking a chance of not finding the titles I needed and some of the records purchased this way were unplayable for one reason or another: deep scratches; warped; cracked and/or chipped; and even unexplainable substances fused or dried on (yuck!). However, I generally made out pretty well finding songs I needed.

I had received a Crosley record cleaning kit as a birthday present which made cleaning LP’s and 45’s really easy. I was amazed at how dusty, dirty, ugly looking 45’s would clean up nicely and sound so good after being so neglected for so long.

Often, amongst the records I didn’t “need”, I found many songs that I knew and liked and so I cleaned them up and converted them to mp3’s as well. Sometimes I would find a record that had something unique about it, like colored vinyl, or a song title that caught my attention, or an artist I wanted the hear more from, or any number of things that made me want to keep it. Soon I found I was “keeping” more and more of these records and for reasons that will be discussed in a future post, I was falling in love with the 45 rpm format. I decided I wanted to create a collection of records rather than a pile of records.

This meant I needed a system to safely store and catalog the records. A system that not only protected the records themselves, but also made them accessible and organized. The first thing I needed to do was get the records out of the tubs and boxes that they were currently piled in and get them into protective sleeves and more suitable storage containers.

A lot of the records I had were in some sort of sleeve, whether it be a record label sleeve or some plain paper sleeve. Most times if they were in a record label sleeve they were mismatched, meaning an RCA record might be in a Columbia record sleeve. Wherever possible, I wanted to reunite each record with it’s appropriate sleeve. Some of my records had what I call “generic” sleeves meaning paper sleeves with no graphics or identifying marks whatsoever. Some of these were white, some were colored green, some were like brown paper bag material, not very uniform. The best case scenario was finding records that were in a “picture sleeve”. Picture sleeves generally have photos of the artist or graphics that compliment the record and usually have the name of he song(s) identified on the sleeve. However, the vast majority of my 45’s had no sleeves at all and as such were at greater risk for scratches, abrasions and breakage.

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So, to remedy this I first began trying to match record label sleeves to the correct record. This would seem like it should be pretty easy, but alas was not and continues to be a problem for me even today. If a Columbia record (for instance) was already in a Columbia sleeve I would assume that it was a correct match that had survived the ravages of time and I would leave it as such. However, if the record and sleeve were mismatched I would separate them and try to find a match. This is where trouble ensued. You see there are so many variations of sleeves within each company it is near impossible to find the exact sleeve in which a particular record was originally sold. I did research to see if there was information somewhere that explained which type of record might be housed in which type of sleeve, but I haven’t found any such database of information yet. I was finding out, however, that certain sleeves might be used for certain genres within the company. I also found out that sleeve graphics changed over time and that sleeves from the 50’s were vastly different from sleeves of the 70’s. I even believe that sleeves were different depending on where the records were manufactured. It may even boil down to the fact that this record, produced at this pressing plant was put into this sleeve simply because it was what they had on hand at the time! Needless to say, I do the best I can.

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The variations of “generic” sleeves was not real pretty either. Those that were ripped, or stained or otherwise, I threw out. This left even more records unprotected. I decided that for these I would settle on white generic sleeves and began to search the internet for where I could buy them. I came across a company called “Sleeve City“. They have a wide variety of sleeves for vinyl available. They have the white sleeves I was looking for, they have clear plastic anti-static sleeves, they have combination paper/plastic lined sleeves, they have plastic “outer” sleeves, etc. etc. But I found out they also have storage boxes as well – which solved my next problem – what to store these 45’s in!

Just like the sleeves they offer, they have a variety of storage solutions for 7″, 10″ and 12″ vinyl records. I settled on their 15″ x 8″ x 8″ white corrugated cardboard boxes. They seemed sturdy and were reasonably priced and could hold up to 150 records per box. I placed my order for 100 sleeves (2 packs of 50 each) and a half a dozen boxes. (Note: this is not a paid ad for Sleeve City, they are simply a company I like to do business with.)

While I was waiting for my shipment to arrive, I began to ponder how I wanted to organize my 45’s. Did I want to separate them by genres, or artists or some other criteria? It finally dawned on me to use the criteria that got me into his “glorious mess” in the first place – The Top 100 Songs from each year! I would bundle the top songs from each year together in order from 1-100. Since the Boxes I ordered would hold up to 150 records each I would eventually have approximately 1 box per year. Perfect! The rest of the records that I wanted to keep, I would organize alphabetically by Artist or Group like I did with my 12″ LP’s. (I might reconsider this down the road and start separating them by genres – we’ll see.)

Since my collection was not complete enough to have one box for each year I would need some sort of dividers to place between records of different years in the same box. I again went back to Sleeve City to see if they had something like this and though they did, it wasn’t quite what I envisioned so I decided to make my own. I am pretty good with publishing software and began creating dividers with tabs for each year that I would be collecting, and alphabetic tabs for the other records I would be keeping. It’s at this point that my enthusiasm for the project (to the casual observer) began to run away with me.

I asked myself, what if each divider also listed each of the titles I needed for that year with a check box to mark when the title was obtained? I went back to the “drawing board” and came up with a format to fit each title on the divider in order of it’s ranking and this is the result:

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Cool! Right? I created one for each year from 1955 to 1993. I also created one for the Top 100 Christmas Songs (a genre that I also like to collect). And I created some that listed records that are in The Top 5000 Songs of the Rock Era (through 2006) that are not in the Top 100 of each year. Wait! Whaaaaaaaat?! Let me explain:

As you will recall, this entire journey pretty much started when I bought a book entitled "Billboard's Hottest Hot 100 Hits" by Fred Bronson, 4th Edition. (My "reference book")  Not only does this book list the Top 100 songs from each year from 1956 to 2006 (the book was published in 2007) it also contains other lists like Top Songs by Artist, Top Songs by Categories, Top Songs by Record Label, and more.  It also contains the Ultimate List - The Top 5000 Songs of the Rock Era (up to that point).  Now you're probably saying wait a minute 1956 to 2006 is 50 years; if there are 100 top songs in each year, that's 5000 songs!  How can there be songs in the top 5000 that aren't in the top 100 of their year?  Well, keep in mind that even though a song is in the Top 100 for a particular year, it may not perform as well when compared to all of the songs of the Era.  For instance:  according to the criteria used for the book, only 1 thru 96 of the Top 100 Songs of 1982 make the cut for the Top 5000, the other 4 songs ranked lower than # 5000.  Conversely, some songs that were not included in the Top 100 of their year ranked within the Top 5000 when compared to all of the songs as a whole. In other words, some years had less than 100 songs in the Top 5000 and some years had more.

And so, my friends, I just had to include these titles in my “impossible quest”!

Oh, but the madness didn’t stop there! During all of this time I would highlight the songs I had collected in my “reference book”. I would flip through the pages time and again to find the titles I needed. I would cart it with me on “picks” so that I wouldn’t buy duplicate titles. Over time it became worn and fell apart! It’s now in three separate pieces with some loose single pages as well. It’s too frail and worn to be able to withstand this type of treatment any longer. Unfortunately, it’s also now out of print. I tried to find a copy online and there are some available, but the prices are outrageous! I think I paid $24.99 for my original book at the bookstore, the lowest online price I’ve found so far is around $40 for one in poor condition and over $100 for good condition. (Remember, I’m cheap!)

So I decided to recreate the Top 5000 list so I could print it on loose-leaf paper to carry with me in a three-ring binder. I created a simple database listing the Top 5000 songs in order from 1 to 5000 and also the songs in the top 100 from each year that are not in the top 5000. And while I was at it, I included check boxes to indicate whether I had each particular title as an mp3, in 45 rpm format and if I had the picture sleeve. This took me a very long time to create! Once it was finished, I used the database program to sort the list alphabetically by artist, or group (to make it easier to find any particular title), so that I could print it out as my new “reference”. The finished project was 210 pages printed front and back. Here is how it looks:

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Now, you would think that everything was in place to keep this project moving along: I had records; I had protective sleeves; I had storage containers; I had a way to keep track of songs I did and didn’t have; I had a way to organize the physical records in their storage boxes. I had done it- right?! There was nothing left to do but keep searching for records, bring them home and put them in their rightful place – right?! WRONG!

I’m a sucker for technology. If there is a gadget that makes something easier to do (i.e. my Crosley record cleaning kit), or if there is a computer program that can help, I’m all about it! During all of this activity there was something gnawing at the back of my brain. Yes I had organized my LP’s. Yes, I was well on my way to organizing my 45’s. However, I also had a sizeable number of CD’s, I even have some old cassettes lying around. Was there any way to pull all of this together into one database that would allow me to know what I had and be able to locate it by different means (artist name, song title, catalog #, etc.)? A way to record where I found a particular item, how much I paid for it and when I bought it? A way to record other information relevant to a particular record? Wouldn’t it be great to tie all of my music together in one nice, neat package? Then, one day I found it! I was surfing around the internet and I typed in something like “record collecting software”, and several websites came up. I looked through a lot of them and was mostly unimpressed until I came across a site called “CollectorZ.com”.

Eureka! Here was a software program that would allow me to record all of the information mentioned above and much, much more! It was reasonably priced (less than $50 at the time I think). They even allow you to download the program and catalog up to 100 titles for free! If you decide to buy the program you can use it forever without any further cost or you can purchase a yearly upgrade package that gives you all of the updates that are produced over the year. Updates are constantly being produced that add new features and fix any bugs (I haven’t encountered any). They even have mobile apps for iPhone and Android that are synced with your computer through the “cloud”. This feature has been invaluable to me for records that aren’t in my “reference book” as to whether I already own them or not. (Trust me, after you have collected a certain number of records, it’s hard to remember exactly what you have by brainpower alone!)

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They have a core database that is constantly being updated with titles. You can search their database by catalog #, artist and title, even barcode and add it to your collection. Once you select it, all of the information is downloaded to your database saving a lot of time on data entry. I have encountered only a few records that aren’t in their database (mostly localized artists and labels) but they allow you to enter them and upload them to the core! There is also a lot of flexibility built in as well. There are user defined fields available to track information relevant to you, places to make notes, drop-down lists and more. I highly recommend it! They even have similar software for collecting books, movies (DVD’s, VHS, etc.), comic books and more! (Again, not a paid advertisement just a great program I use.)

Now that all of the elements are in place, here is how my process works:

1. Go out picking
2. Check my 3 ring binder list or my mobile app. to see if selected records are needed for my collection.
3. Buy the records and take them home.
4. Clean the records.
5. Convert the records to mp3’s, if needed.
6. Download the mp3’s to iTunes and place in proper playlist(s).
7. Enter the record into Collectorz.com Music Collector software.
8. Check the record off in my Top 5000 database and on the divider in the storage box.
9. Place the 45 in the proper location within the storage box.

Oh the feeling of satisfaction as I place each record in it’s correct spot! My collection is under control. I am able to look up titles that I need (or already own) out in the field or at home and I can physically find them when I want to play them. My records are protected and organized. Clutter has been reduced, if not eliminated. I know when I got, where I got, and how much I paid for, most of my records. Matrimonial harmony has been preserved. There’s nothing better! In short – I’m a happy collector!

Tune in next time when I’ll explain just what it is about 45’s that makes me love them so!

Until then . . .

Keep It In The Groove!