58 Comments on Spotlight: The World’s Largest Record Collection
Leave a comment
Recent Comments
Sweater Curse, 39 comments
- Leonardo: - The Lancet and Nature peer-reviewed that poll and found out...
- SlashV: Actually Molly, knitting is an excellent occupation. You should...
- LivingForLOL: I’m never gonna make a sweater!
- retardedmonkeyspoo: It sounds like she says Svatika
Balloon Boy (Know Your Meme), 229 comments
- SchoolhouseTechno: I expected a ‘c wat i did there’ at the...
- bearBdamned: whose the first girl in the line of attention seekerS?
Generative Music, 139 comments
- GERdeathstar: Ellie > Molly
Know Your Meme: Auto-Tune featuring Professor “Weird Al” Yankovic, 2052 comments
- vampireheart1986: I definitely agree. That’s why you don’t...
- MarSilF: NICE!!!
- MarSilF: LOL
No longer available, again? That’s really fast, what time was it posted?
Oh..now I see, you can also click ‘quicktime’ and still watch it, but apparently Youtube’s dead.
It’s a real shame. This man has single-handedly set up a musicologist’s dream and it’s unbelievable that there are no takers. You’d think a major record label would open up a museum to feature this fine collection or some wealthy rock group would do so. Hey Mick, Bowie, ZZ Top (one of them is a real musicologist). Give this collection a HOME…
I have over 2,000 vinyl albums, so I have some inkling of this man’s pride in his collection. It is sad that music’s place in today’s culture should really go by a different name. It is not music anymore. More like “concoctions” with a beat. I hope that he finds his collection a home.
I wish I had the $ for this. If I did, I would seriously look into it. I’d love to see this music digitized and republished.
I agree Drew, that would be great way for people to listen to the music, since vinyl is easily scratched, but it would be nice to be able to look at the actual album covers, read the liner notes, etc. That would be a treat for real music lovers. I can’t believe that some University hasn’t jumped at the chance to house this massive collection of musical history. (hint, hint)
Oh and have an in-house listening room handled by a group of turntable specialists so the actual recording could be heard. There’s nothing that compares to the sound of vinyl.
Neil ain’t home right now but I’ve emailed him…I think he can afford it!
@kam: http://www.thegreatestmusiccollection.com/index.html is the official site.. I heard rumours that it had been sold at last, but it’s not mentioned on the site.
Thanks for that site.
http://www.thegreatestmusiccollection.com/what_sasuitablehome.html
Boy me and this guy think alike, I wonder if he’ll trade for a Mr. Potato Head I have…
Kam, keep bugging Neil.
Simply amazing. What a collection! I’m sure that someone who has the $$$ will come along and buy it for the right price - it’s too much of a collection to be ignored. Maybe the Smithsonian, they have a large music library already. . . . . . .
Good luck and good listening. I’d love to hear some of that library for sure!
http://nationalpsychologist.com/articles/art_v16n2_2.htm
Hi. I’d like to first post a snippet of words from the above link, then add a comment or two. I don’t know how to make a quote block with smaller fonts here, so I’ll simply say BEGIN QUOTE:
‘The motivations to collect’
Why do we collect things…? Some people collect for investment…for pure enjoyment… to expand their social lives, attending swap meets…to preserve the past, but there can be risk here.
For some people collecting is simply the quest, in some cases a life-long pursuit that is never complete. Additional collector motivations include psychological security, filling a void in a sense of self. …
For some, the satisfaction comes from experimenting with arranging, re-arranging, and classifying parts of a-big-world-out-there, which can serve as a means of control to elicit a comfort zone in one’s life, e.g., calming fears, erasing insecurity.
…compulsive buying is thought to be influenced by a range of cognitive domains including deficits in decision-making,…
END QUOTE. That last sentence is important. Deficits in decision making do, I truly believe, inspire someone to buy and collect large amounts of something (which they then control decisively, solely). That woman whom I assume is his wife referred to their basement as “my basement”. It follows from her choice of language that she may have been the decision maker in that family, including telling him what to name his new record store.
So now, pushing age 70, he wants to sell this collection. I don’t believe that he really does want to yet. Sorry. Every corpse in every graveyard everywhere around the world represents a (figurative) lifetime collection of one kind or another that never fully got appreciated nor assimilated onward.
It strikes me as very odd that capitalistic investors wouldn’t jump at the chance to hammer out a deal with Mr. Mawhinney to digitalize and then make for sale 83% of the world’s unavailable recordings from his collection. Something else is still spinning, sadly, I say.
http://www.beck.com/assets/discobox/content/tracks/Mixed_Bizness.mp3
I am sure that copyright laws still apply to at least 50% of that 83%. And those music business shark lawyers have noses like Scenthounds and would find and destroy you if they saw that you were making a buck off of something that they feel is theirs. They make the Sopranos look like nuns.
I believe that he said from ‘48 to ‘66 which would mean, if I’m not mistaken (but I usually am) that you are right: copylaw rights do still apply. To make something for sale i.e. ‘music-being-republished’ requires, I’m sure, an array of music attorneys practiced at music liscense law. But the point is that someone somewhere does not really want to relinquish control quite yet to the feeding frenzy in the depths below, cha, cha, cha.
I can’t believe I’ve totally done this in a more different way, and I wish I haven’t done it since things are becoming more easier and more simple from using a Macintosh.
I wish I have a MacBook, and I wish for my posts removed.
change your perspective for your ending [enjoi]
And, oh, I just realized I wanted to find out the information about and to get the music on this video as posted on November 25, 2004.
I love this music, I wish I could get it…
http://www.rocketboom.com/rb_04_nov_25/
Thnx!
I hate my life. I’m on a Windows PC, and everything sucks. I have all my stuff I’ve been using for the iPod nano, and everything still sucks with Windows. I wish I have a MacBook. I’ve been on a Windows PC for so long, and now it’s going to be even longer before I get my MacBook. Windows still sucks.
I still hate Windows.
i don’t want so seam mean or anything but you are going off topic (big record collection going 2 waste/junk) and as a side note, with the money for a decent computer (dual core++) u can get a mac book… and if u hate windows so much install MacOS on yur computer (yes u can do that) or Linux in any case no games… and windows despite it’s bugz is the most flexible O.S. i know…
and your life doesn’t suck, your just spending your time wrongly… be more positive
Peace! and have a good life :)
Mike D. Thanks for that link … this week I’ve been pondering what is the psychology of collecting. This was after I handed my Starbucks card to a barista and she proclaimed .. Wow what an old one - you could sell it on Ebay. WTF? She then whipped out her private Starbucks Card collection (about 50 or so on a ring) and I gentleman that I am just oowed and ahhed at it. But I wondered … why do people collect?
A lot of talk about digitizing Mawhinney’s collection … good luck I guess. What would you use to digitize records? I have several hundred LP’s which I want to digitize.I imagine it
will talk several years but I don’t know what machinery I should use (I’m looking towards a
computer hooked up record player/converter.) My problem is when I used LP’s I was always trying to minimize arm weight and optimize the cartridge used. I imagine I can’t do that with the record/player converters available.
Love is the extremely difficult realization that something other than oneself is real. ~Iris Murdoch
Post Script: I never realized that ‘Cetus’ is defined as:
Now I realize.
The sky’s vastness can be such a monsterous and evil all-devouring whale sometimes!
Thanks Mike D. for posting that link. Last week I was astonished when I handed my Starbucks card to a supermarket barista and she proclaimed “Wow what an early card you - can sell it on E-Bay”. WTF? She then whipped out a ring of about 100 Starbucks cards which she had collected. I as my normal gentleman self oohed and ahhhed at the collection. I was wondering about the psychology of collectors.
There has been a lot of chatter here about digitizing Mawhinney’s collection. How would you digitize a record? I have several hundred LP’s which I want to digitize. I realize it will take several years. I would use a LP player that converts to mp3 connected to my PC. My concern is the HIFI nature of the LP Player and how easy it would be to maintain a proper cartridge on it. Any thoughts on hardware to use?
http://www.recordspinner.com/
What an amazing story. If I had the cash I would buy it in a heartbeat.
The guy’s a jerk. I’ve been in his store. He treats most of his customers like pee-ons. It’s no wonder nobody wants to buy his collection. Besides, it’s mostly albums by local and regional groups that never made it out of the Pittsburgh scene to the national level. Very little of it is actually valuable, historically or otherwise.
He knows nothing about history. He knows nothing about preservation. He knows nothing about culture. Did you notice the way he holds his records! Notice how he calls the items in his collection ‘merchandise’. He’s only interested in how much money he can fleece from each and every person he meets.
I’ve heard and seen some pretty sad stuff in my life… as short as it may be… but this is just. . . sick. i agree with Portable Kate on this, yet what’s the point in stockpiling something knowing that you are gonna die some day…. this collection, and as ironic as it may sound, like many other things should be something for the public… idk put it in a museum or something…!!!
Peace!
[...] Here and here (The World’s Largest Record Collection) [...]
I just saw this last night, as we were catching up on things on TiVo. As a transplanted Pittsburgher (gone since ‘90) I was startled to see it. My first reaction was, “Is that the Record Rama in Pittsburgh? You mean they just closed this year?” but ultimately, knowing that the era lasted longer than I thought and yet I missed its passing somehow made me sadder. Anyway, whether the guy is a jerk or not (I lived on the wrong end of town and only made it there a couple of times, so never formed an opinion), and whether collecting is a sign of mental problems or not…the fact is, a lot of museums, not to mention the Library of Congress, started off as someone’s collection. I think it could be argued that the world is a richer place because of those people with “deficits in decision-making,” who have concentrated art, books, antiquities, or whatever and then ultimately made them available for the rest of us to enjoy. And I think the world will be a little poorer if this collection is lost…I saw while I was Googling around on this, though, that Mawhinney had turned down the Heinz Museum, which was interested in the Pittsburgh part of the collection, because he didn’t want to split it up. I actually think splitting it up would be a *good* idea - leave the Pittsburgh part of the collection in Pittsburgh, to be taken in as part of Pittsburgh’s history by the people most interested in it (i.e. Pittsburghers), and then the national part should go someplace, well, national. Maybe the Library of Congress should have a music collection?
Didn’t you sell your collection on Ebay awhile back? Thanks
listen to them?
How can I get in touch with the owner of the archive?
this guy is flipping awesome! Hang on to them, like I’m hanging on to mine!
I suggest you talk to Craig Moore of Records By Mail but the guy below says you sold it. Happy 69th birthday Paul.
he should open a record library!!! i would come in very often and check out records…charge 20 dollars monthly..he’ll make some money that way. if they scratch the record they pay 20-30 dollars. even if they’re rare..
If it’s estimated 2 B worth $50 million, then someone would surely buy it 4 $3 mil. Truth is it’s all the same junk U C on the street in giveaway boxes. American music is crap N E way, same with most European stuff. Turkish & Albanian R the best ;) So COOOL!
It’s so strange that this lil country of 3 million has half the world’s cool songs HAHA - & the other 40% R Turkish. 10% 4 the rest. Not 2 say Turkish is all cool - most of it’s crap, but they been ’round 4 thousands of years.
haha i think not
U say nothing. U R retarded.
it has been scientificly proven that turkish music is the worst in the world
=) Go on clown, listen 2 your slave noise (rap). U act as if I am so pathetic I would care what YOU think is good? That’s like asking an alcoholic or fat diabetic 4 health advice HAHA
The guy should pursue a grant 2 put the archive into a couple shipping containers, send it 2 some 3′rd world sewer, & have the monkeys play them into a computer in OOG lossless format 4 posting on the ‘wayback machine’ site or something. These days U can fit all this inventory into a few cubic feet of hard drives - no biggie.
what that guy has is so amazing. i wish i had what he had.
DAMN, I didn’t realize the store had closed!! arghh! I was going to do a long roadtrip to visit it once in my life.
Has he sold the collection yet?
if i were him i would just keep the vinyl…
thats a stanton str8-80 yo, do your research
ok now i see it mr so damn smart
i was looking at the turntable at the end of the video from a far!!!!
read the stuff at the end
obviously you care or you wouldn’t spend your time on youtube trying to convince people what music sucks.
Bla bla man - everything I say is true & U know it. Go fard your ‘kill-the-messenger’ crap 2 someone who cares.
He sold in on Ebay a few months ago. I went for $3,002,150.00.
That is what it is all about!! In the midst of all those years he had those records he didn’t go for the money, he stayed true to the love of the music and the vinly!!! I hope whomever bought that collection cares for it the way he did!!!
if i won the lottery id buy his collection.
that would be so deadly!
it turned out it was a fake bidder, i think its still for sale
should keeped the shop open people are starting to collect vinyl again
I’ve been collecting since I was 12; am 28 now. …and there are lots out there like me. …Just wanted to say that some never stopped collecting.
I would definitely buy his collection if I had the money.
Poor guy…=[
If i could have one wish could true…..it would be one night with megan fox..but anyway yeah i wish I could just visit his store now that I found out about it