All the Perl that's Practical to Extract and Report

sort @vinyl

domm on 2007-10-02T07:54:40

On Sunday I did something I wanted to do for years: I re-organised my vinyl collection.

My previous 'system' looked something like this:

  • A 'main area' containing all vinyl bought after ~1996, which is mostly new stuff. See here for a list.
  • Another rather big area containing vinyl bought before 1994, which is mostly second hand stuff from the 70's (Deep Purple, King Crimson, Pink Floyd, etc).
  • (From 1994 to 1996 I diverged from the True Medium and bought CDs (you know, this ugly little chunks of polycarbonate, locked in disgusting plastic boxes with way too small cover art))
  • A few classical records I inherited from my grandfather.
  • A few Jazz records
  • A few kids records
  • A few (but quite interesting) spoken word albums (Speeches by JFK, Martin Luther King, Poems read by famous Austrians (Qualtinger++))
  • Some reagge albums
  • Some records from Barbara
  • Some Austropop

One effect of this 'system' was that 'Master of Puppets' was located in the 'before 94' stash, while 'Metallica' (aka The Black Album) was in the other. Which sucked.

The new system has all records (aprox 400) in one big stash, except Classical, Kids and Spoken Word.

Everything is sorted first by alphabet (on whatever letter pops up first, ignoring 'the' and 'DJ', (i.e. Michael Jackson is filed under 'M') and then by release date (i.e. 'The Streets' are filed under 'S', first 'Original Pirate Material', then 'A Grand dont come for free', then 'The hardest way to make an easy living')

7" and 12" are stored in a different place alltogether, but I don't have that many of them anyways (~30 in total)

Next: Put all vinyls into the DB...

sort @vinyl_barbie

barbie on 2007-10-02T12:12:34

If you ever feel moved to do my collection, feel free to come over for a visit. Although I should perhaps note that of vinyl alone there are 1500+ LPs, 1000+ 12" singles, 1500+ 7" singles and probably about 100 10" EPs and LPs. Should keep you occupied for a while ;)

If you wanted to attempt the CDs too, then your probably talking similar numbers for albums and singles.

Re:sort @vinyl_barbie

domm on 2007-10-02T12:28:29

The next time Barbara complains I'm spending too much money on records (which she does very seldomly) I 'll just show her your numbers :-)

How long have you been collecting? And do you have any decent tools to convert vinyl to mp3s? (This is maybe the only advantage of CDs...)

Re:sort @vinyl_barbie

barbie on 2007-10-02T12:57:54

I've been collecting for over 30 years! I started when I was about 10, although the peek of my collecting was from 20-25, when I would go to Leicester for the monthly record fair and visit the 15 second record shops on the way home :)

There was a vinyl ripper I used to use that would take Line-In feeds and convert them to mp3, which was also good for converting my bootleg tapes (I have over 3000 of those, mostly recorded by myself). I can't remember the name of the app, as I haven't used it for a couple of years. Which reminds me I do need to set up the tape deck again to get some more ARK gigs online. My brother has a USB turntable, which I've been meaning to borrow so I can transfer some of the vinyl bootlegs I have. I have a classic Black Sabbath one from the Heaven And Hell tour that I haven't played in years.

Re:sort @vinyl_barbie

domm on 2007-10-02T17:27:15

USB turntable. That sound's interesting...

I think I know what I want for christmas (besides Perl 6...)

Wee Papa Girl Rappers!

grinder on 2007-10-02T13:10:21

Holy Cow! Wee Papa Girl Rappers - The Beat, the Rhyme, the Noise... is ten years old?! It came out in 1988.

Man, what a great track. One of these days I will have to get my own turntable online and start ripping. I have about 600 LPs. Mostly a lot of Australian indie stuff, circa 1980-1990. Bring Philip, Andrew Duffield, Severed Heads, Soggy Porridge, Smash Mac Mac...

One of these days...