2657 Productions News

I sold my hardcore soul the other day… for cheap.

Actually, all I did was sell off the majority of my 7” records, but in a way, that action can be seen as giving up my hardcore soul—more so than if I had sold some of my hardcore albums or CDs.

So far, I don’t miss them, and I don’t regret what I did, but it did get me thinking about the “scene” and all the history and all the bands that played and all the music I bought and all the people I met during that time.

The 7”s were a huge part of all of this, and during the time I was heavily invested in the scene, I probably bought about 600 to 700 7”s. They were cheap. They were small. They were short. They came with stickers and patches. They came on colored vinyl. They were limited. Oh yeah, did I mention they were cheap? So cheap that often, it wasn’t a question about if I should buy them, but rather, why shouldn’t I buy them.

These are just a small selection of the reasons that these 7”s held to much attraction.

My room at that time was set up such that, from my desk, I had very easy access to both my 7”s and my record player. So, the short length of music they contained did not bother me. Hours spent doing homework were often broken up with my frequent flipping and changing of the records.

In addition to that, there was always the question of storing these records. Unlike tapes, CDs and LPs, 7”s don’t have a spine, so they had to be stored in a way that you could flip through them. For most people, those with a collection of one hundred or so, a shoe-box worked out great. I couldn’t stand the idea of storing my records in shoe-boxes. It would be an insult to the records themselves. No, I made special, heavy wooden boxes that almost got too heavy once the records were put in them. When I outgrew those, I made custom cardboard boxes for the bands I had multiple 7”s by, effectively making my own, private boxed sets. These could then be stored on a standard bookshelf with a labeled spine. Ultimately, I bought one of those old 1960s-1970s home entertainment centers. It was one of the ones that had the built-in speakers and a covered top compartment that opened to reveal a record player, a radio, and an 8-track player. Since nothing actually worked, I gutted out the whole thing and converted it to storage. On the bottom, I had a shelf for big art-books and LPs. The top compartment was dedicated to my 7” collection.

I think that, although this was the best storage for my 7”s, this manner of storing them also helped me to “let go” of my attachment to them. You see, I have this habit of piling flat surfaces high with other junk. Needless to say, with a lid that I could close, and the desire to keep my records safe, once the lid was closed, it was only a matter of days before access to my 7”s became an incredibly inconvenient task.

Then, when I had to move, I made a resolution to thin out my collection. I started by getting rid of the emo stuff on Ebay, and for each sale, I stuck in a 7” that I knew I would never succeed in selling. That got the collection down to 475 records or so. I also gave away quite a few.

At some point, I ended up still holding on to about 350 records or so. These records contained quality music, but most of it was so obscure that I knew I would have a hard time selling most of it, even on Ebay.

So, when a record store opened up, dedicated to punk and hardcore and staffed by people who actually had heard about and seen a lot of the bands I still had, I decided to make an offer to them. (Of course, even with my resolve to sell my collection, I still had to weed through it and set aside the records I couldn’t bear parting with—mostly the 7”s by local bands and friends.) They accepted my offer and bought my hardcore soul, for cheap. But I think both parties are happy, and all is well…