That was me in the mid-late 2000’s until my first child arrived in 2009.
I haven’t bought many CDs in the last 5 years (maybe 10) and Spotify is my gateway to music. I now look back on my DVD film collection as something I “must” re-visit…I probably won’t as most are now in boxes in the garage and I can get them on Netflix or Amazon Prime.
My CD jewel cases were discarded many years ago and the discs and inserts placed in plastic wallets. These are now all stored in the loft but accessible immediately if an old album needs revisiting and played in the car. This happens maybe once a month!
So most of my £50 is now spent on streaming with a poorer sound quality.
I am going back to my CDs!
minibreakfast says
A few vinyl LPs perhaps.
Or just one if shopping in HMV.
Rigid Digit says
Exclusively physical product for me.
Most purchases from Amazon, but still do a Record Shop splurge every so often.
Since Amazon changed their Postage thresholds, I have become the “just over £20 bloke”.
Not giving up on physical product (dinosaur!), but I have piles …
of CDs and DVDs and no shelf space left
Baron Harkonnen says
Space? Same here, I’ve been juggling books about this last week to create more CD/Box Set shelf space. I have managed to do so but unless I win the Lotto my collecting days may be over or it’s one in – one out. A move I’ve had to adopt with my LPs. Quicksilver Records in Southport are due new stock very soon from myself.
Max the Dog says
That’s me as well, Mr. Digit. 20-25 of your English pounds gets free shipping to Ireland as well. Occasional purchase in my local independent retailer just to encourage him to keep his doors open. Waiting patiently for one of the offspring to get married and free up a room that I can dedicate to family* entertainment. No sign of it as yet…
*My vinyl collection has been in the attic for many years now
craig42blue says
Hi Baron Do you also use Legacy records in Southport?
Baron Harkonnen says
I`m not sure Craig, I did go to another `floor to ceiling` shop in Southport 2-3 times. The problem was the guy had so much stuff it was really difficult packed tight on the shelves. The LPs that I did buy were in good condition and the guy sold them cheap. Checking on Google maps the shop was off Tulketh Street on the same side as the multi-storey car park.
Edit: I`ve just checked and this is Legacy Records. I was told it was shut but it still has a presence on the WWW. Do you have more info on this? Because the next time I go to Southport, if it`s open I`ll call in.
I didn`t know about Quicksilver until about 3/4 years ago. I was a support worker in Ormskirk and one of the guys I supported was a music fan and on my first shift with him he asked could we go. It was he who took me to Legacy Records. Up to that time I used to go with the darlin` wife to Southport so she could shop and I didn`t know about Legacy & Quicksilver. I didn`t even know Southport had an HMV! All those walks up and down Lord Street when I could have been in those places. Turned out OK in the end.
craig42blue says
Yes, Legacy Records is the new name for GT Records (I think) which is now run by the son of George the original owner – shop opens 4 days a week or so. I think following George’s passing it was closed for a while until his son (a very helpful chap) re-opened it, in the same location as you recall.
Baron Harkonnen says
Thanks for that, I will definitely call in next time I’m by the seaside.
The Good Doctor says
Oh man I’ve been in that Legacy Shop before the owner passed away. There were library shelves crammed with records, no genre splits but everything in strict alphabetical order and no real separation between Charity Shop junk and more valuable stuff so Val Doonican occupying several inches next to the Doors and Bob Dylan etc. Not a problem except there were also great towering stacks of records laid horizontally, meaning you couldn’t get pretty much past the letter R without excavating your way through. Been in since the new guy has taken over, friendly fella and seemed like he was getting it a bit more organised so maybe it’s easier to get around in there.
Been to similar shops like Drumbeat in Chorley (nothing priced and seemingly half the stock out of reach unless you can lift huge towers of stuff out of the way) and one in Nottingham I forget the name of with heaps of carrier bags stuffed full of old vinyl. They’re more like walking into the house of a compulsive hoarder than a music retail shop- not for the faint-hearted.
Quicksilver by complete contrast is very pleasant and much more relaxing place for a browse. The stock errs very much on the 70s rock side but he usually has some good, reasonably priced stuff.
garyt says
That sounds a bit like Backbeat Records in Edinburgh. The couple of times I’ve been there the amount of stock, and the random way it is stacked just made the whole effort more bother than it was worth.
Baron Harkonnen says
Same, but it’s probably £75-100 about every 3 months when physically shopping as opposed to clicking buttons on Amazon at least once a week.
Streaming, fans of this medium are welcome to it, I hope I never have to resort to it but you never know.
DrewToo says
Spends $9.99 a month on Apple Music streaming – and a small fortune on the data package to play pretty much anything , anytime anywhere.
Seriously I can access “my music” collection and I can check out pretty much any new music I can think of – and most of it is accessesed on WiFi so no real cost. Physical product – whatever…….
ip33 says
I did spend £90+ in Fopp Nottingham on Saturday but I don’t get to one very often. Plus a fair amount in Resident Brighton every couple of weeks and the occasional Amazon buy. We do have a Spotify account which is £15pw. I’m still mostly physical and like above I’m running out of space but I have plans!
Uncle Wheaty says
You spend £15 per week on Spotify!
What are the extras?
ip33 says
When I chose an artist to listen to they actually come round our house. I’ll tell you that Sufjan is a messy bugger.
Moose the Mooche says
Tell me about it. That McLaughlin feller’s guitar swept all the porcelain figurines off me corbel shelf….. They were hand-crafted, and only another 39 payments to go! *sobs*
RedLemon says
Still Spotify mostly, but since i bought a new CD player for the old hi-fi that really sounds so much better than MP3s, I’ve started buying CDs again and playing FLAC sources.
retropath2 says
£24 a month to e-music (= about 5 or 6 CDs) Probably between 1 and 5 random amazon purchases monthly, tho’ now more often marketplace (or discogs) as less bothered by being the first owner. Had a quieter few months as being buying more live tickets than usual.
As an older reader I recall the drought of the child rearing years. It passes.
mikethep says
I’d spend it on lunch for me and Mrs thep. As previously noted, all my sounds arrive up the pipe from Spotify or TuneIn Radio and I’m quite happy with that. I’ve long ago accepted that I don’t have the sort of platinum ear drivers you need to tell the difference.
I’ve just moved into a flat for the first time since 1979 and I’m unsure about sound levels – I can certainly hear upstairs’s radio from 5am. So I suspect that music will have to be kept at the softly burbling level from now on. To that end I’m going to buy one of these when it’s launched:
https://www.sonos.com/en-gb/shop/beam.html
It’ll obviously transform the tv, which certainly needs it, but I can stream music through it too. Job done.
While I’m on the subject of musical convenience, I’ve just bought one of these for Music While You Cook:
About the size of a small tin of beans, and sounds amazing for its size and price, certainly compared to the speakers on the phone. Feels very solid and weighty.
minibreakfast says
I spent £20 on music yesterday, but did get a whopping thirty records for it. Here are nine of them:
mikethep says
Did the t-shirt come with them?
minibreakfast says
It was from this guy’s shop: https://www.redbubble.com/people/unloveablesteve
mikethep says
That’s a groovy collection. I wonder what (if anything) he does about copyright?
Mavis Diles says
I’m in!!!
Sewer Robot says
🎵Get yer bush trimmed!
Get yer f**king bush trimmed!🎵
Moose the Mooche says
That’s no bush. Her Morrissey impression has gone too far.
At least the hearing aid is obscured.
Moose the Mooche says
“One man walking on gravel”…. they don’t write ’em like that any more. My karaoke banger since you ask.
minibreakfast says
You should see some of the track titles on the library LPs I got from the same stall: Policy Statement! Optimum Output! Royal Entrance! Spooning! Work Study!
Talk about a party.
mikethep says
In certain circles, if you’re lucky, spooning may well lead to the royal entrance.
fentonsteve says
Was it cold in Suffolk?
minibreakfast says
No, hot, which is why I’m holding a giant fan made of LPs.
TrypF says
Since going freelance a year and a half ago, I’m having a more interesting time – and a life much less full of f*ckwits – but am living on quite a bit less. Stuff like new music and clothes have to be carefully rationed, but I’ve found all kinds of random stuff in charity and junk shops. A recent trawl round Oxfam in Godalming brought me:
No Dice by Badfinger (CD) – brand new
Almond Tea by Pugwash (CD) – very rare indeed these days, and signed by singer Thomas Walsh
Here Come the Rattling Trees by the High Llamas (CD) – not their best, but I’m a completist
Repeat When Necessary by Dave Edmunds (CD) – the one with all the hits on
House of Fools Series 1 (DVD) – not as funny as I remember but…
All this for a fiver. This is my life for the time being, and I’m perfectly happy with it.
Twang says
I still buy physical if it’s a band I really like, and especially at gigs where I know the dosh goes straight in the atist’s pocket, but I do use Spotty to listen to stuff I don’t know…and then occasionally I’ll buy it. I too have a space problem and also I’m a bit overwhelmed with all the stuff I have acquired – we have a decent sized house and it is rammed, every room heaving with stuff. I had a major clear out a few years ago and I have another one in mind now, just writing this.
Leicester Bangs says
1.) Person A visits record fair in Leamington Spa. Despite the fact that he has a somewhat recalcitrant nine-year-old in tow, he nevertheless spends £43 on albums by U-Roy, Prince Jammy, Grace Jones and The Damned.
2.) There was a blue Loveless that niggles at him. He feels he should have bought it. He knows it was a bootleg, but even so… wouldn’t it be it great to have Loveless on vinyl?
3.) At home, under the influence of lager, he finds the blue Loveless on eBay and buys it, and now the collection will be complete.
4.) Wait, there was also a Linton Kwesi Johnson album he had his eye on at the record fair, Bass Culture. What he really wants, though, is LKJ in Dub. Let’s go see if someone has that, because then the collection really *will* be complete…
Repeat till fade.
duco01 says
LKJ in Dub and LKJ in Dub vol.3 are both excellent. With those, the Bangs collection will be complete. Probably.
Leicester Bangs says
Excellent, thanks, Duco. I ended up ordering an anthology where the dub versions are played after the standard version. I’m a huge discomix fan so this is my preferred way to hear them.
The Good Doctor says
You can buy Loveless, as painstakingly remastered from the tapes by rock’s least hurried man – Kevin Shields on 2×12″ Vinyl version direct from the band in lovely thick card gatefold sleeve very reasonable £21.
https://www.mybloodyvalentine.org/shop/PhysicalDetails?pid=MBV_PH_4
It’s not blue though.
Leedsboy says
In the main I spend £15 on a family apple music subscription. £8 on Netflix and I have have Amazon Prime as well (but that’s as much for the delivery as the streaming although the streaming alone is good value). I have an Audible subscription so that’s another £8 per month. I buy books mostly for my Kindle but some physical – normally cookery or reference type books.
I guess that leaves about a tenner. Or a pint as we call it down south.*
Things I no longer do – buy magazines, by physical product, buy band t shirts, buy dvd’s or buy newspapers.
* only joking – it’s two pints.
ip33 says
Have you tried Readly for Mags? Recommended by various brilliant people on here, it’s probably saved me hundreds in the year or so I’ve been on board.
mikethep says
Me too. What I enjoy most, however, is virtually leafing through mags that I would never have bought in a million years in a newsagent, eg cookery mags.
If only Private Eye was on there my life would be complete. They don’t have a tablet version though.
Leedsboy says
I have tried it – I didn’t really get on with it. I think I tend to read via websites now rather than magazines. Not sure if that’s a good thing…
Tiggerlion says
I’m rather proud of the fact that, at my age, I’m still a physical kind of guy.
duco01 says
Re: “I’m still a physical kind of guy”
Yeah, absolutely. Me too.
I spent 40 minutes yesterday evening listening to two formats of Joni Mitchell’s “Blue” which were playing simultaneously as an LP and a CD on the duco01 stereophonic high fidelity system. I kept switching back and forth between the two of them to gauge and appreciate the differences in sound. If I carry on like this, I’ll be able to qualify for some of the Steve Hoffman board’s audiophile threads.
attackdog says
Out of interest Mr duco how did the two sources compare i.e. analogue/digital. Those a/b comparisons still fascinate me (yes I know, what a bore, etc,).
I am still very much a physical product type – CD’s only now following a comment on here which contrasted vinly/CD’s by describing them quite simply a ‘different’. Both good, but different. How true.
Latest conquest Tom Petty, Full Moon Fever, £1, Scope in Knaresborough. Yay.
Tony Japanese says
Over the last couple of weeks I have lovingly provided a new home to the following albums:
Steely Dan – Can’t Buy a Thrill
Big Star – Number 1
Leonard Cohen – Songs of Love and Hate
Marvin Gaye – Let’s Get It On
Stevie Wonder – Innervisions
New York Dolls – New York Dolls
Joni Mitchell – Court and Spark
Isley Brothers 3+3
Richard and Linda Thompson – I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight
Black Sabbath – Paranoid
Sparks – Kimono My House
Genesis – Selling England By The Pound
Funkadelic – Maggot Brain
Randy Newman – Sail Away
Lou Reed – Berlin
Grateful Dead – American Beauty
The Kinks – Arthur..
All bought second-hand for a total of less than £50. I am considering subscribing to Spotify, but only as a means to roadtest albums I’m thinking about buying. It get’s annoying when trying to listen to ‘The Who Sell Out’ for example, only to have adverts every couple of tracks…
Twang says
Some cracking albums there.
Tiggerlion says
As time goes by I’m more and more convinced that Sail Away is the most perfect album ever made.
Twang says
You know, I love a good songwriter. But I have a blind spot to RN. Just can’t get on with his voice, and that slightly show tune vibe. I will try SA as a gateway drug.
Tony Japanese says
I’ve just listened to ‘Good Old Boys’ this morning for the first time, and I’m not sure if the opening track is enough to put me off the record. Apart from those two albums, I’ve only ever known him as Pixar’s go to guy. His voice has never bothered me though.
Tiggerlion says
I can understand that. However, the songs on Sail Away are so perfectly formed, that doleful, ordinary Joe kind of voice brings out the best in them. ‘You give me reason to live’ aches with crushing loneliness, for example, not a hint of joy. He plays the weird perv with such satisfying humanity, we can all relate to him, indeed sympathise. Even the slave trader in the title track comes across as a stand up kind of guy, despite the snake oil charm and bare-faced lies. It’s quite a trick to pull off.
SteveT says
Randy Newman on form might be the best living songwriter. ‘I think its going tyo rain today’ is just beautiful however my favourite Randy Newman album is Land of Dreams. In particular ‘I just want you to hurt like I do’.
Brilliant.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Sail Away is indeed Perfect Perfection
Mavis Diles says
Well, I appreciated the irony about The Who Sell Out – well played sir!
duco01 says
Aha! I’ve just got it now. Ha!
Moose the Mooche says
Would have worked with Sigue Sigue Sputnik’s Flaunt It! as well.
SteveT says
On Saturday I met up with Baron Harkonnen and our mate Stebbers in Manchester. Between us we spent close on £200 on cd’s, dvd’s and books.
When I got home there was a further delivery from Amazon and another one today. So yes still physical for me every time.
I console myself with the fact that as an ex smoker my weekend purchases were still less than a weeks worth of fags.
Mike_H says
Mostly a physical product guy. Not interested in the financial outlay to go vinyl, though.
My Kamasi Washington “Heaven and Earth” triple CD was delivered by Amazon this morning.
I spent £50 at the merch table last night at Jah Wobble’s gig at the Half Moon. The nice merch lady gave me a £7 bulk-buy discount for 4 CDs (one a double) and a shirt. Wobble signed one CD too.
I spent £15 on Saturday at the Daylight Music merch table. A CD and a CD-EP from Swedish singer/guitarist Malin Andersson.
I often go for several weeks without buying anything at all.
Vulpes Vulpes says
I just save up all my £50s these days until that bastard @ColinH posts something on here, whereupon I usually have to blow the lot.
Mike_H says
There are a few of those Usual Suspects on here who can make money vanish from my bank account.
ip33 says
After visiting this emporium last week streaming seemed to be the way forward!
ip33 says
And if you collect China? It’s the place for you as well.
Moose the Mooche says
Horizontally stacked vinyl is Satan’s handiwork.
Unless it’s on an autochanger.
Vulpes Vulpes says
What the fuck were you doing in our spare room?
ip33 says
Collect China as well, do you?
Moose the Mooche says
That is not a china collection. Tis a china crisis.
Uncle Wheaty says
The £50 guy he looks old now.
Yeah, but he is still here HP!
Twang says
Like Leeds we have Netflix, Prime (mainly for delivery so the TV is free bunce), Spotify and in theory BTSport with the broadband though I’ve never bothered trying to get it to work as I’m not really interested. I buy lots of books from Amazon Marketplace, generally for 1p which is pretty much a bargain.