Mistakes in production. Changes of heart at record companies. Some of the most valuable vinyl of all time has got that way because someone couldn’t make their mind up.
By now we can all agree that the vinyl ‘revival’ is here to stay. Vinyl will never be a mainstream format again, of course, but if the popularity of Record Store Day (for instance) has taught us anything, it’s that vinyl and the turntable can quite happily coexist alongside the mainstream. For those who value the sonic and tactile qualities of the format (which are significant), and don’t mind paying a premium for them, vinyl remains the music storage format of choice. In the 70-odd years of its existence, it’s seen off the cassettes, the CD, and still performs well in the age of music streaming too – it’s the format that refuses to die. While Record Store Day is an absolute gift to record collectors, making hard-to-find music available again and dressing up old favorites in shiny, colorful new packages, there are some vinyl records that are now staggeringly hard to come by. So hard, in fact, that a serious and dedicated record collector will pay truly huge sums of money to own them. We’ve compiled a list of 10 great records, all worth somewhere between ‘quite a lot of money’ and ‘loads of money’, which you might conceivably have in your collection. So if you’re fortunate enough to own any of these, for heaven’s sake be careful with them. Estimate: $400 – $520 / £300 – £400 / AU$550 – AU$730 So profoundly has SAW85-92 influenced 21st century electronic music, the idea that it was truly unlike anything else when it came out at the end of 1992 is difficult to get your head around. Belgian label Apollo released it but, given that it was an extremely niche genre by an unknown Cornish 21-year-old, the first vinyl pressing wasn’t a big run. Its critical reputation has only gone one way, though, and now it’s very sought-after. If your vinyl copy of SAW85-92 has no catalogue number on the sleeve or the labels, no barcode on the sleeve, and three tracks apiece on sides C and D, you’re in business. Estimate: $780 – $900 / £600 – £700 / AU$1,100 – AU$1280 Black Sabbath’s third album got a bit of critical shoeing at the time, but over two million copies sold and gushing endorsements from the likes of Smashing Pumpkins and Nirvana tells its own story. Like most of the vinyl on this list, you need a very specific copy of Master of Reality in your collection if you’re going to see the big bucks: in this case it must have the embossed sleeve, the Vertigo ‘swirl’ label and – most important of all – the folded poster of the band.
