Are You Ready For This?

by Bobby Rock


When I was a student at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, I was hardcore into jazz drumming and had developed an active obsession with collecting classic old jazz albums. One afternoon, I stepped into my favorite used record shop near the school to have a quick scroll through the bins. As I was taking a pass through the Buddy Rich section (one of my all-time favorite drummers), my heart skipped a beat: I had stumbled across a strange title I had never heard of before. And what’s this, I wondered? Louie Bellson is on this record, as well? Some kind of a drum duel performance of the two of them? Holy shit!

But then when I glanced up at the sticker price, I nearly threw up in my mouth. $50! This was an obscene amount of money for a record back then—most were in the $2 to $6 range—and it clearly should have been a dealbreaker for a broke-ass college student. However, I simply could not tear myself away. A rare “archaeological" find such as this might only come once in a lifetime, right? Why else would it have been so expensive, I reasoned?  I pulled the record from the bin, slipped it out of its hand-sealed plastic covering, then caught a whiff of that vintage aroma. It smelled like the inside of a ’65 Chevelle. Oh man... this might be the only copy left in America right now. Must grab.

I slowly brought it up to the register and asked the attendant to please hang on to it for a hot second while I went to the bank to empty my account. (Like I said: $50 was a lot back then!) Fifteen minutes and a couple of painful transactions later, I was back in my dorm room, savoring every scratchy second of my conquest, and poring over the liner notes like a history professor. The record contained one 28-minute track called “Slides and Hides.” It was recorded in Japan with a renowned Japanese big band that only played a combined seven or eight minutes on the whole thing. All the rest was Buddy and Louie, slugging it out like Ali and Frazier. A drummer’s wet dream.

But the story gets even better for this young drum nerd. Over the course of the next two years, I was able to get both Buddy and Louie to sign it when each rolled through town for shows. Buddy was cordial yet methodical in his signing, while Louie was overtly friendly and inquisitive. In other words, both were “business as usual” in their reaction to the record, which was fine with me. And most importantly, I had a sort of “seal of approval” on a valuable drumming artifact that would often inspire focus and clarity in the four decades that followed.


And this, to me, is the real value of collectibles. Not the market value cash price, but the emotional value we assign to a thing as it lives on to represent something important in our life—or to remind us of something pivotal in our journey. In this way, things like classic vinyl and old dog-eared books are holy relics, holding a space for our higher pursuits… and serving as a critical reminder that the best version of ourselves is still out there somewhere: waiting to hopefully show up in someone else’s “collection” one day… if we’re willing to pay the proverbial piper and do the work.

_______________