How To Organize Your Record Collection

[Guest deathbydrums]

http://www.featureshoot.com/2012/04/record-sleeves-organized-by-color-photographed-by-george-benson/

My collection is organized by John Ruh. Thanks John.

[Buffbloom]

by color of spine

I used to organize my 300 dvds like this when I had bad ocd. I was the only one who could find anything.

[cbbrew22]

I have four sections...current favorites, a queue of stuff I haven't listened to for a while but want to soon, stuff my wife likes, and everything else. No order besides that really.

[Troy plays bass]

I have four sections...current favorites, a queue of stuff I haven't listened to for a while but want to soon, stuff my wife likes, and everything else. No order besides that really.

This is exactly how my parents' CDs are organized.  I alphabetized them once, and they hated it.

[kriss]

^ I neglected to mention I have a similar section when this thread was going a year or so ago. i have a 'new arrivals' section that usually consists of whatever I've bought at any given time within the last few months. that's the only place where anything goes next to anything regardless of genre - just purely alphabetical before eventually being broken down, collated, and quantified.

new question: if you have a large collection, do you ever find yourself sort of 'record shopping' so to speak by digging through certain sections and finding stuff you'd forgotten about for however long? because of the scope of my collection, I can go years without listening to certain things, so it's always fun to find new favorites out of stuff that I'd bought in the early 2000's and had forgotten about.

[Aych]

I do alphabetical by name, then alphabetical by title for everything. 12"s, 10"s and 7"s.

 

I've always preferred organizing things alphabetically, so why change for this, right?

[Guest]

Yeah, anytime I start poking around the collection, I always find stuff I haven't spun in a while that I end up putting in the "to be played" pile.

[thomasj182]

I do alphabetical by band, chronological by album.

Doesn't everyone?

[Guest]

Doesn't everyone?

 

i keep the albums alphabetized. i've considered chronological, but... lazy.

[nivek87]

alaphabetical by artist, same as my tradelist log. makes it easy for me to find

[stranaspank]

I file artists like Tom Petty under P, but what about bands with a person's name, like Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers?

[lfisher]

Alphabetically by artist, then chronologically by album.

 

Some older records aren't perfectly chronological because I can't remember the order. Stuff like ABBA and Rolling Stones had too much back catalogue for me to memorize, even by the time I was born, so to save on frustration I just put them in approximate chronological order.

 

"The Beatles" get sorted as "Beatles, The"

 

"Chuck Ragan" is sorted under C rather than R just because of personal preference. It's not correct/proper but for whatever reason I always got frustrated having them sorted by last name so I switched it.

 

Variants (though I only have a few with this issue) go in order of pressing, if known. Otherwise, however they fall.

 

MIne's done this way for my own personal enjoyment. I'm not OCD about everything being in the perfect systematical order, I just want to know where to find what I'm looking for.

[Guest]

I put the records up my butt and then I poop them out I let them land where they will and that is where they remain.

[000000]

Alphabetically by artist, then chronologically by album.

 

Some older records aren't perfectly chronological because I can't remember the order. Stuff like ABBA and Rolling Stones had too much back catalogue for me to memorize, even by the time I was born, so to save on frustration I just put them in approximate chronological order.

 

"The Beatles" get sorted as "Beatles, The"

 

"Chuck Ragan" is sorted under C rather than R just because of personal preference. It's not correct/proper but for whatever reason I always got frustrated having them sorted by last name so I switched it.

 

Variants (though I only have a few with this issue) go in order of pressing, if known. Otherwise, however they fall.

 

MIne's done this way for my own personal enjoyment. I'm not OCD about everything being in the perfect systematical order, I just want to know where to find what I'm looking for.

 

Pretty much the same as mine.

[derby625]

I file artists like Tom Petty under P, but what about bands with a person's name, like Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers?

 

"P"

 

Just like Elvis Costello & the Attractions are under "C"

[nivek87]

i do first names. the only thing for me is names with "the" which i just file like an above mentioned poster. ex. beatles, the

[derby625]

Here's a few that I've flipped around a few times and haven't been pleased in any way:

 

+44 (P, #, or Symbol)

311 (T or #)

A Perfect Circle (A or P)

 

For splits, I treat them like compilations/soundtracks which are in a spot at the end of my collection

[deadreckoning]

i do first names. the only thing for me is names with "the" which i just file like an above mentioned poster. ex. beatles, the

 

Yes, i also do alphabetically, but since i only own Fall Out Boy and The Used Records it's pretty easy.

[seamoney]

For any titles beginning with A or An you would alphabetize them the same as titles beginning with The.

[tape]

Here's a few that I've flipped around a few times and haven't been pleased in any way:

 

+44 (P, #, or Symbol)

311 (T or #)

A Perfect Circle (A or P)

 

For splits, I treat them like compilations/soundtracks which are in a spot at the end of my collection

 

At my college radio station, everything was alphabetized, and bands with numbers or symbols had them spelled out for sorting purposes. So in your examples, it'd be "Plus Forty-Four" and "Three Eleven". Indefinite articles ("a" or "an") were treated as part of the name, so "A Perfect Circle", not "Perfect Circle, A". The definite article ("the") got the "Beatles, The" treatment, and that was really it.

Since I spent about 9 years involved with the station, that's how I've done it ever since. At the station there was no specific policy about how to sort within a given artist - basically if you could find the band quickly that's all that mattered - but personally I do it chronologically because I'm always thinking about how certain records relate to a band's catalog so it makes sense to me to have it that way.

I gotta say though, and I'm surprised I never thought of that before, but I like your method of treating splits as compilations. Currently I sort them by the artist that's listed first/has the A side, unless I bought it for one artist (e.g. I have this Hot Water Music/Six Going on Seven split 7", but I don't really listen to/care about Hot Water Music and I bought it for the Six Going on Seven song, so I put it under S even though that song's the B side). But that's a cool idea. I might do that.

[derby625]

At my college radio station, everything was alphabetized, and bands with numbers or symbols had them spelled out for sorting purposes. So in your examples, it'd be "Plus Forty-Four" and "Three Eleven". Indefinite articles ("a" or "an") were treated as part of the name, so "A Perfect Circle", not "Perfect Circle, A". The definite article ("the") got the "Beatles, The" treatment, and that was really it.

Since I spent about 9 years involved with the station, that's how I've done it ever since. At the station there was no specific policy about how to sort within a given artist - basically if you could find the band quickly that's all that mattered - but personally I do it chronologically because I'm always thinking about how certain records relate to a band's catalog so it makes sense to me to have it that way.

I gotta say though, and I'm surprised I never thought of that before, but I like your method of treating splits as compilations. Currently I sort them by the artist that's listed first/has the A side, unless I bought it for one artist (e.g. I have this Hot Water Music/Six Going on Seven split 7", but I don't really listen to/care about Hot Water Music and I bought it for the Six Going on Seven song, so I put it under S even though that song's the B side). But that's a cool idea. I might do that.

 

That's exactly how I have it now (with +44 in P, 311 in T, and APC in A) so I'm glad I'm not totally off the wall doing that.

[futures]

i hope its ok that i bump this. i didnt want to start a new thread, but wanted to share a gift i got for my bday last weekend: vinyl separators!

 

 

 

 

[GradedOnACurve]

i hope its ok that i bump this. i didnt want to start a new thread, but wanted to share a gift i got for my bday last weekend: vinyl separators!

 

 

 

 

 

Nice! How much were those?

[monsterrod]

Yeah, I like these separators.

[mertzrock]

At my college radio station, everything was alphabetized, and bands with numbers or symbols had them spelled out for sorting purposes. So in your examples, it'd be "Plus Forty-Four" and "Three Eleven". Indefinite articles ("a" or "an") were treated as part of the name, so "A Perfect Circle", not "Perfect Circle, A". The definite article ("the") got the "Beatles, The" treatment, and that was really it.

Since I spent about 9 years involved with the station, that's how I've done it ever since. At the station there was no specific policy about how to sort within a given artist - basically if you could find the band quickly that's all that mattered - but personally I do it chronologically because I'm always thinking about how certain records relate to a band's catalog so it makes sense to me to have it that way.

I gotta say though, and I'm surprised I never thought of that before, but I like your method of treating splits as compilations. Currently I sort them by the artist that's listed first/has the A side, unless I bought it for one artist (e.g. I have this Hot Water Music/Six Going on Seven split 7", but I don't really listen to/care about Hot Water Music and I bought it for the Six Going on Seven song, so I put it under S even though that song's the B side). But that's a cool idea. I might do that.

It's odd that you like Six Going On Seven and DON'T like HWM. If anyone even knows them I'd assume they're from the same circle/of the same age group/aesthetically Like Hot Water Music...because I certainly like both bands...same thing with Chamberlain/Split Lip.