I am proud to share with you our latest Vinyl Collective Collector of the Month, Oakland Childers. Oakland was actually one of our earliest supporters. He was also fortunate enough to win our first ever contest which gave him a $100 shopping spree in our store back in September of last year. Since that time, Oakland has been one of our biggest supporters having featured us in a piece for the Colorado Daily as well as being a contributor to our message board.

Oakland is the managing editor of the Colorado Daily newspaper in Boulder and has been a music journalist for the past 15 years. He writes band profiles for the Colorado Daily and Thrasher Magazine on a regular basis and has done freelance work for a number of music magazines including DIW, Rockpile and Chord.

*Photographed is Oakland standing in his custom-built elevated library. It was specially made by he and his dad to house his record collection, as well as all the books he and his wife Melissa have.
Click the link to read more about our Vinyl Collective Collector of the Month. Thanks Oakland!

VC: Your name and the city you live in.
My name is Oakland L. Childers. I live in Louisville, Colorado, right in between Boulder and Denver.

VC: How many records do you own?
I have about 2,000 records in all. I thought it was a lot until I found out one of my friends has around 20,000 records. He lives in a tiny apartment and has to keep most of them in a storage unit.

VC: Why do you collect vinyl?
I started buying records because my dad has a huge collection of records so that’s the format I grew up with. I bought a few CDs and tapes when I was a teenager, but I was always a bit turned off by the price of CDs and the relatively bad sound quality. Why buy a CD for $16 when you can buy the same record on vinyl for $8? Of course records tend to cost a lot more now, but I’m willing to pay for the large-scale artwork, the sound quality and the simple aesthetic of vinyl.

VC: What is your most prized record in your collection?
This is a hard one, but in the area of value, I think I’ll say the John Frusciante “Estrus” 7″. I bought it for $2, on sale, and I think it’s worth somewhere around $300 now. What a bargain. It’s probably the worst recording John Frusciante ever made, released on his own Birdman label, but it’s cool in that there are only like 400-500 of them floating around. It’s also a pretty dark look into the life of a great musician who was nearly destroyed by drug addiction, only to pull himself back up. Whatever you think of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, you cannot deny that John Frusciante is one of the greatest guitar players of all time.

Here Oakland holds one of his favorite records, a John Frusciante “Estres” 7″. Today it is worth about 100 times what he paid for it.
VC: What release would you like to see come out on vinyl that hasn’t yet been released?
There are a bunch, but I would really like to see Boy Sets Fire’s “Tomorrow Come Today” released on vinyl. I have been friends with those guys since they started the band and I have all their stuff on vinyl. Rob Avery, their old bass player and my best friend, did all the design work for the record and hand painted much of the artwork. I would love to see that reproduced on a 12″ gatefold. And on red vinyl of course (they’re commies if you didn’t already know that). Those guys poured their heart and soul into that record, only to be dissed by Wind-Up Records.

VC: What is the most you have spent for a record?
I’ve been collecting since I was 10, and I have a pretty hard-core case of OCD, so I bought most of my records when they were new, for whatever they went for at the time. But the advent of eBay has certainly gotten me in trouble once or twice. I think probably the most I ever spent was $50 for a Jesus Lizard “Liar” picture disc. It wasn’t worth it, but a buddy of mine was hurting for money and that’s what he wanted for it. I was feeling generous and I wanted the record pretty bad too. In retrospect it was a good deal for me. I’ve also bought some pretty expensive imports, but I won’t count those because shipping and the exchange rate account for much of the cost of buying from a foreign country.

VC: What out of print record would you kill to own?
There are some great jazz albums I thought I’d never be able to own, but thanks to the good people at True Blue and Mosaic Records, much of my wish list has been filled. I would do just about anything to get one of the hand-painted copies of Dan Higgs’ recent solo record, “Atmic Yggdrasil Tarot.” There are only a few of them from what I understand and the folks at Thrill Jockey Records have been vague about who can get them.

VC: Your last 5 record that you purchased?
1. 108 — A new beat from a dead heart
2. Bad Brains — Build a Nation
3. Minus the Bear — Planet of Ice
4. Rocky Votalato — Makers — German Import
5. Doom Riders / Boris split — japanese import