The project took quite awhile to complete, but my entire collection is now up for your browsing pleasure. In addition to seeing release info and the tracklist, you can also view gallery images! Creating images for each vinyl pressing was painstaking, but now you can see exactly what each item in my collection looks like. In celebration of completing this daunting task, I have decided to share with you the ten most prized items in my collection. Some are rare. Some are expensive. Some simply have personal, sentimental value. Either way, I hope you enjoy looking at some of the more interesting pieces in my collection.

First up, we have the debut EP from Seattle post-hardcore band Pretty Girls Make Graves. I was introduced to this band playing Whirl Tour, a budget Tony Hawk Pro Skater game for which two songs from this EP appeared. I think they're a very underrated band with often clashing, dual guitars, really creative drumming, and were more challenging than the pop-punk I was really into, yet still very catchy. When I started collecting records and browsing Discogs, this was one of the earliest pieces I knew I wanted in my collection. It's not a super rare find as there are still many listings on the popular marketplace going for prices under $100, but this hasn't been repressed since 2002, and it will likely never be.

It's not the highly sought after vinyl which currently holds a median selling price of around $1000, but it is an official cassette sold by the band on their 2012 tour. I'm just happy having some form of physical format as this mixtape never got a wide commercial release. This is most likely due to it containing a host of uncleared alternative rock, hip-hop, punk, and psychedelic rock samples. It's not even available on streaming platforms. This cassette tape is the second pressing after the original run of 100 released by Ormolycka. Despite not being apart of that first batch and the quantity of this release being unknown, this independently released tape somehow fetches a slightly higher price on Discogs; median price of around $150.

This is also not a first edition, but arguably, this is the cooler pressing. In 2009, Sargent House reissued the band's math rock staple Drugs to the Dear Youth on this amazing 10" splatter vinyl. I have a lot of clear, multi-coloured splatter records, but what makes this one special is that it appears like bits of Play-Doh have been pressed into it. It is such a unique effect that no other pressing I've seen was able to copy. Despite how cool it looks, and the records status within the math rock community, I'm surprised this one doesn't go for a higher price; only having a median sale price of $120 on Discogs.

Now visually speaking, this is the coolest thing I own by far. This Danny Brown OD EP has so much going on, I'd be very curious to know how it was even made. It is a 10" clear vinyl picture disc die-cut into a tab of Xanax. If you think that's fun, the music on this addendum to Brown's breakout album XXX contains some of his most obnoxious, silly, and hedonistic tunes.

Prior to putting out Enema of the State in 1999, blink-182 and MCA sent a bunch of promotional singles to radio stations to hype up their new record. Except, radio stations couldn't play it. Family Reunion is a thirty-four second joke song that is essentially a musical rendition of George Carlin's 7 Words stand-up bit: basically it's just swear words. It's unknown just how many promos were sent out, or how many survived after a deception so foul, but I randomly stumbled upon one in a record store one day and had to pick it up. This blink-182 collector's item occasionally pops up on discogs and is roughly sold at $55, or $1.62 per second.

Sudbury, Ontario isn't really known for its musical output. We had a fairly healthy, underground punk scene, but even the best bands struggled to make a larger name for themselves abroad. Anyways, this spot is reserved for repping the hometown. I could've gone with Vicious Cycle's Pale Blue Dot, a great hardcore punk record engineered and produced by members of Fucked Up (and also contains a vocal spot from Alexisonfire's George Pettit), but I decided to go with this very brief, yet incredible EP from power pop-punk trio Statues. This EP contains some very sharp barre-chord riffs and relatable musings on dead end jobs/lives. There's also a cover of G.G. Allin's Dead Or Alive which I strongly prefer to the original. If you want some Sudbury representation in your collection, the good news is that you can do it on the cheap. This EP only goes for around $3 on Discogs; kind of a steal honestly.

The Sudbury representation continues with The Almighty Rhombus' Lucid Living, albeit this one has a much more personal angle. This one marks a lot of firsts for me. It was the first time I was paid to make a record after finishing my studies in audio production and engineering. It was the first time I recorded at Cosmic Dave's Guitar Emporium on an old Mac Pro (or maybe even a G4) that took thirty seconds for playback to roll after hitting the spacebar. And it was the first time I recorded a band live off the floor to tape. That was one of the craziest weeks of my life. The band later pressed the album on vinyl, giving me my first credit on the format. Having this one in my collection will forever remind me of the memories making music in my hometown with my friends, and you can't put a price on that.

Another sentimental first is this record; Suspension by Trident (me). I was playing around with Garageband making ambient electronic music that was highly influenced by minimal video game soundtracks and ambient scores. When making music, I'm often really hard on myself, but during this stretch of time, I really tried to let go of that negative self-perception. I finished up six tracks, released it online, and some people actually said they liked it. To honour myself one birthday, I decided to have my little project lathe cut so I could have something physical to show for my work. It's obviously the only copy, so I guess in that respect it is the rarest item on this list. A cool thing about this record is that the EP is pressed on both sides of the record. So that way, if one side wears out, I can just start playing the other side.

Winding down here, we have the original cast recording of Death Becomes Her. This one is special because it isn't mine; let me explain. This one actually belongs to my partner, Cody, who I think would tell you that aside from musicals, soundtracks, classical, Christmas, and your average pop, he's not the most tapped in music fan. Nor is he a fan generally of physical formats; it's 2026. Despite this, he shares in my interest, knowing how important his participation in this part of my life is to me. Death Becomes Her is the most recent example of him carving out a little space within 'our' collection, a purchase spurred on by his admiration for some of the leading cast. It also happens to be a fairly stunning pressing; a marbled purple that some call 'potion purple.'

Lastly, we have to acknowledge where it all started; The Fall of Troy's Phantom On the Horizon. This record was put out at the height of my obsession with the band, and even though I didn't have a record player of my own, from a collector's standpoint I had to have it. With this purchase, the flood gates opened. I started going to my local record store every pay period and purchasing a record. I eventually invested in my first record player. I bought my first milk crates. I learned how to take care of my records. A whole new world within music had opened up to me and I fully dove in.

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