GRACE NOTES

In a new 416-page coffee-table book, part-time DJ and photographer Eilon Paz takes an intimate look at over 130 vinyl collections and collectors , exploring the beauty and passion behind each treasured trove. The book is a glorious celebration of vinyl records, and showcases the wide variety of collections along with the people and stories behind them.

The collections cover the gamut of ages. There’s a collector from Maryland with a huge catalog of rare 78’s stacked floor to ceiling. There’s Cornell University Library’s neatly boxed and alphabetized collection of 43,000 Afrika Bambaatta records for their Hip Hop Collection. The collectors themselves are just as varied—ranging from known and unknown DJ’s and record producers to ordinary, albeit passionate collectors.

The book is divided into two parts. The first section contains over 250 full-page photographs of collections with short quotes about them. The second part of the book contains detailed interviews with twelve of the collectors, exploring how they organize their collections, where they obtained their albums, what albums are worthy of collecting, and perhaps most importantly, why they collect.

Dust & Grooves is for sale online at www.dustandgrooves.com with two different options. The basic book is $60 and the Limited Edition is $170 for a signed and numbered copy from one of 400 limited prints.

The photographs are beautiful. Some look at the collections on a whole, some feature specific album covers or inserts. Some celebrate the diversity of a collection, others the uniformity. All in all, for anyone who has ever cherished a favorite album, it’s a look at people with similar passions. For anyone who has ever struggled with letting go of their own collection, it’s a great way to reminisce about what could have been.