I’m returning to the eBay purchases today.
Those of you who have long followed the blog will be aware, as I’ve mentioned it a few times previously, that I stupidly lost almost all the 7″ singles that I owned back in 1986. It involved a midnight flight out of a shared flat with whom there had been a lengthy dispute over the rent being charged and moving elsewhere to a new location, without leaving any indication of where that new location might be. It was only when I unpacked my possessions in the new shared flat that I discovered I had left behind a number of boxes of 7″ singles (it was all done in a hurry, and drink had been taken!) and of course, the keys to the old place had been put through the letterbox.
All of which explains why, when I first started using eBay in 2006 to pick up second-hand vinyl, that one of the first purchases was a 7″ copy of Love Will Tear Us Apart to sit alongside the 12″ copy that had long been in the collection.
The price I paid was £3.39. The vendor from back then still has an eBay presence as a long-time seller of vinyl, CDs and tapes. In a perfect world, the same vendor would today have another copy of Love Will Tear Us Apart to offer for a direct comparison. But, as we all know, it is a far from perfect world.
There are, as I type this, 29 results emerging for a search for ‘Joy Division Love Will Tear Us Apart 7″ Vinyl FAC 23‘
The thing with eBay is that it encourages bids over a period of time, and one seller has it on offer at 99p with around three days to go. Other sellers have a ‘Buy It Now’ option, with prices ranging from between £8 and £25.
Once you click on the actual product, you find that some of the lower prices are not offering the picture sleeve, or that the condition of the vinyl is not ideal, or that the single is a later pressing from 1983.
The closest match that I can find is from who appears to be from a private seller who is asking for £15.
Over at Discogs, there are something in the region of 60 copies for sale of the same 7″ as I have. Most sellers are from the UK. The asking prices range, in the main, from £8 to £30, which would seem to indicate that eBay sellers who aren’t connected to shops or stores are taking their cues from Discogs prices. There’s also similar caveats around picture sleeves, condition vinyl etc.
£15 appears to be the average price.
The rise since 2006 works out at 342%. It’s not quite as staggering as that of the Go-Betweens album highlighted last month, but it’s still substantial.
mp3: Joy Division – These Days
THE NEW VINYL VILLAIN 
For reasons known to no-one this week I had it in my head to buy Kate Bush Remastered in Vinyl Box Sets 1 to 4. Now, I have as much Kate Bush as I need and had decided at the time of release that I’d pass on the Box Sets as they offered no new tracks that I didn’t already own just the fact they’d been ‘remastered’.
The Box Set I ‘want’ most is of course the most expensive (aaargh!) with the others coming in at ‘reasonable’ prices in today’s market – albeit some chancers are looking to exceed the reasonable prices by some margin.
The thing that caught my eye – and made me chuckle – is Box Set 2. It’s on sale – with no vinyl included, just the box, at a starting price of £10. I bet it’ll do quite well as it has the sticker on it. I was notorious for taking every sticker off my vinyl sleeves – except the all-conquering Record Exchange stickers – as they took most of the art work with them.
I recently bought a blimmin’ bargain on eBay – that included a cd of they LP too. I bought the bundle version as the included vinyl worked out at about £2. Bargains are to be had.
Will I buy the Kate Bush Box Sets? Probably. But, as I’m in zero rush I’ll hold out till I get them for the price I think is reasonable.
£15 for “Love Will Tear Us Apart” on UK 7″ seems to be a bargain next to the cost of New Order 12″ single in The States! I stupidly traded off my New order 12″ singles when I heard that “Substance” was coming out soon on CD and would contain all of the New Order 12″ single mixes. Well, we all got a shock there what with inferior re-recorded versions instead of the original tracks! So to this day I can’t hear the proper version of the almighty “Temptation!” And the record will cost me $25-80 with domestic shipping, making for once, the UK copies at $25-45 a bargain in comparison!
Big second to PPM ↑ I am often surprised that this solid piece of R&R history is often one of the more affordable NO/JD items in local shops. The 12″ singles (even the crap ones) can get way out of hand.
For comparison, I am one 7″ single shy of a complete Field Mice collection (a band with a slightly lower stature) and that would set me back $30 minimum!
I did a mix recently of my most expensive records (based on Discogs median price). It was an intersting exercise. Some obvi and some downright headscratchers.
JC you should do it for one of your monthly mixes! I would certainly be curious.