Those '60s albums you lost or gave away....

...could be worth a small fortune, assuming you took good care of them. 

  At 'Books for Amnesty' Bristol (where, since 2003, I've been dealing with the music related stuff) we recently received a large donation of '60s albums and singles.  Now, during those 13  years, we've had the occasional exciting item arrive, like the Queen album signed by Freddie Mercury (sold for £160), a 1st pressing of the Beatles first LP (£500),  ditto "Let it be" boxed set (auctioned on ebay for £680) a nice, clean copy of Peter Hamill's book "Killers, Angel and Refugees" signed by Peter (£200) to cite a few that stand out in my memory... but this sizable collection of vinyl from a local donor included first pressings of nearly every name group from that exciting era of pop history. Most of the Beatles albums were there, as well as  those from the Kinks,  Animals, Manfred Mann, Hollies, Searchers, Troggs and the Spencer Davis Group... plus many others. It was soon apparent that the owner of these (now very sought after) albums had taken very good care of them...nearly all had pristine vinyl, most of the sleeves were in excellent condition, though a few un-laminated covers had slightly grubby backs (not that surprising, given they had been around for 45 years or more!).                                                                                               

Well,  after checking them over, giving them a clean, putting them in PVC protective sleeves and pricing them up, I took them to the bi-monthly Colston Hall Record Fair.  Now we've been taking our 'collectable' stock to sell there since the fair started up several years ago and usually do pretty well...average 'take' around £150, every penny of which went to Amnesty (thanks, in part, to the generosity of the Fair promoters letting us have a free pitch). Yesterday, with the fresh stock prominently to the fore and blessed with nice weather, attendance was good and trade was very brisk.  By the end of the day, we had taken over a grand!  A terrific result...and we've still got around 40 of those higher value albums to sell next time! 

Now I bet you're wishing that you'd kept hold of your old LPs!!