Categorizing Your CD Collection

You can tell a lot about a person by the way they organise their CD collection. Most people – people who only have a passing interest in music and purchase maybe thirty CDs in their lifetime, have a stacking system, whereby the most listened to CDs generally go on top, right down to their old Spice girls records at the bottom.

Others – who have around 30-200+ CDs, and a fondness for music – alphabetize, for ease and simplicity. These are people with well-rounded interests, who know what they like and don’t like and like to have their days planned and their hours scheduled and their pets spayed and their nostrils plucked.

Most metalheads I know, who all have more CDs than Germany has kebab shops, organize by genre. Death Metal CDs on one shelf, ranging from simple original death metal bands like Obituary and Cannibal Corpse on the left (each band’s back catalogue organised chronologically, obviously) through to melodic and technical death in the middle, followed by death/black, grind/death and other death crossovers, and the more obscure industrial death, folk death and barely-death at the end. Then there’s black metal – from Venom through the whole Norwegian scene, (Mayhem, Burzum, Immortal) through the un-black (Antestor) and not-really-black-but-sorta-fits (Cradle of filth, Dimmu Borgir). Power metal on the shelf below – from traditional power (Blind Guardian, Helloween etc) to more raunchy traditional inspired power in the middle (Iron Fire, DreamEvil etc) to wanky orchestral power bands like Nightwish and Kamelot at the end. Bands that – while not being metal themselves – have played a heavy influence on the genre go on the topmost shelf. That’s Pink Floyd, Uriah Heep, Alice Cooper, Led Zepp, etc. Bands that bear no resemblance to metal but we still kinda like them anyway go on the bottom. There’s mostly grunge there – the entire Kyuss catalogue – and a Sarah Maclachlan CD that’s never listened to (honestly) but just haven’t got around to throwing away.

I once met a metalhead who organized his CDs in chronological order. Albums released in the same year are organised alphabetically. Looking at his rack demonstrates the evolution of metal music for the past three decades. It’s interesting to look at, but seems difficult to maintain to me.

Some people throw their CDs in the corner, and they get mixed up with the dirty laundry, and they stands on them and break them and can’t afford to replace them. This is why I no longer lend out CDs.

Once upon a time, before the great joining of the CD and book collections which was my marriage, I alphabetised by the second letter of the band or artists name. So Metallica would be filed under “E”, Iron Maiden under “R” and Tyr under “Y”.

But alas, my husband declared this perfectly sensible system strange and unwieldy, I reorganized all our CDs alphabetically, but it lasted all of three days when CDH discovered that Iron Maiden – his then favourite band of all time – had been placed near the bottom of one of the stacks due to their mid-range position in the alphabet. Now we function on a purely shove-it-anywhere-and-come-here-for-some-sex system, which works very well indeed.

Since someone asked, here’s our current setup:

I have two of these racks, made by my dad from recycled rimu, on either side of my desk (made by my husband)

Levi the cat modelling my desk CDs

I also have a couple of bookshelves decked out like this (the hanging hook is the tail of a monkey)

And this drawer unit sits on CDH's side of the bed

All this, and do you know what we do now? Buy music on iTunes. Bloody lucky too, since some thieving bastards broke into our car the other week and took a wallet of 40 CDs, and our car stereo face. Not the stereo, just the face.

So, how do YOU categorize your CDs, if at all? Do you even own CDs, or are you all about the vinyl? Are you all about electronic music files or holding the CD booklet in your hand? Do you buy the special editions in the fancy cases with the extra DVDs and artwork (they annoy me because they don’t fit in the racks).

I am in awe of this metal cd collection (Via Metal Addiction)

Love, lust and puddin’ crust