Arts & Culture

A while back I was in a thrift store digging for records, and a young boy accompanied by his mother picked up an album that had fallen out of its sleeve. "Mama, what's this?" he asked. "They have music on them," she replied. Then he furrowed his brow and held the record up to the light as if he was trying to see where the notes were hidden. Music you can'touch; in an age where pretty much any album you're looking for can be found online and downloaded in seconds, good old-fashioned vinyl records still appeal to music fans of all ages who crave a physical alternative to the ephemeral nature of MP3s and streaming sites. 

The Vinyl 101 program happening at 6:30 p.m on November 12th at the Toronto Reference Library is a great chance for both vinyl veterans and newcomers to learn more about every aspect of record collecting. But if you'd like to brush up on your knowledge in the meantime the library also has several crates' worth of books about records and the dedicated collectors who love them.

A big part of the appeal of collecting is organizing, displaying and showing off your collection, and vinyl fans are no exception. Dust & grooves: adventures in record collecting, by Eilon Paz, takes you on an intimate tour of the record rooms of some of the most famous DJs, musicians and producers in the world (including Gilles Peterson and Questlove). The gorgeous photos are accompanied by interviews with diggers around the world – from big names to everyday enthusiasts – who discuss their favourite finds, what motivates them to keep looking and how and why they got into records in the first place.

Record collecting used to be thought of as exclusively a boy's club, but that viewpoint (reinforced by the popular book and movie High Fidelity) is almost as dated as the wax cylinders records replaced decades ago. Record collecting for girls: unleashing your inner music nerd, one album at a time, by Courtney E. Smith, gives readers a full double LP's worth of the female perspective on record collecting and music fandom in general.

Records are more than just the music they contain within their grooves; visual artists have been using them as both medium and inspiration for as long as they've existed. The record: contemporary art and vinyl, by Trevor Schoonmaker, is a catalog of the first exhibition to explore the culture of vinyl records in contemporary art and includes works by 33 artists who utilized records in sculpture, performance, painting, photography and more.

It should go without saying that record covers and sleeves are works of art unto themselves. Here are a few of the many collections of album art available at the library that will send even the most jaded diggers back to the crates for another expedition in the hopes of unearthing some of the eye (and ear) candy on display in these gorgeous coffee table books.

• Fade to black: hard rock covers of the vinyl age, by Martin Popoff
• Coast to coast: album cover art from New York to Los Angeles, by Graham Marsh
• The art of the LP: classic album covers 1955-1995, by Johnny Morgan
• Hipgnosis archives, by Aubrey Powell
• Punk 45: the singles cover art of punk 1975-80, by Stuart Baker and Jon Savage

Like pretty much everything else you can buy them online now, but back in the day if you wanted to buy a record you had to trek over to an actual brick-and-mortar store. Record store days: from vinyl to digital and back again, by Gary Calamar, is an affectionate look back at the retail goldmines which often doubled as clubhouses, art galleries and launching pads for bands and record labels alike. A few years ago many people were writing record stores off as a doomed relic of the pre-digital age, but since then they've made a comeback alongside records themselves. If you're reading this in Toronto you're lucky enough to be in one of the world's best cities for record stores, so get out there and get digging!