RECORDS COLLECTORS

7 Records I’d save in a fire

Chris Campbell on the record his mother left on his bed when he was a child, the record which always reminds him of his late brother and how his dog got on the cover of one of his favourites.

Interview with David Rea

10 January 2026

A photograph of a middle-aged white man wearing glasses and smiling in front of a wall of shelves containing vinyl records.

Photo: Chris Campbell’s YouTube channel: The Long Cut

Started collecting: 1981

Number of records: 3,000-3,200

Estimated value: $100,000-$200,000

The River

1.

Bruce Springsteen

Chris Campbell: When I got my first record player — it must have been 1981 or 1982, so I was 8 or 9 — I came home one day and my mom had left this record on my bed.

My mom played a pretty big role in my early love of music, mostly 50s and 60s stuff, but she knew I was a Springsteen fan. This is one of the first records that I ever owned and I cherish it and I still listen to it all the time. I can still remember the moment I walked in. I have a great mom.

I understand Bruce Springsteen has played a huge role in your life.

Yeah, absolutely. My parents divorced when I was really young. My dad had this huge framed replica of the Born to Run cover at his house. It was massive, like the size of a wall. He was a big Springsteen fan and had a huge influence on my early listening. He got me into Bob Seger, took me to see Fleetwood Mac in 1982. And then he took me to see Bruce Springsteen on the Born in the USA Tour in 1985. I still have the ticket.

Bloomed

2.

Richard Buckner

This was one of my brother's favourite records, who sadly passed away about 4 years ago. I have about 50 records from his collection and he never stopped talking about this record.

You have talked on your YouTube channel about the music you shared with your brother. What's it like having 50 of his records in your collection?

Yeah, the day I got his collection was not a great day. I was going through the trauma [of his passing] and I hadn't slept at all. I remember I was going to the FedEx in Chicago and the woman at the counter was so incredibly sweet. I got the sense that she just noticed it.

I've been sending my brother's record collection to people he knew, and sometimes even to people he didn't know. I'm just trying to spread his record collection all over the place. Cause that's the way he was. He made a lot of mix CDs and he bought records for people.

Your Dog Champ

3.

Brent Best

That's my dog on the cover! My dog Bennett, who was named after Jay Bennett from Wilco. This came out in 2015, I think, and I had posted this photo on Facebook, and Brent Best and I were friends on Facebook, and he asked if he could use this as his album cover.

He sent me a note and said, ‘How much?’ And I was like, ‘For what?’ And then he said, ‘I want this to be my album cover’. And I was like, ‘Zero dollars’. Such an honour. He is one of my favourite songwriters and just an incredible human being, somebody that I legitimately consider a friend now.

More A Legend Than A Band

4.

Flatlanders

This is really just a hugely instrumental record in my discovery of country folk. Lane, my brother, introduced me to it. He sent me the CD in 1999, and he was like, ‘These guys are incredible’. It was right when we were discovering Uncle Tupelo, Gram Parsons, Johnny Cash and all that. This record really makes me think of my brother, and how much he loved introducing people to music. So it's a big one for me.

No Depression

5.

Uncle Tupelo

I have an advance copy of No Depression by Uncle Tupelo, one of the copies they were sending out to radio stations.

I went to college in Boston, and in 1998 I went back with my girlfriend at the time and spent maybe a week there. We went to a record store called Nuggets and I went straight to the U section because I was such a fanatic about Uncle Tupelo at the time. And this was in there, and I was like, ‘Oh my God!’. I went up to the clerk and he shook his head and said, ‘I knew I should have priced it higher’ and I was like, ‘Well do you want to charge me more?’. He was like, ‘No, no’.

It's got ‘defective’ written on it. I played it once and there's one song that starts three seconds late.

If I had to grab one record [in a fire], it would be this. It's just having an advance of the first record of the band that had such a huge, huge impact on me and my friendships and relationships. This would be the one. There's no price on this, right? If somebody offered me $5,000, I wouldn't do it.

Night Beat

6.

Sam Cooke

Next one is Sam Cooke, Night Beat. And this is like a Mobile Fidelity version or Acoustic Sounds. And it's the first time I heard a record sound this pristine. I had a big record collection at the time, but I didn't have a lot of the high quality stuff. And I remember putting this on the turntable and I was like, ‘Whoa!’. It sounded like you were in the room with Sam Cooke. And to hear his voice, right? I think he's the greatest singer probably who's ever lived.

It got me started on buying all of these high-end vinyl records. It was just shocking to me how good they sounded, and still sound.

Songs for Beginners

7.

Graham Nash

Graham Nash signed my copy. I brought this record to a performance. It was Graham Nash and Jenny Lewis. And he was just so nice and charming. He seemed a little bit taken that I’d brought this record and not a Crosby, Stills & Nash or Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young record. And he said something like, ‘This record?’ and I was like, ‘I love this record’. And he was beaming when I said that. It was just really sweet. And then he performed with Jenny Lewis and it was just beautiful.

It's so meaningful to me because, one, it was right after I was sick and was sort of recovering, and my dad played Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young so much when I was a kid.