Y’know, as soon as I opened up the Top 30 Most Expensive items list for December of 2015, I had this funny feeling in the pit of my stomach. It’s just…it’s…well…

You ever get that feeling that you’ve been here before, that this isn’t the first time this has all happened? I mean, it seems like it was just May of last year when Lonely Every Day from the Golden Earrings shot all the way to the #1 spot in our top 30 with a price tag of nearly $3400.00. It does make some sense that I’d feel this is way too familiar, right? Collectors love the fact that there are only around 25 existing copies of this angsty 1965 single from our favorite Dutch rockers, so you have to believe it’d pop up every now and then in the top 30. You see, some info on the sleeve came out all weird in translation. Yeah, that’s right: at one point in time a grammatical error would force a record company to recall a pressing. What a strange world.

Stranger still is this sneaking suspicion that there was also a limited Nirvana 7″ in the top five back in May, going for right around $2000.00. That seems a little harder to swallow, though. I mean, Love Buzz b/w Big Cheese? That sounds like something I used to order at Burger King. Well, the stats don’t lie. It was the second most expensive item in the marketplace in December. Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce: these early Kurt rarities won’t upset us.

Rounding out the top five this month, we’ve got the most infamous Beatles album cover variant at number three: a tight shot of Ringo’s junk gracing Please Please Me. Aw, just kidding! It’s the ‘babies and meat’ version of Yesterday And Today, and it brought home $1892.00. Slightly less cute at #4 (but only slightly) is It’s Summer, a hidden gem from 1979 with soulful vocals and groove for days. It’s also rare enough to net you around $1630.00 if you’ve got a copy of this Marlon Hunter rarity just lying around in your garage. I’ll be the bearer of bad news, though: you don’t. You almost certainly don’t have a spare pressing of People Like You either; it’s a trippy little folk album from John Villemonte, who apparently had a lot to say about, you know, society and the human experience. And stuff. Oh, plus flutes and harps and 12-string guitars and all those other noises you could get away with in the mid ’70s. Aw, I’m just jealous because I also don’t have an extra copy floating around. There are only a couple hundred original LPs that survive, after all. This probably explains how it got to #5 on our list with a $1619.00 price tag. I mean, it does and it doesn’t.

Elsewhere in the top 30, well, you ever get that feeling that you’ve been here before, that this isn’t the first time this has all happened? I mean, it seems like it was just last month that we were talking about extravagant box sets from rock royalty, the first EP that Iron Maiden ever released, and kaleidoscopic pressings of the Smiths’ debut album from Germany. Was it something I ate? That’s the last time I order a Love Buzz and Big Cheese, I can tell you that much.

There’s plenty more fun to be had in the top 30. We got free jazz. Seriously, I never thought I’d see the day where Sun Ra streaked across the top 30 constellations, but I’m overjoyed that Secrets Of The Sun made the cut. We got foundational British folk. If you’ve not yet given your ears over to Five Leaves Left, the debut album from Nick Drake, go find a copy right now, even if it costs you $1000.00. We got whatever the hell is going on with the 1619 Bad Ass Band’s eponymous first record, and I think anything else I say about that will just ruin the magic. We got almost 20 other records that are just waiting for your eyeballs, and they’re all laid out for your viewing pleasure right on the other side of this post.

One last thing before I go: you ever get that feeling that you’ve been here before, that this isn’t the first time this has all happened? I mean, it seems like…oh, whatever: THERE ARE MORE BEATLES RECORDS IN THE TOP 30. Which ones, though? Is the suspense too much? Well, what are you waiting for! Oh, right: the link. Just click on over to the Discogs Top 30 Most Expensive Items Sold list from November 2015 to find the answers you’ve been desperate to get at since the start of this paragraph. Please remember, though: curiosity got the plastic doll covered in steak bits and slapped on the front of a compilation. Consider yourself forewarned.



