The First 10 Records to Buy

How these ten were chosen

Four rules, applied in this order. None of them is a judgement about which albums are best, because that is not a judgement this site is in a position to make or a useful one to publish.

1. It has to be in print right now. Every listing here was checked live before it went on the page: a real vinyl release in Amazon ’s Physical Music category, with a real price and stock, not a pre-order and not a single second-hand copy. That rule alone removed several obvious albums — Neil Young’s Harvest, Bill Withers ’s Still Bill and Curtis Mayfield’s Super Fly all currently show only marketplace copies or out-of-stock entries, so none of them is featured here despite belonging on any honest list.
2. It has to be cheap for what it is. A first record should not be one you are nervous about handling while you are still learning to cue a tonearm. Nothing here is a limited edition, an audiophile pressing or a collectible.
3. The set has to cover the range. Quiet and loud, sparse and dense, 1959 to 2020. Ten records that all sound the same teach you nothing about your system and get old fast.
4. Each one has to do a job on a new deck. Not an audiophile test-disc job — a practical one. Sustained voice reveals speed instability. Quiet passages reveal hum. Dense inner-groove passages reveal alignment problems. The ten between them cover the faults a new owner actually hits.

What each one tells you about the turntable

This is the part most first-record lists skip, and it is the reason to buy a spread rather than ten records that sound alike. If something is wrong with a new setup, one of these will show it.

• Speed stability. A sustained solo voice or a held piano note is where wow and flutter becomes audible as a slight seasickness in the pitch. For Emma, Forever Ago is the clearest test here. If it wavers, suspect the belt or the motor before you suspect the cartridge — the diagnostic order is in turntable troubleshooting.
• Hum and grounding. Quiet, low-level recordings put your noise floor on display. If you hear a steady hum under the soft passages of Kind Of Blue, the cause is almost always a disconnected ground wire between the deck and the phono stage rather than anything to do with the record.
• Tracking and alignment. Dense, loud passages near the center of a side are the hardest thing a stylus has to do. If the last track of a side gets harsh or spitty and the rest is fine, that is an alignment or tracking-force problem, and balancing the tonearm is where to start.
• Speaker placement. Melodic, forward bass — Innervisions is the one here — changes character dramatically depending on how close your speakers sit to a wall. If the bass is boomy on this record and thin on others, move the speakers before you blame anything else.
• Whether the system is worth it at all. Aja and OK Computer are the two here with the most headroom. If a system makes those sound flat, the limiting factor is upstream of the records.

The five paths after these ten

Ten records is roughly where people work out which direction they actually want to go. Rather than guess, follow whichever of these you keep reaching for.

• Jazz. The genre with the best-documented reissues by a distance — Blue Note publishes its mastering chain, which almost nobody else does. If Kind Of Blue is the one you keep playing, this is your lane and it is the cheapest one to do well.
• Classic rock. The largest catalog and the cheapest entry, because these records were pressed in enormous numbers and are still being repressed.
• Hip-hop. The most rewarding and the least transparent: labels rarely publish anything about a reissue’s source, and running times mean many albums need a double LP.
• Soul and funk. Where the format and the music fit together best — these are albums built as continuous sides, and several of them are the quietest, most revealing records you can own.
• Indie and modern. For a collection that does not stop in 1979. Current pressings of current records, generally well made and generally cheap.

What not to buy yet

Four categories to leave alone until you have played the ten above and know what you like.

• Audiophile pressings. A Tone Poet or Mobile Fidelity edition can cost three or four times a standard reissue. There are real, published differences behind that — and there is also a great deal of marketing. Read what each line actually publishes before you pay for one, not after.
• Box sets. Almost always more expensive per album than buying the two records you actually wanted, and they arrive with six you did not. The arithmetic is here and it is not close.
• Anything scarce or collectible. A first record should be replaceable. You are going to mishandle at least one while you learn.
• Picture discs and novelty colored variants. Bought for the object rather than the playback, and they are the one part of the colored vinyl argument that genuinely holds up — see colored vinyl.

Look after them from the start

Records are cheap to keep in good condition and expensive to rescue. Three habits, all of which cost nothing on day one.

1. Store them upright. Stacked records warp under their own weight and the damage is not reversible. Why vertical storage matters covers the mechanism; the practical version is that a shelf is fine and a pile is not.
2. Brush before every play. Dust in the groove is what the stylus grinds into the vinyl, so a few seconds with a carbon fiber brush prevents damage rather than just reducing noise. A basic kit covers it.
3. Watch the stylus hours. This is the one that costs you the collection rather than the sound — a worn tip damages every record it plays. The manufacturers’ own hour figures are lower than most people expect.