How I turned into One Quid Man

I thought things were goin' well / But it hasn't turned out so swell / Has it? Oh shit

So the other week I bought this CD in a charity shop ...

... price £1. Big deal, right? An ancient (if good) album on a boring compact disc. Who cares? True enough, but for me it was a slightly weird thing to do and something I wondered about afterwards. Why buy a CD version of an LP I've owned for decades by a band, good as they were, that are hardly an unknown quantity? Have I - shocking thought - turned into a latter-day 50 quid man? A middle-aged geezer hoovering up "classic" albums to replace (or sit alongside) my vinyl stuff? Gulp. This format-obsessed urge to replicate a "collection" (it used to be CDs to replace albums, and recently it's turned into people getting pristine £25 vinyl to supposedly "complete" their dull collections) is almost comically conservative and a million miles away from what has ever interested me about music. But ... er, I guess there can be exceptions. A little flexibility in the semi-conscious, self-imposed "rules" concerning music acquisition. But, but ... it wasn't so long ago that I was arguing that this kind of "doubling up" should be absolutely verboten for any self-respecting music person. Even doubling up that included stuff you might only have as a home-recorded cassette or whatever. Hmm, such purity in my old (c.2020) thinking. Well, was I right then or am I right now? Is doubling up self-indulgent and dumb, or should you allow yourself to snaffle up things like the Buzzcocks CD because, well, because it's there, it's good, it's cheap and it would be (ahem) "nice" to have it on CD? Er no, it doesn't really wash. This is just pathetic excuse-making. I've totally let my guard down - probably because I have a soft spot for Shelley and co, but still, it's the thin end of the wedge. Before you know it I'll be lining my walls with all sorts of over-familiar 40-year-old music. So that's that sorted out. Now I know where I stand. No more missteps like this with the Singles Going Steady purchase. Except, wait, what's this?!

Oh no, it's my recently-acquired CD copy of Closer which I've just remembered I also bought (another fateful double-up) only a few months ago, and even - dammit - from the exact-same charity shop as the Buzzcocks CD. Another £1 spent stupidly regressing. Jeez, I'm now a serial offender. So, despite my high-minded stuff about how you need to keep your music listening and acquisition fresh, it seems I've now joined the serried ranks of the 50 quid men. Only I'm a cut-price, Poundshop version. God help me, I've turned into One Quid Man ...