Home Grown: “My record collection is my sanctuary”

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Because every record collection has a story.

Home Grown is our series profiling you lot and your excellent record collections. Taking our cue from the brilliant submissions to the #VFRecordCollections thread on Instagram, we want to share a little of your hard-earned love for vinyl with the world.

Each week, we’ll be profiling a different collector from around the world and finding out what makes them tick. Want in? Send us a pic and a few words about your collection to [email protected].


Name: Mauricio Cadena

Location: I was born and raised in Mexico City. But I live in Katy, TX. Which is a suburb about 30 miles west of Houston.

Size of collection (approx.): Around 600 records (and more than 2,000 CDs).

How long have you been collecting for?

I started collecting music around 1989 or 1990, but it was mainly CDs. I got into vinyl in 2011, if I remember correctly. I was living in Chicago back then. I was browsing around at a garage sale and I saw a small box with a few records in it. I didn’t have a turntable but for whatever reason I decided to pick up a couple of them – Pearl Jam’s Ten (turned out to be a much-coveted 1st edition), Stevie Wonder’s Innervisions, R.E.M.’s Automatic for the People and The Shins’ Chutes Too Narrow. Soon after I got myself a turntable and, needless to say, got hooked.

What part of your set-up are you most proud of?

I like its simplicity and its nice combination of a not-so-vintage yet excellent ’80s Technics amplifier with a sleek bright-red Pro-Ject Carbon Debut turntable. I don’t know if my headphones should count as part of the set-up, but I really like how they accentuate my music room. Nothing too fancy there, though.

Which record(s) are you most proud of?

That Pearl Jam album I mentioned earlier is definitely one of them. I also have a first edition of The Replacement’s Let It Be and of Jane’s Addiction’s Ritual de lo Habitual. But I think my favourite one has to be a box set of The Flaming Lips. It’s called Heady Nuggs: The First 5 Warner Bros. Records, 1992 – 2002. Not only all of the albums are fantastic, but all of them are gorgeous colored vinyl, each of which matches the color of the album cover. Beautiful.

What does your record collection mean to you?

It’s my sanctuary… my haven. Music has been part of my entire life. It’s my passion and everything I am and everything that I’ve been is somehow connected to music. And I think that my record collection is, ultimately, a tangible manifestation and reflection of myself, of my history.