Many records with covers autographed by the artists are worth quite a good sum, and average everyday people owned these, so you will run across them at thrift stores or estate sales from time to time. Others with cover art that changed very quickly after the original album was released can be quite pricey. Then there are the true rarities that were never released commercially that vinyl collectors relish adding to a collection. Before you get too excited when you find one of these albums at a thrift store, keep in mind that it was reissued in 2015. Those newer versions of the LP usually sell in the $25 range as used records. His record label, RCA, pulled the first version of the cover, which depicted a cartoonish rendition of Bowie with “dog genitals” on the opposite side of the gatefold. Only a few of these worrisome issues of the album cover were released. Most later versions have the artwork doctored with airbrushing to remove the offending areas. If you can’t clearly see the dog naughty bits on the lower half of Bowie’s body on your cover, it won’t be worth anywhere near $2,500 to $7,500 like the rare version. What you’re looking for in this case is turquoise blue lettering spelling out Led Zeppelin in the upper left corner of the cover. This takes the value from an ordinary price to several thousand, and as much as $5,000 to $7,500 in near mint condition. Other less valuable versions have red lettering. In order to qualify as a rarity worth $4,000 to $10,000, your copy of this record should be by Parlophone with gold and black “STEREO” on the label and “Dick James Mus. Co.” credits. Without those attributes, according to Rate Your Music, this title won’t hold nearly as much value. Only one copy of “Original Stack O’ Lee Blues / Mama you Don’t Know How” is known to exist, making this 1927 recording worth $30,000 to $60,000, according to Rate Your Music. “Gang of Brown Skin Women / Don’t You Leave Me Here,” also with one copy known to exist, might sell in the $5,000 to $10,000 range. Time to check great-grandpa’s stack of 78s to make sure he wasn’t a blues fan. There could be another copy of either of these recordings out in the wild waiting to be discovered. See if your copy of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan contains these four songs: “Rocks and Gravel,” “Let Me Die in My Footsteps,” “Gamblin’ Willie’s Dead Man’s Hand,” and “Talkin’ John Birch Blues.” Those tunes were left off of subsequent releases, so a copy featuring them can be worth $20,000 to $30,000 if it is in near mint condition. Other issues of this LP usually sell for less than $50. In this case, the album was in the collection of Ringo Starr, who famously pounded percussion for The Beatles, since it was introduced in 1968. As reported by Rolling Stone, Starr said, “We didn’t think, ‘We’ll keep it for 50 years and it will be in pristine condition.’ Whoever gets it, it will have my fingerprints on it.” To further support that claim, it was numbered No. 0000001, indicating it was the first pressing ever of The White Album. The LP sold for $790,000 at Julien’s Auctions in 2015. There are other pricey variations of The White Album around, but none will likely match this chart-topping auction record.
