I've been facinated with the beauty of the vintage drums since I was a teenager. I'd send away for the catalogs and just admire the designs, colors, layouts and so forth. I mostly anticipated what I would buy if I could afford it. But those drums were very expensive in that era when compared with other necessities of life, and by percentages, far more expensive than a good level of say, DW, Ludwig or Gretsch kit today. When they became affordable, I started to dabble and have gone though too many to count. I had probably peaked at a dozen or so at one time.
I've had similar fascinations with antiques houses (New England variety), restored several and built new reproductions of the same. The motive was similar in that I appreciated the details of their designs and the various functions that drove the layouts of those buildings. My favorite was the half Georgian colonial. That can be an expensive realm to play in and I moved away from our last circa 1820 place in 2007 after a massive renovation effort.
The third passion was British sports cars, of which I owned countless numbers, but never more than a few at a time and none now. Again, an expense realm to travel in.
By comparison, vintage drums are relatively inexpensive and I like to change them out with regular frequency. I probably will sell off a couple later his summer and maybe get down to two or three from 4-1/2 right now. But I'm careful on total expense. I have a Rogers 20,12,14 with a matching Dynasonic I got a couple of years ago for $1800. I had to wrap the bass because it had cracked all the way up the side. $100 bucks later it was done. Because it's jet black, it's the same wrap today as it was in '68. That will probably be the last to go, or maybe my son, who fools around a bit with drums will end up with it. Who knows?
It could be worse! I could be into casinos or something of that sort. However, I like building and fixing things back to the way the should be. Just a part of who I am.
