In this digital age, you don’t actually need catalogue numbers anymore. When a record label uploads an album to Spotify or Apple Music, it does have a barcode, believe it or not. But a catalogue number is no longer needed. What started off as a purely administrative aspect of vinyl production is now a part of the all-encompassing artistic experience of ‘physical music’ that vinyl is keeping alive.
In my early days of collecting vinyl, the catalogue number was a doorway into a deeper experience, helping me to discover other releases either by the same artist or the same label. Take the Thompson Twins, a group that controlled every aspect of their presentation, from remixes to B-sides to picture discs to catalogue numbers.