The Final Bankaccountkiller

[Josh Mooney <jdmooney@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

on 7/3/03 3:30 AM, zeppelin-digest at owner-zeppelin-digest@xxxxxxxx wrote:

> Date: Wed, 2 Jul 2003 15:56:00 -0400 (EDT)
> From: James Holloway <jwholler@xxxxxxxxx>
> Subject: Re: The Final Bankaccountkiller
> 
> I apologize in advance if this is an idiotic question, but what is it,
> exactly? 70 discs of what?
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> James Holloway

"The Final Bankaccountkiller." Oh, man, that's hilarious! Good one!


It's not an idiotic question, James. "The Final Option" is a stunningly
obsessive, quite rare assemblage of 70 LPs' worth of Zep boots, released in
a limited, numbered run of 150. I'm not sure when it was made, but some time
before 1990. I've been intrigued by it since I first heard about it years
ago. Like, who would put together a special box of 70 LPs, printed,
apparently, from the original plates, and then only make 150 sets?

But I quite agree with the man who suggested you'd have to be nuts to buy
it. $4000? As the starting bid price? Hey, I'm sure the box it comes in is
swell, but come on---that's almost $60 per disc. But if you're supremely
rich (billionaire-rich, say), then four grand is nothing---it's what you pay
in a month to the guys who keep the bugs off the flowers in ONE of your
gardens on ONE of your estates.  It's good to keep these things in
perspective.

I guess one question would be, are any of these vinyl boots better than any
more recently minted CD versions? Maybe an expert out there can tell us. I
have three vinyl boots included in the "Final Option" set, and have better,
later versions of those shows on CD, to be sure.  In the meantime, I'll
quote from Robert Godwin's "The Illustrated Collectors Guide to Led
Zeppelin, 3rd Edition": "This is an item that is only for the really serious
collector." And how.

I notice that the Ebay seller doesn't bother to include a legible photo of
the back cover, listing what's in the set. The titles aren't mentioned
anywhere else, either. Sloppy, to say the least. Nor does he say what
condition the vinyl is in.

I'll be really surprised if it sells on Ebay. I remember when that poor
dude---a roadie or something---offered up Jimmy's guitar bow from the '77
tour on Ebay, asking 50 grand for it. He said he'd hand-deliver it to you.
Uh, great. Thanks. That's worth an extra $45 thousand. No one bought it, of
course. And a year or so later, I think it was down to about $5000. I wonder
if it ever sold? Anyway, I think this set has only a slightly better chance
of selling. But feel free to prove me wrong.

- --Josh