Glenn A. Baker is a rock historian, collector, author and impresario. Now 72, he’s offloading his lifetime collection of 80,000 vinyl records, CDs and pieces of rock memorabilia accumulated over more than six decades.

Fitz: How old were you when rock ‘n’ roll transfixed you?

Glann A. Baker with some of his estimated 50,000-strong record collection.Credit: Louise Kennerley

GAB: I was 12, sitting at home in my red jammies, watching the evening news. It led with the arrival of the Beatles at Mascot Airport on their 1964 tour, and my life was never the same again. Just seeing them, hearing a burst of their music, changed my view of everything, and even though I couldn’t afford to buy the records, I could walk into a record shop and actually touch the brown Parlophone sleeves, which also carried releases by The Easybeats and The Hollies. It filled me with such joy, captivated me, and as soon as I had saved up enough money, I started collecting LP records. I’ve kept collecting since – enough to fill three semi-trailers, and most of a warehouse.

Fitz: You were an odd kid?

GAB: I went to 12 schools in 10 years, had three different names, and I think three or four fathers.

Fitz: Without pretending to be your psychoanalyst, is there any connection between the background of having multiple names, schools and fathers and obsessing about records? Did they become your anchor?

Baker with Jimmy Barnes in 2008.Credit: Anthony Johnson

GAB: Absolutely correct. I actually could never make friends, never have any social structure because I moved on so quickly. And so the records sort of became my friends. I had a small battery-powered record player, which I carted around with me when I went from school to school. Plus, I had this sort of encyclopaedic recall of data, and I just remembered everything that was on the label; who produced it, where and when it was done. All that stuff.

Fitz: So what was your professional breakthrough, from loving and collecting records as a kid to being paid money to write and talk about them?

GAB: I have to credit a man who’s no longer with us, Graham Webb, a legendary DJ who had a show at Channel Seven called Sounds Unlimited. I was often on the set, and every time one of the guests didn’t show and he needed somebody who could talk under wet cement, he’d throw me on. From there, I went on to spend 40 years on television, doing things like Countdown, The Midday Show, Good Morning Australia, Today and Sunrise because I could express the excitement many felt when the cameras turned my way.

Fitz: Where did your signature hat, like a fez without a tail, come from, and why couldn’t you wear a red bandana like normal people?

Baker with Sydney artist Nafisa who painted his portrait for the 2010 Archibald Prize. The picture won the Packing Room Prize.Credit: Louise Kennerley

GAB: [Laughing.] I first wore it for fun for the cover of one of my travel books, sitting upon the engine of a 747 – they had to get a ladder to get........

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