diff --git a/beets/ui/__init__.py b/beets/ui/__init__.py
index cdc29cc28..cdcf778e2 100644
--- a/beets/ui/__init__.py
+++ b/beets/ui/__init__.py
@@ -695,6 +695,33 @@ class SubcommandsOptionParser(optparse.OptionParser):
         return options, subcommand, suboptions, subargs
 
 
+# callback for an option with variable arguments
+# parser.add_option("-c", "--callback", dest="vararg_attr",
+#                   action="callback", callback=vararg_callback)
+
+def vararg_callback(option, opt_str, value, parser):
+    assert value is None
+    value = []
+
+    def floatable(str):
+        try:
+            float(str)
+            return True
+        except ValueError:
+            return False
+
+    for arg in parser.rargs:
+        # stop on --foo like options
+        if arg[:2] == "--" and len(arg) > 2:
+            break
+        # stop on -a, but not on -3 or -3.0
+        if arg[:1] == "-" and len(arg) > 1 and not floatable(arg):
+            break
+        value.append(arg)
+
+    del parser.rargs[:len(value)]
+    setattr(parser.values, option.dest, value)
+
 # The root parser and its main function.
 
 def _raw_main(args):
diff --git a/docs/changelog.rst b/docs/changelog.rst
index b3679293d..4ba970a5f 100644
--- a/docs/changelog.rst
+++ b/docs/changelog.rst
@@ -6,6 +6,10 @@ Changelog
 
 New features:
 
+* :ref:`add_subcommands`: Added ``optparse`` callback utility function, allowing
+  plugin developers to add options with ``action=callback`` and
+  ``callback=beets.ui.varargs_callback`` and a variable number of arguments.
+
 * :doc:`/plugins/duplicates`: The new ``keys`` option allows you to specify
   arbitrary fields over which to consider potential duplicates.
 
diff --git a/docs/dev/plugins.rst b/docs/dev/plugins.rst
index eacd3c271..6feb73326 100644
--- a/docs/dev/plugins.rst
+++ b/docs/dev/plugins.rst
@@ -44,6 +44,8 @@ containing your plugin).
 
 .. _virtualenv: http://pypi.python.org/pypi/virtualenv
 
+.. _add_subcommands:
+
 Add Commands to the CLI
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^