Drastic Plastic Records - punk/post-punk vinyl reissue label

Drastic Plastic is a punk/post-punk vinyl reissue label that started in 2010. This forum has given them praise for their vinyl reissues of The Clash's The Clash (self-titled debut) and Give 'Em Enough Rope.

Their releases.
http://www.drasticplasticonline.com/Drastic-Plastic-Releases_c_251.html

They generally put out releases as limited split-runs, a 150g colored version and a 200g heavyweight black version. Does anyone have comments on whether the the 150g colored version or 200g black version is generally better for this label?

 

I have the two Circle Jerks releases on 200 gram vinyl. They sound great, but I can't compare them to the 150 gram versions.

 

The Drastic releases I've got are:

Au Pairs: playing with a different sex (pink 150g)
Crispy Ambulance: plateau phase (black 180g)
A Certain Ratio: to each... (black 200g)

They all sound good.

Some of their more recent stuff doesn't seem to interesting to me, mostly because a lot of it is easily available on affordable, decent sounding CDs.

 

Their releases are generally made at high quality pressing plants. So far I own:

Black Market Clash
Au Pairs - Playing with a Different Sex (thank god for this reissue)
Agent Orange
The Damned - Machine Gun Etiquette
Mott the Hoople - All the Young Dudes

They're all very nice and sound great!

 

No experience, but thanks for heads up - would love Mind is a Terrible Thing to Taste on vinyl, if only for the college memories.

 

They just reissued Johnny Thunder's "So Alone", and Empire's only lp, formed by ex-Generation X'ers Bob Derwood Andrews and Mark Laff.

 

As a general rule I avoid 200g as it is much harder to get right (I remember Classic having a lot of problems with their 200g releases). There certainly would be no difference in sound anyway so what is the point.

 

Ordering their 200g Mott and Thunders LP's.
Never heard of it being harder to get 200g right. I have a Neil Young or two on 200g and they are fantastic.

 

I have their issue of the Undertones debut on white vinyl, sounds great to me.

 

I think they do a great job. Not all of their releases are from original sources, but they do their best to get great masters. They also have most of their stuff pressed at QRP. The packaging is also usually top notch.

 

I have that one too, also on white vinyl, and I agree that it sounds excellent.

I've also got Black Market Clash and Give 'Em Enough Rope, and both are very good. I had The Clash s/t, which was right up there with my UK original... Red Lorry Yellow Lorry was another good one, split yellow/red wax.

If I'm interested in a particular title, I'm definitely happy if I see that Drastic Plastic is reissuing it.

 

Wondering now if I should go 180g. Hmmmmm...

 

[QUOTE="sberger, post: 11401554, member: 2935" Empire's only lp, formed by ex-Generation X'ers Bob Derwood Andrews and Mark Laff.[/QUOTE]

I wonder what their source was for the Empire LP? IIRC the CD reissue from awhile back was a needledrop from an LP.

 

I wonder what their source was for the Empire LP? IIRC the CD reissue from awhile back was a needledrop from an LP.[/QUOTE]

Yeah my thought too, and I'm guessing because they didn't note that it's from the original tapes as they noted with the Clash, Motorhead, and some others, that it's something less than that. I've got an email in to the company so if I find out anything I'll let you know, but I figured they've released good sounding records in the past and I like having the Empire lp on vinyl. So we'll see.

 

I'd be interested in the Empire LP eventually if it sounds better than the CD version.

 

I have the Clash titles and they're excellent.

 

I wonder what their source was for the Empire LP? IIRC the CD reissue from awhile back was a needledrop from an LP.[/QUOTE]

DP got back to me today:

"The original master tapes have been lost for Empire, so we had the folks at Masterdisk master directly from the original vinyl. The vinyl was played back and captured through a mastering A/D converter into a hi-res audio file. From there the audio was cleaned up and re-mastered. "

FWIW the new release sounds quite good. I had an original back when it was first issued but it's long gone, and never had the cd, so can't compare but I'm quite happy with this release. It's quite limited so probably should jump on it if you're on the fence.

 

Thanks for sharing your experience. If it's still available in the new year I may buy it.

 

I don't think 50g is going to make any difference to anything, so I can't offer an opinion there, but I bought their recent Love and Rockets "Seventh Dream of Teenage Heaven" color vinyl and it was a good purchase. It might be digitally sourced but it was mastered well, and the packaging was exceptional: attention to detail re replicating as closely as possible the original artwork / label, very high quality print and card, and the blue color of the vinyl almost exactly matched the sleeve color. And I heard zero pops or crackles on first play with no cleaning, zero.

Only problem is it was very expensive to get on import from the US, but for US etc friends who won't have to pay so much, a very trustworthy label if my one purchase is anything to go by.

 

Great label - my only criticisms are 1) some of their pressings sell out very, very fast and 2) they need to do more in such an underserved market!

 

My 200g Thunders and Mott arrived. Here are my thoughts..

http://www.metal-rules.com/metalnews/?p=77583

http://www.metal-rules.com/metalnews/?p=77585

 

I have the Gun Club "Las Vegas Story" on green and white marbled vinyl and I'm very happy with the sound quality. I am often tempted to buy, but their prices have gone up recently. I am considering Cramps "Flame Job" reissue

 

I see that they are releasing The Only Ones' s/t debut. I am very interested since I hunted down a UK original copy for years before landing one . . . and I paid too much. The CBS UK LP is mastered very quiet and so surface noise is a bit of a problem - the sound quality is not as good as I had hoped. I am wondering if this new pressing will improve on the original or not, not sure about the provenance and source of the Drastic Plastic version.

I was tempted by All the Young Dudes, too, but I have a UK original of that, too, which sounds great but is noisy. I noticed that the hype just said "Mastered by Kevin Gray," but did not say anything about source -- I am wondering if the Only Ones release will have more specific info.

 

The Clash S/T was my first experience with Drastic Plastic, and only after giving up on finding a clean US or UK first issue and I stopped looking once I heard it. They did a really nice job on that one.

 

Shoot them an email. I'm guessing someone would respond with the answer...