Sierra Records Silver, Gold, and Platinum Clubs

I believe these clubs have been discussed in the long Gene Clark thread, but I haven't seen a thread dedicated to them. The link below describes these clubs.

Sierra Records Mail Order

I signed up for the Platinum Club. Included in my membership is two sampler CDs. From the above link:

""Sierra Records 2017 Sampler" CD (Silver, Gold & Platinum Members) and the end of the year "Sierra Records 2018 Sampler" CD (Platinum members only) will only be available as members. They will NOT BE SOLD OR AVAILABLE IN ANY RETAIL STORE. Making these 'sampler' CDs even more special, the first 100 compact discs will be produced on a 24kt Gold compact disc, a true collector's item. Only 500 memberships are being offered, so you must act now as this email is going out to over 6000 current Sierra Records Mail Order customers."

Note the part above about the 24kt Gold compact disc. I received my copy today, and it is a CD-R. The plastic ring states the following: "700MB MAM-A 24k GOLD ARCHIVE INKJET".

When I received the solicitation about these clubs by e-mail a few weeks ago, I wondered about the gold CD. Are any labels releasing real gold discs anymore? I wondered if Sierra Records would be able to get real gold discs produced cost-effectively. Now I have my answer.

For what it's worth, the CD-R came in a paper sleeve with a flimsy paper insert. The artwork is nothing to write home about.

 

I also signed up for the Platinum package. I don't mind too much that the sampler is a CD-R. It was el freebo and the music is good.

 

Sure, but it's still false advertising.

 

I wrote Sierra Records about the gold sampler CD-R. Their response:

"Audio Fidelity are now 24kt CD-R gold discs exactly like ours, if you
want to cancel your membership, I will refund and you can keep the
disc. I sold out of them anyway, and now just available as a
standard alum. CD. Many labels are now moving to CD-R discs as
replication is dying.

Our future digital releases will be either CD with MQA encoding and
or hybrid SACD."

 

Aren't all of their releases now CD-Rs and DVD-Rs?

 

CD with MQA encoding?? WTF?? Will that even meet the CD standard?

I'm okay with hybrid SACD, though.

 

I have no idea. That would be good to know before I begin placing orders through the Platinum Membership. Maybe I'll just stick with SACDs to be on the safe side.

 

I have never dealt with MQA, so I did a search. Per Wikipedia:

"Master Quality Authenticated (MQA) is an audio codec using lossy compression[1] and a form of file fingerprinting, intended for high fidelity digital audio internet streaming and file download.[2]"

And,

"MQA encoding is lossy;[10] it hierarchically compresses the relatively little energy in the higher frequency bands into data streams that are embedded in the lower frequency bands using proprietary dithering techniques."

Master Quality Authenticated - Wikipedia

The obvious question is why would Sierra Records utilize MQA encoding? Releasing standard 16/44.1 PCM on CD-Rs is bad enough, but why MQA?

 

Have fairly recently ordered one used CD originally published by them, plus one CD and one DVD directly from them; all three "burned", but nicely labeled and packaged.

 

Thanks. I'll focus on their SACDs.

 

Placed my order of 4 CDS more than a month ago to fulfill my membership, and never received my order. Or had a reply to my email inquiry.

Feeling burned and DONE with Sierra.

 

I received an “End of an Era” sale notice from Sierra today. 50% off of everything if you spend $25 or more. What does this mean for the Gold/Platinum clubs, I wonder?

 

Yeah, the wording makes it sounds like a going out of business sale but the more I read it the more I got the impression that it was more a matter of clearing out old stock....hopefully

 

I thought Audio Fidelity simply stopped releasing 24kt CDs, switching to hybrid SACDs instead.

 

This just in..........

"END OF AN ERA SALE-Half Price On The Entire Sierra Records Mail Order Catalog"

THIS is the last sale for 2017 and beyond. Yes, both Black Friday and Cyber Monday are over but for only the next 72 hours, Sierra Records Mail Order is having a half price sale on the entire online catalog (sierrarecords.net) when you order $25.00 or more.
Between now and Midnight December 1, 2017 (Pacific Standard Time) Just go to the website:

sierrarecords.net

This could be your last chance to support Sierra Records.
Sincerely,
John Delgatto, Founder/President

 

That's sad.

But given all the cd-rs people have been getting... I'm not gonna bite.

 

John recently came forward with a new year update announcing that the success of his End of an Era promotion "will insure more great releases in the coming months, years," which is good news.

As to the CD-R issue, as the one who started one of this forum's most extensive CD-R complaint threads (Some OJC (and other Concord CDs) are being re-pressed as CD-Rs. List them here ), I'm obviously not thrilled. But I'm more inclined to give John some slack and my support than I would, say, Universal, which has also put out CD-Rs (as my thread shows) or Warner, which has done the same.

I do think it sucks that he isn't being forthright about what titles are CD-Rs and what titles are legit pressed CDs, and I think in the end that lack of transparency will prove to be a bad business decision for him. Most of us would buy his titles if they were CD-R only, if he advertised the fact. But I also know he's dealing in very small volumes and that Sierra is close to a one-man operation. So, as I said, I give him some slack.

For what it's worth, I bought five titles in the End of an Era sale before I was aware of the CD-R issue. They arrived a week or so ago. Knowing what I now know, I was surprised to find that only one of the four CDs (Clarence White -- 33 Acoustic Guitar Instrumentals) was a CD-R. The others seem legit, though I haven't yet unwrapped my copy of Doug Dillard's The Banjo Album to see if it is too. I was particularly surprised to find that my copies of Nashville West and the Gene Parsons Kindling Collection were not just real CDs with laser-etched matrices, but that they were in old-stock jewel cases with the CDDA logo. He was only charging something like $3 for them so I'm kind of shocked.

On an unrelated note, does everybody's copy of Kindling Collection have an upside-down back cover?

 

Did any platinum member receive the "SIERRA RECORDS 2018 Sampler" that will be shipped this FALL 2017 which will include just discovered, the earliest professional studio recording of Gram Parsons from the early 1960s."?

 

Received this email...
"limited edition vinyl"

 

Huh. Never received this email or a refund. Color me annoyed.

 

This morning's email included this message from John Delgatto announcing the closing of Sierra mail order. After the shipping problems with the Gene Clark release, I wondered how much longer he would continue. I guess it was inevitable, but it still makes me sad that his company is going out of business on kind of a bum note. I was lucky enough to get my order quickly, but I saw lots of angry posts from customers who didn't.

I am grateful for all the fantastic music and books that I have ordered from John over the past 25 years or so. I wish him nothing, but the best.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


SIERRA RECORDS MAIL ORDER

WEB STORE CLOSING

It is with regret that I am closing the Sierra Record Mail Order website effective July 31, 2018. Since 2004, I have provide online ordering for some the best music ever made. Before that, direct mail ordering that began in November 1971 with a tiny ad in Bluegrass Unlimited magazine.

There were several factors leading to this decision. The website hosting company for Sierra since 2004, goemerchant.com, is discontinuing their current 'shopping cart' software in favor of a "new premium cart" that is incompatible with what has been offered over the years. Second, the mail order business has declined to the point that it is no longer cost effective. I am joining other such independent mail order companies that have closed in recent months, years like Folk Era/Rediscover and the gold standard of mail order, County Sales.

Then I was faced with the recent problems with the postal services here and abroad which has caused me both money and my patience. Lastly, my on going battle with lung cancer and now arthritis in my right hand (making it almost impossible to package orders now) being the last straw.

The future of the label itself is yet to be written. Starting on August 1, 2018 when you go to any of the current websites- sierra records.com or sierrarecords.net you will be directed to a one page site, sierraglobal.net where in the coming months I will post information on what the future holds. You can still reach me at the either "[email protected]" or "[email protected]".

Some of the titles that are currently available at the Sierra web store will no longer be available for purchase in the near future. After that, most of them should be available at places like amazon.com, acoustic sounds, elusive disc, etc. They along with with itunes, pandora, spotify, emusic, etc. will be carrying the digital download/streaming versions of the catalog now and in the coming months. So if there is anything you wanted to purchase but held off, this will be your last opportunity. All new orders until July 31, 2018 will be shipped into August.

I know this sounds like one of those old "going out business sales" that never ends. I can assure you, it is not. It's an end of an era.

Entrée Records, the specialty label, will continue to issue a wide variety of music releases including those for future 'Record Store Day' events. Again, these will be available at your local 'brick and mortar stores' and amazon.com moving forward.

A simple 'thank you' seems inadequate at this time. Sharing this music with you first when I began as a "DJ" in 1966 in Pasadena through the 70s, 80s, 90s, 2000s with the record labels, until now, has been an honor. My hope is that there was at least a song or two that I released that brought you joy and pleasure.

Not really a goodbye, but just as Gram was fond of closing his letters,

Sound as ever,

John Delgatto