Green Rykodisc jewel cases: for sale anywhere?

After reading a thread here about the Rykodisc pressings of the David Bowie catalog I've hit the town this week and picked up almost all of them. As they were used CDs most of them didn't come in the green Ryko jewel cases. Since I'm as anal-retentive as they come I'd like to get some light green jewel cases to replace them. Does anyone know if you can buy them anywhere? I checked Ryko's homepage and they don't even provide an email address (only their snail mail address) so I'm guessing they won't be any help. Tried eBay and no one was selling any there either.

Thanks!

 

i think those have become an artifact of days gone by

 

That's what I imagine, too. Thought it wouldn't hurt to ask!

 

The first run of Bowie CDs would have had standard black-tray jewel cases. I think the green ones came out a little bit later, like in 1994 or thereabouts.

 

These are a pretty decent match for the later green ones - I saw these the other day, after we were talking about sleeves for digipaks.

http://www.bagsunlimited.com/p-5110-single-cd-case-no-tray.aspx

 

the very first ryko cases were clear green…too bad i ditched all mine…thats a lotta zappa mostly ...then a lot of bowie…i do still have the discs and booklets, for the most part

 

There are discount bin titles with the green cases that make for good replacements. The prongs on the inner hub often crack.

I don't believe all the Ryko Bowie's were issues with green cases. I like the original cases so if the item came with clear I keep it clear...

There are two types of green cases...one has the lighter inner tray that cracks the prongs easy and has lines on the face of case near spine. The other has different inner tray.

 

I got some of these, cases and trays, from Ryko some years ago now - they were free, and I still have some. The company were happy to send me some after a phone call. One or 2 of my Ryko CDs had cracked cases.

There's likely to be a stock of them somewhere.

 

This is the answer. Ryko issued a lot of obscurities back in the day that can easily be found in dollar bins. $1 ea for green cases ain't bad and you might accidentally find some new muisc you like as an added bonus.

 

The early runs were in standard cases with black trays. The later ones in green. You can tell which one your Bowie releases came in, because the green ones have a picture of Bowie on the inside of the tray liner, and the original ones have plain white on the inside.

 

Yeah, I remember almost all of my Ryko discs would have loose teeth floating in the trays when I bought them.

 

The Greensleeves reggae classics releases, which are still in print, have green tinted cases. As I don't own any to compare, I can't tell you if it's the same shade of green.

 

Buy a bunch of these and discard what you don't want.

 

The Greensleeves are a much darker shade, I got a couple of boxes of the genuine Ryko cases from the distributor, they had boxes of spares, not sure how many I have left, maybe they'll make me rich.

 

Just to add some more ambiguity to the mix, there are also two versions of the back of the case. Towards the later years of Ryko's heyday, they switched from plain green backs to green cases that had the Rykodisc logo very subtly frosted on the bottom right hand corner.

 

Also, my CHANGESBOWIE Gold has Au20 embossed in gold on the front of the (scratched up) green case.

 

Do you think that not having the green case would effect the value of the disc as a collector's item?

 

Wow, I sent a bunch of these off to the re-use centre a couple of weeks ago.

 

Or you could buy up a bunch of Sugar/Bob Mould ryko's for cheap and use the cases, great albums

 

Thanks to everyone who has responded!

I started working for a major (now defunct) music chain in 1988 and opened a record store in the 90's. All of the Ryko promo CDs I remember from that era came in the green jewel cases (releases by Big Star, Badfinger, Marty Willson-Piper, Dave Stewart & Barbara Gaskin, Richard & Linda Thompson; I've still got them all in my collection). The one Bowie promo I got was "Ziggy Stardust" and it's in the green jewel case. The date on the disc is 1991. That's the "Sound & Vision" (post long box) era of Bowie reissues and they all came in green jewel cases. Believe me, I remember having to replace HUNDREDS of those jewel cases that were broken in transit from Ryko headquarters to my shop. It seemed like every single Ryko release arrived with broken teeth in the tray! Those broken teeth would end up all over the place!

 

Yes, without a doubt. Collectors want the item in its original condition with the original packaging.

 

I love the green cases, but replacing them is a chore....

 

And even more: The trays are, as stated above, of 2 kinds - ribbed and unribbed, but they're also 2 different transparencies -the ribbed ones are semi-opaque, the unribbed are fully transparent.

 

I tried in vain to find replacement jewel cases for standard WB CDs - they have a logo on the front bottom right hand corner.(European) or rear (US).

 

As do the Rykodisc green cases... not sure if they all do though.