What are RCA Record Club lp's. I presume they are lp's sold through a club? Do they generally sound worse or better, first or last pressings? Any info welcome.
If I remember correctly RCA music club was the old name for the "BMG Music Club" or whatever they call it now... Their LPs were sometimes good, mostly just ok, and sometimes really aweful sounding. Every now and then you would get a "real" copy of an lp that didn't have any mention of it being from the club, but it was only occasionally. I am so old that I was once a member of the Columbia House 8 track club!! I know those Styx 8 tracks are around here somewhere....
The pressings that the record clubs made were mostly put on "thier own" vinyl, but yeah, the cutting was either cloned or a stamp made by them. Some issues sound just fine, but most don't yield anything amazing....just good. Don't break your legs for a record club pressing unless it's a record ya want, and it's mint. That's all...
If you want the originals, don't buy anything from the RCA/BMG or the Columbia House Record Club. Like Sckott just said, these Record Clubs had "their own" vinyl manufactured for them unless it was an in-house title. I have returned this kind of records to used record stores just because they were record club version and I had missed it. The Record Club of America, if I remember the name correctly, was different, though. It bought from the record labels then put a small sticker on the covers. Some of those could be first pressings.
