Blimey, that's your take from this thread? I've seen posts where the host of this forum gives away CD'S and stuff I'm sure he doesn't have the exact legal right to do so. In fact taping an album on a cassette tape years ago was "killing music" Have you ever lent a CD or LP to another human, do you have the license to do that Where does it end?
Hi Scott - got your Vivabeat email, and will be picking up both the CD and the LP (even though I don't currently have a turntable set up.) Also good news on Lene Lovich, who I saw live back in '83 or so - great show. Your involvement gives me hope that it will sound much better than Cherry Red's typical releases. All the best to you and your label.
Because I've just started reading this thread And I wanted to post something is that a good enough answer for you?
I am pleased to see you are doing the Guadalcanal Diary releases. They are an awesome band. I’d love to see definitive CD releases of both Jamboree and Flip Flop with unreleased tracks, live stuff, demos, etc. The band may own and have the rights to the extras. I’m not sure the source of everything on the Rhino Handmade releases. Also for something like this it’s fine if it costs more too. I’m not sure how Rhino Handmade did it - but they basically only sold online in the early years and at premium prices. I don’t know if you could do more promotion and make more by selling direct only for some titles.
Hey Scott, Mike at the In-Groove new stock YouTube channel feed, featured your Oingo Boingo releases today.
Scott, I was recently gifted your remaster of Trees Sleep Convention by a friend and fellow forum member and I’m really enjoying it this afternoon. Right up my new wave/synth pop alley. I will follow it up with some Visage!
Glad you enjoy Trees, I'm sure more people would if they heard it. It still pains me to think about those that went to the scrap heap, but it just wasn't moving. Speaking of Visage, someone mentioned to me a couple months or so back that someone from Universal purchased my CD reissue of The Anvil off eBay, and now I think I know why. My remasters of The Anvil and the Special Dance Mix Album recently appeared on streaming and download services, though not the debut album. All the Boingo EP preorders are just about out the door, and it's been another big turn out, but not a sell out. Some might creep into distribution but if anyone has been holding off, I will be increasing the price once I submit it for distribution. If I've mentioned in the recent past that titles with an MSRP of $26.99 are barely breaking even, even with my new distribution deal, no way will this go into wider release at the current $24.99 price. I'm looking at the present pricing as an early bird or introductory price. I got a new clearance today, and sorry CD fans, it was another LP. So go my big retirement plans, ha! An interesting twist is the clearance came from the legal department and not the usual FCP (final clearance person), though they were still on copy. So, maybe they are delegating responsibility to possibly help move some things along. Another interesting fact is it's one of the LP requests I sent in only a couple of months ago. I do hope some of my dusty requests eventually get resurrected.
They are easier to make perfect copies of than vinyl. And right now people are grotesquely overpaying for vinyl.
Tax write off and freeing space in my basement warehouse. I was sending about 5 copies into distribution every 5-6 months and maybe having one direct sale in that time, so the market had been served and vinyl was requiring more space in the basement.
Oops, my earlier response was with the assumption that you were asking why more LP's were getting approved by the majors than cd's.
They never have. Both Trees and Krisma went right up on streaming services when my CD's came out. When I did my first CD, Ataraxia, someone at Sony asked me for my high resolution remaster, which I gave them and they promptly put on Qobuz and other HD audio sites. No credit, no payment. I think the general viewpoint is they own the music and that includes the mastering, which could be open to argument since I was never hired to remaster for them. But I'm not going to be too concerned, the Visage CD's are out of print but if they were still available then that would be annoying. There's always question if by having my Trees and Krisma remasters online at the same time the CD's were available, if that may have contributed to the lower sales on those two titles. It's anyone's guess. But then they do this often with other third party licensed releases. When Edsel and CR have put out garbage quality mastered from vinyl CD's, the majors will blindly put them on digital services without any verification of quality, and those become the only versions out there, even if master tapes exist. Classix Nouveaux 'Secret' and Thompson Twins 'Set' come to mind.
Between the work you have to go through just to get the labels to clear your releases and how little they seem to care about whether you're able to make any money from your work, it seems outright predatory that they can just lift your masters and put them online.
Not arguing but…I think that the least they could do is what they did; presume authority over the releases which they approved Rubellan Remasters for issuance. Not that I approve of this, but, there might be language in the contracts which entitles them to use any new releases under their purview, out to the streaming sites under their own banner. The lawyers don’t work for the bands, they work for the corporations.
If only it worked like that. From my experience working with different departments within U, it's fairly typical of a large corporation, meaning each department is essentially its own entity who really has little to do with other departments unless necessary. In other words, I'm sure the department that sought out my Visage remasters to make available online had no contact with the licensing team who cleared my original releases, and I'm sure the only people within the organization who even knows about it are the ones who worked on getting my remasters uploaded. Back when my Lucifer CD was still fairly new, I was asked by production if I could send them a copy, which I did and they used it to post on streaming and download sites. Now, that irritated me. But it's not too unlike the fairly recent request in which they asked me to supply my artwork restoration of one of my releases, which turns out it may be used to create a competing product. I'm still pretty steamed about that... if it happens anyway. When it comes to big business, I don't expect much in the way of conscience, and certainly no favors for anything they choose to exploit that I might have worked on. But what's odd is the Lucifer and Visage CD's were done as finished goods deals, and they are supposed to have copies sent to them from the manufacturer at the same time I do, so they should have already had them somewhere.
It's possible they retain the legal right to do so, depending on whether or not that's specified in the licensing agreement. And if they don't retain those rights, it's up to the licensee to decide if it's worth their time, effort and money to pursue legal action. I WOULD say that, morally, they shouldn't be able to benefit from Scott's mastering work - especially for the reasons you've already stated. EDIT: I see @Cherrycherry has already posted the same thing about the legalities.
Well, it's nothing I would ever concern myself with, and certainly not something I would bring up to anyone at U. That would no doubt throw a bigger snag in getting clearances, but I'll just carry on as is. Just ordered my master transfer for the new LP clearance. It's a late 80's album so the master is on umatic tape, and in the UK. I also ordered a copy of the LP off eBay for my artwork restoration. The original LP's are around $30 on the low end, so I'm hopeful that translates to sales potential. I've had the CD since the 80's, this will be my first LP copy.
I mentioned a little while back the second Ocasek CD was being worked in early 2022, and then it was dropped never to be cleared, like so many false starts, and inquiries have been futile. It's not been denied, it's just another case of the FCP moving onto other things, including the other clearances I've received since, and not returning to it or any of the others that were started. If you're going to start a job, finish it. This kind of thing really irritates the hell out of me. Well, I got my master transfer for my LP clearance from last week and have the remastering completed. I got the LP I purchased to create the artwork and have been chugging away on that. But I'm kind of in limbo at the moment because I usually get the agreement to sign within a day, though haven't yet, even with a follow up. So, I'm just going to sit on it until other movement happens. The band in question is still active and I sampled some of their more recent work, and was surprised how good it was. I purchased the two most recent CD's yesterday and should have them for the weekend. I got the Guadalcanal Diary test pressings on Saturday. While one sounded stellar, the other was rejected. There was a very loud POP just into the opening of the first track and when I tried it on my more standard quality turntable, it jumped the groove every time and was on all five copies. The manufacturer has gone back to the stamper creator (RTI) to check if it's in the mother and needs a recut, or just a new stamper. I'm suspecting a new stamper but we will see. A bit annoying and it will likely move the releases out further, as it seemed I got the tests later than usual and now this unexpected showstopper. Gotta love vinyl... The Vivabeat projects are moving along and we're just about set to get the LP to the manufacturer. The audio has been done but we've just finished up all of the credits and such. Since things have been taking a while on these projects, I dropped the idea of an insert for the LP but the booklet for the CD should be more than sufficient, as they are going to provide lyrics and some sort of band history.
Any chance you could offer the insert as a printable pdf or make the cd booklet available to vinyl buyers as an additional purchase? I’m not a cd buyer but will buy the vinyl. I would pay extra for the insert.
