Thanks, Beave. We're all yearning for the The Monkees on Blu-ray. I'm happy with my Monkees music collection and I only wanted the Blu-ray episodes. At the time, $200 for the videos and music was overkill for me.
You got it! What I'll do is what I did with the Tex Avery collection. I'll keep an eye out for someone blu raying them privately. Probably wont have artwork but I don't care if the price is right. Heck, years ago I got CD's of mp3's of the Beatles 'Thirty Days' bootleg, I forgot how many cd's the actual issue was, but it was a lot, I got 3 cd'r's for like $29. So there are people filling that niche out there, it's just a matter of keeping my eye out for them. But I fear, if Rhino leases the HD data to a streaming service, then we'll never see legit physical product again. And that's scary. But again, it's the times we're in right now. BeaVe
$200 is pricey for a 2 season show. I didn’t bite right away either. Then it dropped $50 and I just thought I might as well get it now instead of waiting for it to drop a few more bucks, which I thought it would. Short time later it was gone. I was stunned because I felt Rhino was asking too much for the set and it’d be around forever or have its price collapse.
their original Nuggets album on vinyl had a version of the Vegetables-I Still Love You that never appeared again anywhere...I needle dropped it thankfully! I love that version.
And it IS. BUT, as a collector I personally look at it like this, and guys and gals this is just my thing I go by, If it’s done Well, and it’s on physical media, then I Will pay a premium for it as I look at my collection as not so much a collection of music schiit, but a private Smithsonian library. And in that view, yeah $200 is a lot of money. But acquiring a master video elements of a complete series in high def, to ME….$200 is chump change. I look at it this way, we’ve been living in a world where technology AND marketing are changing SO FAST that it’s very hard to keep up with it. So when I see a product come out, either audio or video, and it looks like it’s been done correctly, I go for it. Within reason, I’m not going to pay $500 for the Monkees Blu ray set. But the reality is that we’re probably never going to see that set again. It’s Gone. Poof, just like that, gone, because of fate and bitching fans. Fair enough, because I agree that Rhino was really stupid in the dumb box, the big price, and they botched it all up. But their not the only dumbschitts out there. I’m a HUGE fan of the UK 26 episode documentary “THE WORLD AT WAR”, which I first saw on pbs in the 70’s. They’ve had like 8 different issues from vhs to dvd to BluRay and they, in America, botched up EVERY issue over 3 decades! Finally, FINALLY a British company took HD transfers in the Correct Aspect Ratio of 4:3 and put it out on BluRay, BUT ONLY IN EUROPE which is incompatible with BluRay players in the USA. To me, it was a no brainer. This was history and this type of proper remastering is never going to happen again, so I bought the British set and bought a region hack for my OPPO 103. Crazy if you ask me but I HAVE to preserve what I love when it’s done right, because physical media is dying fast, so while I can, I’ll pay the price for a Library piece. And just as a point, last Christmas, my wife wanted to watch Home Alone with our grandkids, went on YouTube, nope, went on Netflix, nope, went on Amazon prime… Bingo!……..uh………maybe not, $5.99 to watch a 20 year old movie we already have on vhs. I DONT THINK SO. Then we scored a dvd at goodwill of it for $1.99. And now we watch it whenever we want without paying for the privilege. Ok, I’m done fo4 the night, have to wake up at 3:40am to go to work My best to you all! Beave
Good points. And our willingness to pay a certain amount of money for product isn’t always consistent or is influenced by rarity value. A few years after the MGM stereo version of Yellow Submarine went out of print in the early 90s, I ponied up $200 for a sealed copy of the laserdisc. I choked on the expense, but not too much. When the fully restored and far superior version from Apple came out years later on BluRay I think I grumbled over the $40 list price! I’ve spent hundreds on individual Springsteen bootlegs sourced from audience tapes, but these days I whine about a $15 fee for a fast and easy download of a Bruce show that was professionally recorded. Go figure.
Thanks for the sanity check. In the meantime, some people are trying to sell the Blu-ray/CD set for 1,000.oo +/-!
While I'm not parting with my box set any time soon, I've got a spare box if that's any consolidation
Just Checked right now. $555 $561 $571 $750 $799 $800 $847 $930 $1050 So all these SOLD in the past 30 days. People ARE paying these prices. WOW. And their are like 4 or 5 up for sale right now. I guess if you've got some disposable income and you can let the kid out, makes a great present to yourself! Excellent!! Good for you!! Beave
I'm very grateful for my copy. I shouldn't have hesitated and just went all in when Rhino first offered it. At least I paid a price I can live with. Those eBay numbers are scary.
Clark, I think a lot of us have been there. You do the best you can at the time. We can't really predict the future, especially with technologies, which are evolving so fast. I didn't even know about the Monkees Blu Ray debacle until like 3 weeks ago. Luckily, I did have some disposable income and got both DVD sets for $178 total, which to me all things considered, was OK. And Ironically, I received them like a week before Mike Passed away. Now, even the dvd sets have shot up to close to the $200 for each season, $400 for both, or even higher. What Rhino COULD DO, but won't, is MOD the set themselves. They've got the digital files/Blu Ray Masters. Or just partner with Amazon, they already have the equipment to burn them and print up artwork. But then you run into the Price problem. If they sold burnt discs at say, $99 list price your still going to have complaints about a Hundred Dollar set of burnt discs. So, it's really not a good situation for the Physical Product scenario. And that's why I plunked down the cash now, and I'm glad i did. But when you look at just the cost of the boxes without tax and shipping, it was reasonable, $50 for season 1 in excellent condition and $108 for a sealed season 2. But very much like a Lot of Bands I Love, like the Stones and Beatles and Who, we've really been spoiled by product over the past 20 or more years. And now the sun is starting to set a bit, Sad, but at the same time, we still got a lot of goodies over the past years. Happy Tuesday Beave
What's the reasoning behind the series not making it's way to any streaming platforms? This would definitely knock the value of the set from the obscene amount now, but would still keep the bonus content exclusive. The lack of access to the series for the public outside of free YouTube uploads is the most frustrating thing in all of this IMO.
A few months ago you could find both seasons and Head on both Tubi and CTV, IIRC there was some rumors' and discussion about services not paying and a little later on they were removed. I think Head is still on CTV but nonetheless its disappointing there's nowhere to watch them officially.
I think the problem is that Sony still owns the broadcasting/streaming rights. I know Sony was not happy about the Rhino purchase.
NO DOUBT the following has already been asked, but: Does this collection feature the ORIGINAL unedited shows pre-1969? That year producers swapped in newer tunes from old to promote the later Monkee records. For example, “Good Clean Fun” wasn’t recorded until after the show wrapped so it would be cool to hear the original tunes reinstated.
From what I understand, the streaming services are happy to stream just about any television show. As long as they don’t have to pay anyone. For obvious reasons us reasons the people that own the content don’t want to just give it away. Having said that, if someone like Disney came calling- and agreed to promote it and feature it on the launch page— Handing over the streaming rights to the monkees at no charge might be worth it.
Yes, it has all the original 1966/67/68 versions. The syndicated versions seem to actually be few and far between by comparison.
Well, it’s worth a try but believe me, their well aware of what The Monkees have generated income wise over the past 3 decades. If nobody at Warner is enthusiastic about it then it might be flogging a dead horse. A big conglomerate who eats up a smaller entity knows what that entity brought to the financial table. They might be viewing the Rhino Monkees project as having run its course. If that’s the case, then future streaming is the only thing that might happen. Their well aware of the problems the BluRay box had and the fandoms complaints. With all the jockeying going on with streaming services right now, (every company is looking to make a dent into this new market) the last thing their thinking about is the Monkees. Case in point, Benny Goodman. Except for some legit US titles, his RCA catalog just sits there. There is an old 16 LP vinyl set that’s great, but it’s so unpopular right now that it’s going for like $50 in near mint condition. 16 lp’s pressed in Japan on the vinyl Mofi used and there is little to no interest in it. Benny Goodman, an American icon……. And almost nothing. So again, a sad situation to be sure. I’d sign the petition, but if their even giving up on Looney Tunes, then you KNOW we’re in trouble here. Beave