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Thread: Time Life collection TV offers

  1. #1

    Time Life collection TV offers

    Have you ever ordered CD collections from them? (I was recently given their "We Love The Night Life" disco collection as a gift. Great stuff!)

    Question- they claim to have a 30-day money back guarantee. (& "no questions asked") What would stop someone from ordering, ripping the CDs & then sending the whole thing back?

  2. #2
    No. What's the point? They put a truckload of shit on those things, just because they were "number one hits" or whatever, and the stuff that's worth owning is easy enough to get on the actual albums by those artists (frequently accompanied by much better songs, too!). Unless you want to demonstrate how variable popular music has been over the course of the 60 years, they're completely superfluous.

    Having said that, I did get a few ideas for things to play on Journey Of The Sorcerer's Apprentice from a couple of those infomercials. Yeah, I've actually sat and watched a couple of them, that's how I ended up playing Delta Dawn a couple months ago. The "host" patter is obnoxious, but some of the music you hear is good. The operative word being some of the music.

    I remember the old Reader's Digest sets that were kinda nice. My mom had the "Great Hits Of The 50's And 60's" set on 8-track (!), which is how I first heard The Supremes, Ramsey Lewis, Hugo Montengro (!!), Horst Jankowski (!!!), Otis Redding, The Association, Dusty Springfield, and The Youngbloods.

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    anyone ordering those Time Life things are "old school" listeners who still value packaging and having something as part of their collection.

  4. #4
    Quote Originally Posted by benson View Post
    anyone ordering those Time Life things are "old school" listeners who still value packaging and having something as part of their collection.
    Anyone ordering those sets are people who think the upper reaches of the Billboard charts represent some high watermark for quality or whatever.

    Back to the Reader's Digest set: I just found the track list, and it turns out the fourth tape was relatively consistently good. The other three tapes in the series was littered with crap like Pat Boone, Nino Tempo and April Stevens (winners of the various "Best Rock N Roll Recording" Grammy!), Perry Como and other performers who make anyone with good taste thankful for the existence Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, and Chuck Berry.

    I actually mainly only remember the fourth tape (the other three disappeared somewhere in the mid 70's...my attorney has advised to not discuss that matter any further), and the worthwhile stuff on the others one I heard either via sources (including the American Graffiti and Animal House soundtracks).

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    ALL ACCESS Gruno's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by GuitarGeek View Post
    Anyone ordering those sets are people who think the upper reaches of the Billboard charts represent some high watermark for quality or whatever.
    .
    Snobby thinking.

    Ever think some who buy those are doing so because they simply enjoy those songs all in one collection?

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    I have Classical Thunder vols I and II sets by Time Life which I bought in the mid 90's when I was just getting into classical music. The set were by Telarc which always were very good sounding disks. I know somewhere there is another TL set or two around. Growing up, there was plenty of Time Life book sets in my house and also Readers Digest sets.

    Yes, I still would rather have a CD over an mp3 file. If I have the CD I can always make an electronic file. Old school and proud of it!
    Last edited by Tangram; 09-01-2013 at 11:27 PM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Gruno View Post
    Snobby thinking.

    Ever think some who buy those are doing so because they simply enjoy those songs all in one collection?
    Exactly!

  8. #8
    I must have a dozen of these releases "Hits of the 60's /70's" done by Time Life / Readers Digest / KTel or whomever... call them guilty pleasures... you can find them for $1-$2 each in the used section of most any record store (I know they are few and far between nowadays)... The time and cost for me to cull "those" songs and burn them on a separate CD... are you kidding? Add to the fact that the majority of theses songs were singles (which I stopped buying years ago) and not available on albums.. When my wife and I are on a road trip / vacation.. etc.. these are always "go to" CD's where there is no disagreements on what to play!

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    Member rcarlberg's Avatar
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    Be wary however, it was not uncommon back in the day for these "greatest hits" compilations to use re-recordings of the actual hits -- sometimes not even by the original artists!

  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by rcarlberg View Post
    Be wary however, it was not uncommon back in the day for these "greatest hits" compilations to use re-recordings of the actual hits -- sometimes not even by the original artists!
    A friend fell prey to this... He loaned me a 2 CD set to burn and I mentioned to him... "you realize these aren't the original" artists don't you?"... much to his embarrassment he agreed!

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    Member nosebone's Avatar
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    The Sound Effects on Ktel in the 70s!
    no tunes, no dynamics, no nosebone

  12. #12
    Progga mogrooves's Avatar
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    Years ago my wife bought for me the Time-Life cd series Living the Blues, an excellent, representative overview of recorded blues history contained in 20+ cds that I received in installments over about a year.

    Quote Originally Posted by Rickenbacker View Post
    What would stop someone from ordering, ripping the CDs & then sending the whole thing back?
    Nothing. But Time-Life is playing the percentages; most people don't return them.
    Hell, they ain't even old-timey ! - Homer Stokes

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    Quote Originally Posted by JJ88 View Post
    I have not encountered or read about many Time Life compilations having re-recordings. I'm a bit of an 'oldies' junkie I suppose, and have always tried to avoid those sort of releases.

    Rhino did a few interesting compilations, one I have is a very nice CD called 'Summer of Love' of what would be called 'sunshine pop' and has all mono mixes.
    The Rhino "Decade" compilations are excellent, mainly the 70's 80s and 90's collections.

  14. #14
    Anyone who pays full price for these is a chump, they’ll be plentiful at your local Goodwill for pennies on the dollar soon enough.

    Quote Originally Posted by rcarlberg View Post
    Be wary however, it was not uncommon back in the day for these "greatest hits" compilations to use re-recordings of the actual hits -- sometimes not even by the original artists!
    Pickwick Records had session musicians re-record popular hits of the day, the results were often hilarious (the version of “Bohemian Rhapsody” on Million or More in ’76, for example).

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  15. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by rcarlberg View Post
    Be wary however, it was not uncommon back in the day for these "greatest hits" compilations to use re-recordings of the actual hits -- sometimes not even by the original artists!
    And didn't some of them, in the LP days, occasionally speed the tapes up slightly, so they squeeze more songs onto each LP side? Also, don't some of them also use single edits, too?

  16. #16
    Quote Originally Posted by JJ88 View Post
    I have not encountered or read about many Time Life compilations having re-recordings. I'm a bit of an 'oldies' junkie I suppose, and have always tried to avoid those sort of releases.
    These days, they specifically state in the advertising that the sets contain "absolutely no re-recordings", so I imagine they'd be in for a class action lawsuit if they actually used any.

  17. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by Progbear View Post
    Pickwick Records had session musicians re-record popular hits of the day, the results were often hilarious (the version of “Bohemian Rhapsody” on Million or More in ’76, for example).
    When I was a kid, I had two or three records that were apparently done by "anonymous session players". They were part of a series of records, apparently configured to represent a pseudo radio broadcast (hey, just like Journey Of The Sorcerer's Apprentice) or "dance party", hosted by a DJ named Irwin, The Disco Duck. And yes, the first album in the series had the Rick Dees song on it, along with DJ patter between the songs done in the same voice as the "duck" in the song (though apparently, there was also a second pressing which used a normal DJ voice, as did all the subsequent albums, which suggests that the long arm of Walt reached out from beyond the grave with the "duck" voice, as it was obviously patterned on Donald).

    I also had one or two other cheapie records, one that I remember distinctly I think was on Wonderland Records, and had what I think were re-recorded versions of things like the Deodato version of the Also Sprach Zarathustra fanfare (see? I'm so pretentious I can't even be bothered to refer to it simply as 2001, the way it does on the record!), the disco version of the Star Wars theme, there was also a sort of disco/lounge jazz arrangement of the Star Trek theme, and I think also the Six Million Dollar Man theme.

    And there was another record I remember from when I was little, though I think this one my mom simply borrowed from the library and copied onto cassette for me, that had the disco arrangement of the Close Encounters Of The Third Kind motif (hats off to whoever it was who figured out how to literally build a 3 minute disco arrangement out of a five note motif), and more sci-fi themes, but also things like Short People (yes, the Randy Newman song) and We Are The Champions. What a weird gaggle of songs to throw together!

    Oh, and then there was also Chipmunk Punk and Chipmunk Rock, the former of which, despite it's title had no punk songs on it (though I think the album cover was supposed to be an allusion to the first Ramones album cover). Oh yeah, and better not forget Urban Chipmunk (the Chipmunks go country!).

  18. #18
    Connoisseur of stuff. Obscured's Avatar
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    I actually worked late/overnight shifts as a phone order taker some 10-15 years ago for TimeLife. I would process your credit card or check payment if you were buying their Motown Hits collection. "Hi, thanks for ordering your Motown! My name is Joe, may I have your credit card number please." After the sale was made for the cd, we would try and get the buyer to purchase a copy of the video too. "This is a limited offer (yeah, yeah, limited to anyone that wanted to buy it) of many of those same artists you love from a live performance never before seen (except of course by those that had seen it). We have not advertised this on tv because a very limited (see earlier) number are available".
    I could not believe how those 50+ phones in our steamroom started to ring 25 minutes after the ad would run. I made a ton of money as commissions were high, especially for the videos. The ads ran all over the country especially in the wee hours.
    BTW, I did get copies of the cd and videos and enjoyed them quite well. Would have I paid for them....well, no. I am a purist and would have bought the actual albums, but for someone who likes hits, especially to play at parties, go for it. Although if one truly wanted to hear those Motown classics, all one had to do was turn on any one of many radio stations.
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  19. #19
    Quote Originally Posted by Obscured View Post
    " After the sale was made for the cd, we would try and get the buyer to purchase a copy of the video too. "This is a limited offer (yeah, yeah, limited to anyone that wanted to buy it) of many of those same artists you love from a live performance never before seen (except of course by those that had seen it). We have not advertised this on tv because a very limited (see earlier) number are available".
    Kinda like those ads that Vince guy does now, ya know for the Sham Wow or whatever..."If you call in the next 10 minutes, because we can't do this all day". Wait a minute, your ad runs at all hours of the day and night, so in effect, you are doing this "special offer" all day.

  20. #20
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    I stopped by a yard sale this weekend and picked up a Time/Life set (or pieces of it) called Flower Power for $5! There was a pile of 9 double CDs, all belonging to this Time/Life collection. Looking quickly through it, I thought I had at least half of the material on it, but I thought I'd ask how much anyway. When the woman told me "$5 for the set" I said "Wow, I'll take it". I picked up the CDs, gave her the 5 bucks, and practically ran to my car.

    I still haven't looked through all of them, but now I realize that I have around 75% of the material. Still, it was a great deal, and it's nice to throw those CDs on and take a ride through the late 60s and early 70s. And it's great to have those songs I didn't already have.

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