Anthony Phillips had a lot of records on Passport. I never had much problem with those pressings.
Bill
Anthony Phillips had a lot of records on Passport. I never had much problem with those pressings.
Bill
She'll be standing on the bar soon
With a fish head and a harpoon
and a fake beard plastered on her brow.
The weight of the record -- 180 grams, 160 grams, 140 or in the case of Dynaflex even 125 grams -- is not as important as the COMPOSITION of the vinyl. During the oil shortage vinyl records began appearing with substantial percentages of recycled vinyl in them -- old melted down Heino records -- and of course it was too much work to remove the labels first. The Dynaflex records had some kind of plasticizer in them which supposedly kept them quieter and, aside from an elevated tendency to warp, they generally WERE very good sounding LPs.
It's true the labels stopped producing esoteric experimental low-volume albums in the early-'80s, but I don't think it had anything to do with increasing costs. It was a business decision. Multi-million sellers (like Michael Jackson's "Thriller" 1982) have huge profit margins, and all the record execs liked unlimited coke budgets. Whereas previously record publishing was somewhat like book publishing, where a publisher keeps certain low-volume titles in print for the prestige of being their publisher, after "Thriller" everyone wanted the home run, base hits weren't good enough anymore.
I haven't noticed any difference in sound quality between 140g vinyl and 200g vinyl. The only difference is that I need to raise the tone arm height to play the thicker vinyl.
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Laura
Well, yeah, there was that. But I was talking more late 70's. The "esoteric music being bankrolled by big record labels" thing kinda ended more in the late 70's. Think about some of the records that were around in the early 70's that were put out by big labels. Consider Columbia, for instance. They released Bitches Brew, Sextant, Caravansarai at least three Soft Machine albums (and a couple Hugh Hopper solo records, too). NONE of those records has anything that even remotely sounds like it was aimed at being "a hit". But someone at the label (presumably Clive Davis or one of his underlings) must have thought they could at least break even, while at the same releasing fantastically creative music.
BUt by the mid 70's, that was kind of over. It seemed like everyone was moving in a more middle of the road direction, or else they were working for smaller labels who were less concerned about hits than they were about just making good music.
Oh sure, there were a couple guys at Arista who went off the reservation and signed Happy The Man and Anthony Braxton, but that was kind of like the exception during that era. Everyone else was backing away from stuff that they didn't think would make it on radio in some shape or form.
Of course, the whole industry was changing in general. AOR was replacing freeform progressive rock radio stations, "jazz radio" was kinda becoming an endangered species. And of course, there was the rise of punk and disco, which is said to have had a lot to do with everyone burying their faces in Mount Everest sized piles of Peruvian marching powder to the extent that "trippy" music was cutting it anymore.
So who knows what happened. There was so many different things going on once.
The go-go eighties happened, when greed suddenly became a laudable goal in and of itself and nothing else mattered.
No, it's on the other side of town. It's on W.14.
A Separate Reality Records
2678 W 14th St, Cleveland, OH 44113
(216) 644-7934
https://g.co/kgs/jvIdEf
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Laura
Thanks, I'll have to check it out!
I visited a record store in the Tremont area (I think) several years ago that was set up like an art studio, with a couple of floors. They didn't have much stock at the time, as they had just opened. I recall buying a UK press of Crimson's Earthbound but that was about it. I wonder if that's it?
Another record store I remember from the 90s is Chris' Warped Records.
Speaking of the 90s and vinyl, I'm currently playing "White Light, White Heat, White Trash" by Social Distortion, which was a 1996 release by Sony.
Social Distortion was somewhat popular, but they were never on the level of Nirvana or Pearl Jam, so the fact that Sony released that album on vinyl in 1996 is somewhat surprising. I forgot I even had it, and found it searching through my vinyl. I probably haven't played it for 20 years.
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Last edited by lak611; 01-01-2017 at 01:19 PM.
Laura
Dinosaur Jr. is another band where the label released LPs through the 90's. I guess for those alt-rock guitar oriented bands, vinyl was still "in" and it was profitable enough for the labels to keep making it.
Chris" Warped Records is defunct now. I still had the shrink wrap on the Social D album with the $8 price tag, which is what I paid for the new record in 1996.
I saw Social D at the Cleveland Agora in 1996.
Back in the 90s, I went to all sorts of concerts/clubs. I saw everything from indie rock (Sebadoh, Guided by Voices, The Jesus Lizard), punk (Social D, Murphy's Law), prog (ELP, Yes, Pink Floyd, Daevid Allen/Kevin Ayers), jazz (local bands at Sixth Street Under and Night Town), country (Willie Nelson), classic rock (Bob Dylan, Deep Purple), metal (Judas Priest, Metallica, Ozzfest), classical (free concerts at the Cleveland Music Institute). That's just a small snippet, but I went to everything from small clubs to stadium/arena shows.
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Last edited by lak611; 01-01-2017 at 08:28 PM.
Laura
Confirmed Bachelors: the dramedy hit of 1883...
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