I think y'all are saying the same thing now. That redubbing tape is what Fremer is referring to when he says "original master tape". It would have made huge news if they somehow found the actual original tape. The EMI tape they found at Abbey Road a few years back I believe is the closest to an OG tape that exists from what I have read.
Sounds like there isn't an original tape according to Hoffman. I'm not sure what exactly they did at bell sound, but it sounds like the original recording tape went in and all that came out was the re-dub, which he has also referred to as "the cutting tape" I don't know anything about that process so I can't venture a guess as to why.
He says it in one of those posts--companies did redubs to simply bill more. It was standard practice back then. It was also sadly standard practice in the 70s for a lot of actual masters to just get thrown out or they were poorly taken care of. ABC in particular had lots of cost-cutting which resulted in lots of sad consequences. Michael Cuscuna who has overseen tons of jazz reissues said this:
May be true. It's strange that out of many Impulse titles of the same era, it seems a Love Supreme was the only one that happened to though if what he said is was common. And if what Steve said was true, that the only time ALS original master was used was at bell sound, then I'm not sure why it would be wearing out.
I think it happened with a lot of impulse titles though...People tend to play fast and loose with the term "original master tapes"...it sounds better than "from 2nd generation dub tapes". A lot of Impulse! titles haven't been reissued since ABC took such bad care and cut so many corners in the 70s with older albums.
I just mean with Hoffman saying he worked on a reissue campaign of 12 Impulse reissues and he says all were from original masters except ALS, that doesn't sound like it was true for those other 11 titles. But, maybe they picked the ones where they were available intentionally and threw ALS in because it would sell.
Kahn says it’s a fold down cause only a stereo was cut.
Fremer hints that they wanted to do more Impulse and other titles in this AS x Verve series but Kassem wasn't happy with the sources available. I think the issue is more rampant than people tend to acknowledge. Also, for the record, I'm just not a huge fan of Hoffman's work so that may bias my interpretations of what he says sometimes. He does just seem really inconsistent with things and often takes shots at other pressings that other engineers made. I never entirely believe him because of the contradictions. It's also extremely hard to figure out details of some things because there are lots of different stories from different people.
That's the other quote I was looking for. Thanks!
You mean because it was only recorded in stereo?
Yup.
I am hardly a fan of Hoffman's work and there is a massive amount of misinformation on his forum.
Tone Poet also is what it is because the licenses on their bigger titles have been given out to MM and why would anybody buy any MM titles if the same exact team was making the same exact pressings for half the price or less? This series is taking the same approach but adapting AP OOP titles and some other crowd pleasers for a new audience. There isn’t as much demand for an entire series of lesser known Impulse titles and when a lot of impulse masters were destroyed in the UMG Fire, it likely becomes harder for them to reissue AAA titles. ABC also was notorious for throwing away a lot of masters sadly instead of preserving them when they took over Impulse.
Oh great, that's good to hear. It's no where up here yet. I have it on order...
Been eyeing that Legrand Jazz for some time now. It’s time to pull the trigger soon
My local ordered it for me and and it only took about a week. Picked it up on friday, so some copies have made it up north. It’s a fantastic pressing.