Vinyl Me Please Classics

MikeH said:
yea not a bad pick, but also not a $60 record at all for me. price hike happened at the absolute worst time if the ROTM titles that people have deduced end up being true.
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Exactly. It's why I stopped my subscription, I couldn't figure out 3 records in the 3 months that I wanted. At that price point, I am in for audiophile level versions of titles that are home runs. They use to hit home runs on a regular basis, now they're hitting singles and the occasional double and striking out a lot.
 
wmeugene said:
Exactly. It's why I stopped my subscription, I couldn't figure out 3 records in the 3 months that I wanted. At that price point, I am in for audiophile level versions of titles that are home runs. They use to hit home runs on a regular basis, now they're hitting singles and the occasional double and striking out a lot.
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labels are making it harder and more expensive for third party labels to license titles, especially with all their own subscription and reissue series going on.
 
wmeugene said:
oh definitely. They're between a rock and a hard place for sure. And I'm with @Mather on these picks.
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they need to (and seem to be) raiding other label catalogues. from most accounts i've heard, the majors are being extremely greedy (no shock there) and either not allowing access to titles, not letting tapes out or wanting to charge an arm and a leg. this was always my thought with VMP--they own nothing proprietary and the labels can cut them off at any time, or raise prices and VMP can't do anything about it.

Craft/Concord is still willing to play ball it seems, and TONS of good stuff there. Wouldn't be shocked if Craft was the supposed interested party in acquiring VMP at one point. They would have gotten a huge built-in fan base, have a large number of titles across tons of genres and could have kept prices down to keep subscriber base up.
 
MikeH said:
they need to (and seem to be) raiding other label catalogues. from most accounts i've heard, the majors are being extremely greedy (no shock there) and either not allowing access to titles, not letting tapes out or wanting to charge an arm and a leg. this was always my thought with VMP--they own nothing proprietary and the labels can cut them off at any time, or raise prices and VMP can't do anything about it.

Craft/Concord is still willing to play ball it seems, and TONS of good stuff there. Wouldn't be shocked if Craft was the supposed interested party in acquiring VMP at one point. They would have gotten a huge built-in fan base, have a large number of titles across tons of genres and could have kept prices down to keep subscriber base up.
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They will scrape whatever barrel they can at this point.

Craft/Concord don't want a record reissue club. They have a much larger customer base via retail. They can reissue whatever they like from their catalog with far wider distribution. And they would lose a lot of VMP licensed titles - competitors don't renew licenses or grant new ones. Then VMP would become a subscription to Craft titles - a bad investment, the subscriber base would not doubt decline.

I can't see anyone other than one of the bigbox online dealers buying VMP. However, at this point, why bother? Can get it from the bankruptcy trustee for pennies one of these days.

BTW - on licensing - different labels have different licensing arrangements. Some it is a per unit fee, others a percent of retail price, others a flat fee. In every case licensing is a function of the artist and title demand. Licensing Gus Cannon is nowhere near licensing Otis Redding.

Not wanting to let tapes out is nothing new. Few labels do this anymore. The cost of insurance is quite high if using an original master tape of any halfway popular artist. That is actually more than the cutting cost. So many reissue labels prefer a hi-res digital or copy tape.

VMP's problem isn't greedy labels. It's being over-extended, losing their shirts on stupid titles and pouring money into a pressing plant.

All self-inflicted.
 
RHANDMJ said:
They will scrape whatever barrel they can at this point.

Craft/Concord don't want a record reissue club. They have a much larger customer base via retail. They can reissue whatever they like from their catalog with far wider distribution. And they would lose a lot of VMP licensed titles - competitors don't renew licenses or grant new ones. Then VMP would become a subscription to Craft titles - a bad investment, the subscriber base would not doubt decline.

I can't see anyone other than one of the bigbox online dealers buying VMP. However, at this point, why bother? Can get it from the bankruptcy trustee for pennies one of these days.

BTW - on licensing - different labels have different licensing arrangements. Some it is a per unit fee, others a percent of retail price, others a flat fee. In every case licensing is a function of the artist and title demand. Licensing Gus Cannon is nowhere near licensing Otis Redding.

Not wanting to let tapes out is nothing new. Few labels do this anymore. The cost of insurance is quite high if using an original master tape of any halfway popular artist. That is actually more than the cutting cost. So many reissue labels prefer a hi-res digital or copy tape.

VMP's problem isn't greedy labels. It's being over-extended, losing their shirts on stupid titles and pouring money into a pressing plant.

All self-inflicted.
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There are quite a few reissue labels lately that have talked about not being able to get access to tapes or fees being too high. Rubellan and Speakers Corner both come to mind.

The plant definitely fucked them but inability to license titles due to a bunch of factors also hurts and limits what they can license. And needing to do 3 titles on a monthly basis also hurts them.

I just know Craft has a cozy relationship with VMP and they are one of the only big labels that don’t have their own sub to compete with VMP. Interscope is off limits. BN is mostly off limits as are many other universal titles. Slim pickings for sure.
 
MikeH said:
There are quite a few reissue labels lately that have talked about not being able to get access to tapes or fees being too high. Rubellan and Speakers Corner both come to mind.

The plant definitely fucked them but inability to license titles due to a bunch of factors also hurts and limits what they can license. And needing to do 3 titles on a monthly basis also hurts them.

I just know Craft has a cozy relationship with VMP and they are one of the only big labels that don’t have their own sub to compete with VMP. Interscope is off limits. BN is mostly off limits as are many other universal titles. Slim pickings for sure.
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If you look at what VMP has reissued over the years AAA, overwhelmingly it's Warner and Craft titles — both companies who are much more generous themselves with in-house AAA reissues as well.
 
MikeH said:
There are quite a few reissue labels lately that have talked about not being able to get access to tapes or fees being too high. Rubellan and Speakers Corner both come to mind.

The plant definitely fucked them but inability to license titles due to a bunch of factors also hurts and limits what they can license. And needing to do 3 titles on a monthly basis also hurts them.

I just know Craft has a cozy relationship with VMP and they are one of the only big labels that don’t have their own sub to compete with VMP. Interscope is off limits. BN is mostly off limits as are many other universal titles. Slim pickings for sure.
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Speakers Corner basically retired when the pandemic hit, although he did some represses and actually has two titles coming out this year - both lacquers that were cut pre-covid. Retirement/pandemic more than costs.

Rubellan is marginal at best. Or was. Looks like a bad licensing deal put him under.

You may have noticed the very large price increases for vinyl over the last 3 years or so. Quite in excess of licensing fees, which as I mentioned, are typically on a sliding scale relative to artist stature/sales.

Sony has no subscription offerings and actually has among the largest catalogs in the world. Nor does Warner. Nor does Universal, although two small-ish subs are trying - Verve and BN. Small as far as Universal scale goes.
 
RHANDMJ said:
Speakers Corner basically retired when the pandemic hit, although he did some represses and actually has two titles coming out this year - both lacquers that were cut pre-covid. Retirement/pandemic more than costs.

Rubellan is marginal at best. Or was. Looks like a bad licensing deal put him under.

You may have noticed the very large price increases for vinyl over the last 3 years or so. Quite in excess of licensing fees, which as I mentioned, are typically on a sliding scale relative to artist stature/sales.

Sony has no subscription offerings and actually has among the largest catalogs in the world. Nor does Warner. Nor does Universal, although two small-ish subs are trying - Verve and BN. Small as far as Universal scale goes.
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Those bigger labels don’t have subs necessarily but have regular series. BN has plans for most records between BNC and Tone Poet. Warner has rhino HiFi for rock titles that VMP was trying to license.

Speakers corner’s founder said in an interview that it was getting too costly and too difficult to cut new reissues from tapes. He just couldn’t make it work so he retired and they just repress stuff now (aside from the two titles coming out that were already cut).

Sony pretty much gutted their third party licensing division. In September they had no reps and fired the production liaison. Not sure if that has changed since then.
 
MikeH said:
Those bigger labels don’t have subs necessarily but have regular series. BN has plans for most records between BNC and Tone Poet. Warner has rhino HiFi for rock titles that VMP was trying to license.

Speakers corner’s founder said in an interview that it was getting too costly and too difficult to cut new reissues from tapes. He just couldn’t make it work so he retired and they just repress stuff now (aside from the two titles coming out that were already cut).

Sony pretty much gutted their third party licensing division. In September they had no reps and fired the production liaison. Not sure if that has changed since then.
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Agree.

BTW, whatever Kai at SC says, by the pandemic he was like 70 and had his retirement already laid out. It was an easy push.

I don't know what the scoop is on Sony. They seem to be more interested in rights management than product. They are still very active in sync but less in reissue licenses, and as the only major really run out of Japan, I'm not sure they ever really understood the reissue market.

But look, bottom line - at the prices VMP charges, licensing fees - a cut in most cases - isn't the issue. Mismanagement and shit curation is, and being in a cash crisis with an increasing payment backlog doesn't get you access to anything from any label.
 
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