HW: Re: Voiceprint

[Jonathan Jarrett]

On Sun, 22 Nov 2009, Steve Freight wrote:

> I can fully appreciate the comments that are being made around the
> Voiceprint releases, and yes they must take some responsibility for the
> mis-mastering of the CD where a track has appeared twice (not the first time
> for a HW release (Silver Machine on SA wasn't it), but they have also done
> some good releases (The 2 Take Me releases) and they can therefore do a good
> job when the releases warrant it.

 	I never saw the post that this one seems to be replying to, but I 
feel both sides of it, having just recently bought the Reading 1992 2CD. 
Actually a lot of my annoyance here was caused by Amazon, who had it 
described as an Atomhenge release, which made me think it would be 
soundboard and decently done. Actually, of course, it's Voiceprint, it's 
off what sounds like audience tape albeit with very little audience noise, 
it's about as good as I remember the tape of that show being but no 
better, and the tracklisting doesn't match the actual CD press. So, a 
fairly typical Voiceprint job, which I probably wouldn't have bought if it 
had been properly described. That would have been a pity, as it was still 
an excellent show and the recording doesn't lose that, but all the same, 
argh. They will keep doing three-quarters of a good job.

 	<snip>

> Personally I'm happy to have these releases, and do share everyone's
> frustrations at the quality of some of them (Glastonbury and Complete79
> being the worst IMO), but if it wasn't Voiceprint it would be someone else
> who would be releasing them. Remember the weird tapes were originally of a
> similar ilk to these releases, led to arguments amongst band members,
> and remember where these led to - Samurai and all those other sub standard
> releases we do avoid. At least the Voiceprint stuff is tied up legally now I
> believe.

 	On the other hand there is that. Ropey releases these may be but 
at least we know the band are getting their money from them (or at least, 
we know that Dave is). I've bought rubbish-quality live things from Gong 
several times before because I knew that my money was helping to keep them 
on the road, and this is a lesser instance of the same thing for those of 
us with the money to spare. But if I was still as poor as I was when I 
started buying Hawkwind as a cash-strapped student, I'd really resent 
these albums being out there. Especially since, at that point, the regular 
albums were really hard to get hold of (and even now, Amazon et al. seem 
to have trouble shipping the Atomhenge stuff). Obviously people with 
little money are bad people to market to, but 'd like to think the band 
wasn't thinking like that... Yours,
 				    Jon (who will be along again later 
with more positive things to say about HW)

ObCD: Farflung - _A Wound in Eternity_
-- 
       Jonathan Jarrett, Cambridge    jjarrett at chiark.greenend.org.uk
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