Penguin Guides and LPs

[tinpanalley]

Are the early penguin guides that reference LPs worth having for LP references? I know some would argue that anything on LP available on CD would be "better" to have in the latter format but nostalgia, deleted tracks in digitising, reordering of tracks, etc are all things that becomes issues often on CD.

I've got the 4th version and I'm just wondering if I should bother looking for a 9th edition or just get the earlier ones to help with my record collecting?

Thanks!

[romualdo]

I have all of the editions (1 to 9) with editions 1-2 covering LPs/cassettes, that's what the covers say but it's only the first edition that actually covers LPs.

I bought each edition as it was released (cept for #3 which I only picked up recently)

I'd recommend the first edition (easy to pick up second hand AFAIK) if it's only LP's you are after. Most of the LPs covered are from the 80's (ie material that was still available on LP by the early 90s)

As the first edition was published in 1992, many of the jazz "classics" had already made to CD.

As the editions progressed some material was deleted & new releases (plus reissues) were added so I find I use use all 9 volumes.

IMHO the best jazz resources of the nineties & noughties - Cook & Morton had a sense of humour & it's reflected in their reviews.

[Kevin Bresnahan]

I have the first 8. I agree with romualdo that only the first one has LPs listed but be aware the LPs listed are only LPs that were still in print in 1992, which was not a lot. There are only a few labels that were still keeping LPs in print by then.

I won't be buying the 9th as I think it's not really the Penguin Jazz Guide but the Reader's Digest Penguin Jazz Guide. In fact, once they stopped having the index in the back, the usefulness of the guide dropped quite a bit. Impossible to cross-reference without that index.