J.A.W.

JSP, Proper, etc.

Well, you prompted the discussion yourself when you said that the Frémeaux Collection was legit But you're right, this has been discussed ad nauseam - and it won't be the last time, I'm afraid... Change of topic: who mastered the Frémeaux sets?

And also this regarding sound recordings: http://www.copyright.gov/docs/sound/

Just found this from the U.S. copyright office on the 'net: http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-duration.html

Public-domain CDs like the Frémeaux Armstrong sets are legit in Europe, but not in the United States if I'm not mistaken.

Of course King Ubu was all tongue-in-cheek Well, I didn't get that ; as I said before I'm pretty naive when it comes to things like that. As for the rest of your post, I don't have any problems getting Japanese releases, even older ones; CDJapan and Amazon Japan are great sources. But perhaps I'm not your typical collector...

... and available for a mind-boggling seventeen days I don't think so, I got them from Japan several months after they were released.

I agree with this, but (and how many times have we had this debate?!) if the material is available nowhere else, well, I get it. Example: The John Graas Jazz Studio and Jazz Lab recordings originally issued on (I think) Decca. They're only available from Lonehill. Mosaic has never touched them, and neither, to my knowledge, have any of the "legitimate" reissue labels. So I got the Lonehills. I don't feel great about supporting the label, but I want to hear that music by a (pretty well forgotten) fine jazz artist. gregmo I wasn't talking about material that is not available anywhere else, my point was and is that some labels "borrow" transfers and masterings of material that is available on labels that paid for those transfers and masterings. By the way, John Graas' Jazz Studio 2 and Jazz Studio 3 albums were released on CD by Universal Japan in 2004. There was a thread about the Japanese Jazz Studio reissues some years ago.

It's a public-domain release.

I don't think John Fahey worries about money much anymore; he died in 2001.

I probably missed that, as I have no idea which "borrowing" label and which boxed sets you are talking about.

As I've said before, probably ad nauseam, I have problems with labels that blatantly "borrow" transfers and masterings paid for by, for instance, Mosaic and Bear Family. Copyrighting those transfers and masterings as Mosaic and BF do these days doesn't seem to make a difference.

Those are typos. Ron Carter only played bass on this Gil Evans date. My hybrid Analogue Productions SACD lists the following personnel: Johnny Coles – trumpet Phil Sunkel – trumpet Keg Johnson – trombone Jimmy Knepper – trombone Tony Studd – bass trombone Bill Barber – tuba Ray Beckenstein – alto saxophone, flute, piccolo Eddie Caine – alto saxophone, flute, piccolo Budd Johnson – tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone Bob Tricarico – flute, piccolo, bassoon Gil Evans – piano Ray Crawford – guitar Ron Carter – bass Elvin Jones – percussion Charli Persip – percussion

I asked Scott about all this and he confirmed that they used some tracks from those Decca CDs. He also said that waiting for the metal parts to become available would probably have taken several years.

This is what they're saying on their website: I'm not sure how to read this; as I understand it they transferred those Decca CDs including the restoration work done by Mr Labson, i.e. including the noise reduction he applied, which, if I remember correctly, was explicitly mentioned in the booklet that came with the CD I had, and possibly including his mastering, which I did not like very much. Please correct me if my interpretation is wrong. [edited to correct an error]

I agree with Larry in another thread Mr Lobbyman started:

This is a European public-domain release, most likely taken from the previously released Columbia CDs.

I had one Decca CD, Spinnin' the Webb, and if I remember correctly it suffered from noise reduction. I sold it when I got the John R.T. Davies-mastered Hep CDs Rhythm Man and Strictly Jive.

It's simple: it's either legit or it isn't. If it isn't, an ad asking for a copy is against forum rules; its age doesn't make any difference.

Were these broadcasts authorized by the owners of the rights to be released on LP? If so, they're legit; if not, they're bootlegs.

I guess it's a bootleg and ads asking for bootlegs are against rule 7.

A few years ago I did a quick comparison between the APO hybrid SACD's CD layer and the 1990s digipak CD reissue that was mastered by Erick Labson, and to my ears the former swept the floor with the latter: it sounded much more musical, with a better tonality, not at all harsh, which was one of my problems with the Labson remaster. If the APO vinyl version (which I've never heard) sounds about the same, I can recommend it wholeheartedly, though I can imagine that having to turn the records every 10 minutes or so is a nuisance.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernie_McGann

Agreed, to my ears they are much better than the digipak versions from the 1990s which were mastered by Erick Labson. The APO hybrid SACDs were mastered by Kevin Gray.

That's probably how the tapes sound.