Big Beat Steve

And even if you look well beyond the Fantasy catalog, where do you often end up in the case of FS, for example? Does ANYBODY actually think that big bucks are to be made by reissuing the "Bob Graf sessions", the Bob Davis LP on the Zephyr (whazzatt??) label, the "Westchester Workshop", the Don Bagley LPs, etc.? If it really was only about making as many bucks (relatively speaking) as could be made even in this tiny niche market, then wouldn't there be lots of "name" artists out there who'd be the prime "targets" any time because they'd attract lots (relatively speaking again) of prospective buyers who'd even buy any previously unreleased or long OOP lo-fi CD of those name artists practising in their closets. Realizing that there IS a shady area by some yardsticks (but not shadier than with any other PD reissue projects) I'd really, really hate to use the used and abused term of a "labor of love" to describe these reissues but I'd still say a fair amount of idealism has to go into resurrecting THAT kind of obscure music and not the more obvious names.

So it seems like there really are those who feel sorry about not being able to take control (or to see control being taken by somebody they would feel comfortable with) on something that they've lost control of (because these items have gone PD elsewhere) so they now start acting like "if I cannot ensure control is being taken by those who I'd like to take control then I'll see to it that these things are distributed freely so nobody takes control." The bottom line? Sour grapes, that's all. Now I'll call GIGA-bullshit on that. Because it's not about any MORAL "triumph" at all. It's only about availability of marketable goods in a package that suits the buyers' expectations and pocketbooks. You pay what you are prepared to pay. If you are not prepared to pay - fine. But others decide differently and that's only THEIR VERY OWN decision and judgment, not yours. Because nobody forces them to pay. Just like some would even want to shell out double or triple the normal amount of money for Mosaics though fidelity or packaging cannot be possibly three or four times better than on other, more "mundane" reissues (PD or not). Tastes and expectations vary, and the legal situation being the way it is, there is room for everybody within that legal framework.

Which is what I meant when I spoke above about "being afraid of losing control".

Indeed. Thanks for summing this up so very much to the point. Your reference to Japan and its PD laws, in particular, deserves to be recalled indeed. PD laws anywhere (INCLUDING Japan) first of all do not compel that material to be BOUGHT. Each and everyone is free NOT to buy it. But passing judgment on those who do buy them, well ... BTW, if I wanted a free yet ethical download of P.D. recordings, I'd look here, for example: http://westernswing78.blogspot.com/ Please note the fine print about "physical product" reissues. Do the download sites that you advocate follow the same principle?

Of course I do. Among friends, in particular. But today's world being the way it is, if I expected my business associates and clients NEVER to lie to me on business matters I'd be utterly naive and probably unfit for business. Be that on alleged business deadline constraints, alleged money constraints, input to be provided from business associates or clients but being withheld for reasons that clearly are just excuses, etc. etc. (Note I have been self-employed in a freelance job for a very long time now so I've had some dealings here and there too and have come to take more than one business statement with a grain of salt and YET had to accept them at face value, despite the fact that I knew better . Knowing darn well you are being lied to right in your face sometimes is just part of the game.) And just to repeat my question (and sorry for being quite to the point now), and may I - with all due respect - please ask you not to be evasive: What would your guess be what OTHER P.D. reissue labels would say if they were asked the same question about the legitimacy of those products being sold in the US (where the P.D. laws differ from those in other parts of the world)? And please don't tell me they had not been asked and that this question is therefore beside the point. Because it is not (as the underlying problem exists with those "other" labels too and we all know it) but in this case I would have to assume that you prefer not to know and not to find out. Which in the end would put us all very close together in how we prefer to deal (or should I say "cope") with "the world being the way it is today".

Today's world being the way it is, it tells me that he is arranging details of his dealings to suit his own frame of reference (and possibly peace of mind - stating it often enough until one believes it oneself, maybe ) - just like I guess many, many others in every realm of the business world do too on a daily basis. And it also tells me he had the good fortune of being able to clarify a few points of what he did in this interview as well as the MISFORTUNE of being the #1 reissue producer being singled out for critical scrutiny in this P.D. reissue market niche. Would you like to take a guess about what the producers of certain U.K. (P.D.) boxes would have to say about the legality of their product as being marketed in the US (where AFAIK it is being marketed) when so questioned? Or the producers from other non-Spanish P.D. reissue labels? The more this debate about the legitimacy of those P.D. labels appears to be all about singling out specific labels for criticism, the more it reeks of "being afraid of losing control" to me, and the Spanish seem to have struck a nerve there with those who seem to dread losing control. In short, blaming P.D. reissue labels that circumvent the USA P.D. laws? Fine - go ahead, blame them. No doubt there are valid reasons to do so from the U.S. angle. But then blame them ALL. Or else it will have to be assumed that there are entirely different agendas behind this.

Again one of those "Which was first? The chicken or the egg"-type questions ... With all due respect, but to me this really is like a HUGE lot of sales transactions involving exporting (and therefore importing) goods from around the world into another country that may be subject to different laws of what is allowed to be sold in the respective destination (importing) country. Such as radar warning devices mnarketed legally in the USA and strictly illegal in Germany, or pharmaceutical goods and medical products legally on sale in the USA and exported wholesale by US peddlers (or should I say "dealers" to stick with a term used on that other Pujol thread? ) to destinations around the world, and in some countries in Europe they are strictly illegal and anybody caught importing them (even for private end use) there will be fined heavily. No notion anywhere in the destination countries of putting the blame on the sellers, though. See the parallelity? Now tell me, if you will, please - where are the U.S. enforcement bodies that will curtail importing these goods (CD) if they are so illegal there? Sleeping on the job? Too indifferent to care? See where the blame definitely lies too (or even primarily)? IMHO putting the blame on the seller and exporter (who is only satisfying a demand the legality of which is for the importer to clarify and regulate in their specific destination countries as this is where IMPORT rules are applicable) is irrelevant as long as in the abovementioned examples (and many more, against the total gross transaction volume of which this CD businiess really pales) the exporters aren't just a much taken to task.

True, Larry, but I have severe doubts that the "ethical" aspect has ever been so much at the forefront of purchaser's motivations to purchase. I have a feeling that it rather was and is a matter of availability and convenience and (due to the lack of activity elsehere) a sort of "last resort" approach if one was keen enough to obtain those goods at all. As for lying in the public's faces, oh well ... I'd rather not think about how many out there who claim all sorts of noble motivations are lying in our faces in even bigger ways day in day out (no, of course I am NOT talking about persons like Messrs. Lion or Nessa!), and no doubt at least a sizable portion of all us here should be aware of a lot of that but it seems we prefer not to be reminded of it too much, lest our own actions in that field (including buying records, simple as that ...) become too much of a quandary because we wouldn't know anymore where to turn without having to feel some sort of guilt if we REALLY wanted to keep up our high moral principles all the time. Just one example: That extension of European P.D. coypright laws from 50 to 70 years which was pushed hard by musician moguls such as Cliff R. and Paul McC., and this at a time when the music of the one had only just begun to fall into PD and the music of the other was about to enter PD. Coincidence? So do we actually pretend we believe this entire initiative was only launched for the PRIME reason of giving those poor, semi-anonymous session musicians some long-merited royalty bucks that they had not received in the past or were threatened to receive no longer? Or wouldn't this rather be only an incidental and occasional side effect whereas the BIG royalty money is to be made elsewhere? Who are they trying to kid ... As if the royalties from relatively successful 60s pop hits where it is a historically known fact that the band members in whose name the record charted did NOT ACTUALLY play their instruments on those records would now all of a sudden and automatically go to those session musicians who'd been called in to do the chores back then but who were never credited for this publicly at the timne the records were released. People who know much more about the insides of the music business than simple collectors like me have strongly doubted this alleged motivation ever since that law project was put on the agenda, and by all accounts these doubts do not seem totally unfounded. And YET we are being fed that blurb. Talk about lying ...

In BIG business I am afraid there are a lot like that who cover up in a big way (so I am not really surprised that niche markets have their shady niches too). It is not a matter of trusting them - it is a matter of buying goods for purely practical reasons in a world that is the way it is - not least of all due to the nonfeasance of those who COULD do better. That said (and please bear with me for my candor - I am indeed aware of your credentials), would you have trusted Jack Kapp from Decca if you had been one of his contemporaries, and even though you are not but are knowledgeable anyway, has this kept you from buying pressings of the recordings that Count Basie did for Decca in past decades? (No doubt you know what I am getting at, right?) So much for the ways of the world ... And as for those "other" Spanish labels (not FS) doing re-reissues of previously reissues - unethical this looks indeed, right (and I avoid the more blatant cases too), but is this ILLEGAL as long as the copyright Public Domain limits of those countries where the goods are manufactured are respected? And that said, would you protest against tose "Proper" products in the same manner? I've named relatively blatant cases of them re-reissuing stuff that had been reissued not that long before too, and STRANGELY ENOUGH hardly anybody has seen fit to comnent on that, whereas as soon as the trigger word "Andorra" or "Barcelona" comes up they are all over the place like the proverbial Pavlovian dogs. Strictly speaking, of course those British re-reissues are just as legal as others that comply with P.D. laws but home come hardly anybody finds much to say about ethics there? Treasured convenience, maybe? Or sensitivity vs LP-era reissues whereas 78-rpm era reissues are of no concern? Strange ....

Oh come on, King Ubu, really ... The "most" of course is an exaggeration but when it comes to covering almost the ENTIRE spectrum of what was released then in at least a passably representative manner you kow better than that .... Just take a look at what the "majors" reissue and how they mess up whatever they have in their vaults (do I need to go into details of how the once so great entire OJC catalog fell by the wayside through sheer couldn't-care-less-ism? And this one only had covered a handful of labels from the outset). Of course, if one's perception of 50s jazz is limited to BN and a scant few other "cult" labels and "cult" artists, then yes, there are reissues aplenty. But is this one-eyed tunnel vision really doing the subject matter justice? Somehow I have a feeling some of the beefs against FS reissues (where in the vast majority of cases you really cannot speak of blatant direct re-reissues - u.e. "lifting" - of material that had been reissued only very, very recently elsewhere) boil down to the fact that certain records aren't that exclusive anymore. Well, should I feel sore because some of my original LPs (Bob Enevoldsen on Liberty - see Jazzwax article, Bob Davis LPs, Westchester Workshop, etc.) are now available as reissues that easily via FS? I don't, except that I regret that a lot of their 2 LPs on one CD type reissues combine one I already have with one I don't have (and am not likely to find anywhere else at an affordable price). But that's another matter. Oh, and please don't nobody mention Japan to me. As long as their reissues are as hard to get as they are from over here and are priced the way they are, and tend to vanish as fast as they do they are no REASONABLE yardstick of how to keep things in print and available. At least not in each and every case for me anyway. And are there really no needledrops in there among those Jap reissues? Not even among those they did and do - for ever so brief runs of availability - of European jazz stuff (stuff that has been obscure ever since its original release and where probably most remaining original copies are now with Asian "investors" )? So ... yes, IMHO Jazzwax makes some fairly reasonable points. What's been said here a zillion times. But fell on deaf ears with those who prefer to cuddle their beefs. "And let's not forget that if it weren't for Pujol and Fresh Sound, we'd never know how most of the jazz albums recorded in the 1950s sound." "If you harbor a beef, it really should be directed at American record companies that have steadfastly refused to release these albums, granting Pujol a smart business niche." "You don't like that these CDs from Spain are sold here or that Pujol operates under another continent's set of copyright laws? Don't buy them." "Frankly, I can't think of a single jazz musician who has ever complained to me about their earlier works being re-issued by Fresh Sound. Most have told me they're happy that the label has kept their names and music alive when American record labels have failed to do so." Yet I for one would be interested to hear from anyone who has tangible proof that musicians actually DID complain and tried to enforce withdrawal of the reissues etc. (Speaking of which and seeing how certain estates are kept in firm stranglehold by the heirs/families etc., is there any conclusive evidence that Sue Mingues has sternly objected (and threatened lawsuits) to the reissue of Charles Mingus' "Jazzical Moods" LP on Period and "Mingus Three" LP on Jubilee by Fresh Sound on vinyl in the 80s and still in print on CD in their current catalog today, along with several others?)

My Prestige/Milestone twofer of that material got a lot of spins through the years and I still treasure it. I don't usually "wear out" my vinyls but this is one of the few cases where I've actually considered getting another copy of the same record as and when I come across one in significantly better condition.

Am reading the book right now - once you've worked yourself through the longish prologue about Denver Ferguson's hustling businesses into the MUSIC side of the subject on hand, it's really colorful and insightful indeed, and fills a huge gap in the history of black territory swing bands and 40s & 50s "grassroots" R&B etc. Strange though that the term "Chitlin Circuit" should appear to be THAT unknown (as the reviewer stresses). No doubt I've only seen a small part of this term's appearance in print but I cannot even recall how often I've come across it in earlier music literature on post-war Black music (some of it apparently printed not long after that alleged first-time??? use of the term in 1972) but it was very, very often ... Not an unfamilar term, then, but high time it is given some in-depth coverage. Another inter4sting character evoked in that book is Don Robey - his Chitlin Circuit background somehow doesn't seem to be mentioned to any extent when his Duke/Peacock label career is discussed.

Wrong. As long as you are talking to somebody OUTSIDE your sphere of applicability of YOUR law, TOTALLY WRONG. The 50-year P.D. cutoff date law is a law in those countries where it is legally in force. Period. And that makes sales of such material legal in those realms of the world. Public domain means that the erstwhile rights holders forfeit their rights after these 50 years (or 70 from a certain point of time of applicability). Period again. So go ahead and differentiate your discussions on this entire topic, if you will, please. And discuss the "thief" thing with those who come under the jurisdiction of "your" law. But leave the others alone. And as for conveniently ignoring things, see my above posts indicating numerous examples of cases of their reissues where - by all indications - legal arangements with the rights holders have been reached. Time to come to realize it isn't all either black or white in this debate, don't you think so?

Fine that this had made your day, then.

The thieves are elsewhere IMO. E.g. on download sites (at both ends of them). Fresh Sound complies with 50-year rules that are as they are in this part of the world, like it or not. The time when U.S. rules were the enforceable rules of the WORLD is long over. The thieves (if any) in the U.S. are at the intra-U.S. distributors' and retailers' end, nowhere else. So go complain there and tell them you will boycott buying ANYTHING from them as long as they carry stocks of "thieves' labels", how about that?

Dan, have you ever taken a closer look at those Fresh Sound VINYL reissues - ever? 1) Many of them carry production dates several years prior to 1987. 1986, for example, minus 25 means 1961 (which leaves a margin of several years with many of their reissues - simple maths). And there must have been a lot of tehm that were reissued prior to 1987. The "Jazz West Coast" book by Alain Tercinet that makes extensive reference to Fresh Sound reissues as ACCESSIBLE listening examples of the artists and recordings of WCJ was published in 1986. And the 1987 Fresh Sound catalog already includes the reissues up to no. 279 (all those I am aware of carrying recorings made long before 1960) out of a total of some 335 vinyl reissues done by Fresh Sound. So do your maths. 2) The small print on the back cover of many of those LP reissues says specifically that the reissues were made upon agreement with a) RCA, b) WEA, c) EMI-Odeon. Which accounts for quite a lot of reissues and reissue labels. And I'd really think they'd not get themselves into hottest water deliberately by indicating agreement with licensing companies if they had NOT made such agreements. Not to mention that the entire NOCTURNE catalog, for example, was reissued by Fresh Sound with the SPECIFIC endorsement of Harry Babasin (just check the Nocturne CD box). So who will know and judge for sure where deals with the rights holders were concluded and where they were not? 3) If you want to quote P.D. time spans, do quote the full statement, please (which, talking about the pre-1995 or pre-1987 laws, goes on to say "Other countries like Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands and much of Europe had protection terms that went from 15 to 25 years". Which just MIGHT explain their extended presence in the German record shops, for example, at that time. ) Finally, is there anybody out there who can offer conclusive proof that those other (quite non-Spanish) reissue vinyl labels that were contemporary to Fresh Sound and went down a very similar route in their reissue record programming, such as VSOP, to name just one, adopted a totally different royalty policy that adhered strictly to the U.S. rules?

If you read teh interview carefully you will notice that it is stated there that at the time of these reissues (80s/early 90s) the copyright laws all across Europe were set to a cut-off P.D. date of much less than 50 years.

Yes, this irks me too - in a BIG way. I could rattle off at least a dozen Fresh Sound "2 CDs on one" reissues that I've not bought just because I already had one of the two CDs included in each set and the other one was not THAT mandatory for me to want to get it by all means. HOWEVER - I think the marketing strategy behind this is a fairly simple one: Fresh Sound has reissued a LOT of material in their vinyl days that was just heaven-sent back then (because - as pointed out in the interview as well - the major labels just did not give a rat's ass about reissuing ANY of that). And now they are expanding their program but are of course rehashing (O.K., re-reissuing would be a nicer word) their former catalog on CD too, because a) those vinyls are long OOP, and b) many collectors have given up on vinyl and use CDs only. So all this would be fine with a newer generation of colectors. But as I have a fairly large proportion of those Fresh Sound LPs from the 80s (and will NOT part with them ) the value-for-money ratio of the 2-in-1 CD reissues is a bit slim for me. But that's only me ... And it's a reissuing policy that is not uniuque to Fresh Sound, unfortunately. OTOH, what I don't understand is that IIRC there have been some CD reissues of SINGLE LPs on Fresh Sound (now maybe deleted?) that have now been re-reissued on Fresh Sound in 2-in-1 couplings. A bit unnecessary. As for fidelity, oh well ... Japanese reissues are a different playground altogether and as long as their pricing and worldwide acesiblity is as it is it's a moot point to discuss about items that seem to vanish almost as fast as they appear. And maybe I am just a bit too tolerant on some needledrops because if you have embraced so many reissues from the 78rpm era you have learnt to make concessions (as long as the "noise" on these 78rpm reissues doesn't overwhelm the overall sound impression).

Good to see this clarified straight form the horse's mouth. But will the bottom line - that the "fault" in all this reissuing business lies with those "majors" who are unwilling to reissue recordings or keep them in print themselves - really stick with those who have made a point of being indiscriminately oh so wary of ALL European reissues?

My first Parkers (right after the 1945 Diz and Bird recordings reissued on that Prestige twofer) - at age 16 or 17 - were those on Dial (including one LP on the "Charlie Parker Records" label) and left a lasting impression on me, maybe reinforced by the fact that at about the same time I read the "Bird Lives" biography (yeah, I know what some of you are tempted to say now ... ). So I'd vote for the Dials too, not so much for those subjective nostalgic reasons but (though I dug into the Savoys not that long afterwards) because to me each of the Dials somehow epitomizes the concise, dense, down-to-the-point summary of the essence of bebop crammed into the length of a 78 rpm record. An impression that the Savoys somehow did not have on me to the same extent (whereas the Dexter Gordon Dials - that I first bought not long after the Bird Dials - in fact did too). So maybe there was something to the recordings on Dial?? (Yes I know others will refute this for a long list of well-founded musical reasons but there you are ... )

The early post-war Buddy Rich Big Band - as heard on Golden Era LP-15021 ("Great Moments) and on Hep CD 12 ("The Legendary 47-48 Orchestra", for example - was fairly boppish at times too, certainly not far behind the modernistic overtones of Woody Herman and many other bop-influenced bands -

Lots of interesting points brought up in the Discussion section under the link you gave. Amazing (and comforting) to see there are that many (way outside our jazz etc. collectors' world, it seems) who want the PHYSICAL product, not something out there on some "cloud" (as one of them said). Sounds familiar ...

Oh well, Brownie, you know how quite a few Americans have always been when it comes to "Yurp" and the "finer" points of its geography, territorial boundaries, etc.: Paris is located right at the Cote d'Azur, Heidelberg is on the banks of the River Rhine and both are located in the heart of Bavaria, of course! Details of geography? And getting them right, even? What for? Just an unnecessary burden when you are about to set off for a "Europe in four days" sightseeing marathon. Not to mention what many in the ranks of that "all-volunteer Army" would be willing or able to digest while on post over here ... Petty things that appear negligible. So CNN is perfectly in line ... (Nah, I am not taking a swipe at the U.S. population per se but if you look closer a a certain type of Americans you just cannot help wondering ... ) And this seems to tie in with what certain polls have shown about the alleged future importance of U.S. FOREIGN policy (and knowledge of foreign matters) to the voting populace ...

True, there was little about music I have an interest in either (though it was interesting to see that in the opening sequences of the camera going over those record racks, a Louis Jordan LP was clearly seen, and the same LP appeared in another scene - LPs in record crates - again later). But collectors being alike anyway, there were lots of sentiments that I could sympathize with, and being acquainted with several dJs and doing a DJ job very occasionally myself, I can also confirm what the DJs said about the hard top grasp attraction of handling vinyl instead of just pushing the music through computers.

French, Germans (and others in Central Europe), catch this if you can on your ARTE TV channel tonight at 22:15 h: http://www.arte.tv/fr/semaine/244,broadcastingNum=1281764,day=6,week=44,year=2011.html http://www.arte.tv/de/woche/244,broadcastingNum=1281763,day=6,week=44,year=2011.html Should be interesting/amusing ... Wonder how many of us will recognize ourselves in there ...