Columbia quad reels????

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QL is a wealth of knowledge on this stuff Adam.

It's almost like Columbia started an entire new numbering system at the start of quad, with the numbers starting at C 30000. So older releases which were remixed to quad got a new 30000 number as their earlier 4 digit catalog numbers were no longer relevant.
 
QL is a wealth of knowledge on this stuff Adam.

It's almost like Columbia started an entire new numbering system at the start of quad, with the numbers starting at C 30000. So older releases which were remixed to quad got a new 30000 number as their earlier 4 digit catalog numbers were no longer relevant.

Thanks Jon, she certainly is :)

Maybe Columbia's faith in Quad as the next big thing was so great that they believed Quad would need a brand new cataloguing system with an extra digit for those thousands of Quad records and tapes they envisaged releasing through the years..?

Not trying to be contentious at all but I do have to take mild exception with a couple of things said in this thread earlier...

1.) A couple of posters have said that the Columbia (and assoc. label) Quads didn't give credit to the remix engineers - and that is simply not true, even from the earliest titles I've been able to lay my hands on, those SQ LPs that don't credit the Quad remix engineer are the exception rather than the rule..

and

2.) The assertion that Mr. Phil Brown (I totally respect where he is coming from however) won't talk about his time at CBS because the people are still alive is unfortunate since many of the key players that did get name checked on all those Columbia/Epic etc SQ records (guys like Larry Keyes = RIP 2007, Harold J. Kleiner = RIP 2002,.. etc) are actually now sadly dead - and besides who would want anything juicy or salacious? I'm searching for facts and as much interesting info on the process behind mixing these wonderful Quads as possible, not malicious gossip or any stories of a personal nature.

If Mr. Brown is reluctant to say anymore on the subject, perhaps he might encourage any of his ex co-workers who are still in the land of the living to drop by here?

It would be so sad if those few Columbia/Epic Quad mixing guys that are alive were to die off before their reminiscences on their Quad work so many of us here cherish could be told.. time is running out.
 
CBS started a new combined numbering system for all their sub-labels (including Colubmia, Epic, etc.) at the beginning of 1970 and everything issued after that followed. It was just sort of a happy accident that quad began around the same time (January 1972) so all the quad stuff coincided with the beginning of the 3xxxx numbering series.

Whereas it seems RCA decided to go back and remix a lot of back catalog stuff from before the dawn of quad, it appears that Columbia believed that releasing modern/current stuff was the best strategy for quad to take off - you can see it in the fact that they commissioned quad mixes of stuff like Edgar Winter's White Trash (1971), the first Johnny Winter album (1969) and Laura Nyro's 'Eli & The Thirteenth Confession' (1968) and then decided not to release them in favour of albums from 1972 onward. Obviously there are a few older titles that Columbia did remix in to quad (BS&T II, Paul Revere, Sly's Greatest Hits, the early Santana albums) but they're the exception rather than the rule compared to mixes that were 'contemporary' at the time.

Linda's right that anything remixed for quad from before 1970 got a new 3xxxx designation - the other ones that come to mind are Chicago Transit Authority (GP 8 in stereo became GQ 33255 in quad) and Chicago II (KGP 24 in stereo became GQ 32258 in quad).

The interesting thing (for me) with the 3xxxx numbering series is that there are huge swathes of unused numbers. Were these earmarked for releases that never were, or did they use the numbers internally for other assets like master tapes or session reels, or were numbers just assigned arbitrarily (ie someone wanting a nice round number), or was there some other criteria like numbers being tied to year of release or something else that I haven't even thought of.

I posted a link to this site in another thread a while back, it's an extensive list of all the known releases in the combined CBS 3xxxx numbering system, both stereo and quad. Even if you just have a passing interest in this stuff, it's worth a quick browse.
 
CBS started a new combined numbering system for all their sub-labels (including Colubmia, Epic, etc.) at the beginning of 1970 and everything issued after that followed. It was just sort of a happy accident that quad began around the same time (January 1972) so all the quad stuff coincided with the beginning of the 3xxxx numbering series.

Whereas it seems RCA decided to go back and remix a lot of back catalog stuff from before the dawn of quad, it appears that Columbia believed that releasing modern/current stuff was the best strategy for quad to take off - you can see it in the fact that they commissioned quad mixes of stuff like Edgar Winter's White Trash (1971), the first Johnny Winter album (1969) and Laura Nyro's 'Eli & The Thirteenth Confession' (1968) and then decided not to release them in favour of albums from 1972 onward. Obviously there are a few older titles that Columbia did remix in to quad (BS&T II, Paul Revere, Sly's Greatest Hits, the early Santana albums) but they're the exception rather than the rule compared to mixes that were 'contemporary' at the time.

Linda's right that anything remixed for quad from before 1970 got a new 3xxxx designation - the other ones that come to mind are Chicago Transit Authority (GP 8 in stereo became GQ 33255 in quad) and Chicago II (KGP 24 in stereo became GQ 32258 in quad).

The interesting thing (for me) with the 3xxxx numbering series is that there are huge swathes of unused numbers. Were these earmarked for releases that never were, or did they use the numbers internally for other assets like master tapes or session reels, or were numbers just assigned arbitrarily (ie someone wanting a nice round number), or was there some other criteria like numbers being tied to year of release or something else that I haven't even thought of.

I posted a link to this site in another thread a while back, it's an extensive list of all the known releases in the combined CBS 3xxxx numbering system, both stereo and quad. Even if you just have a passing interest in this stuff, it's worth a quick browse.

There are some real anomalies... like Art Garfunkel's "Angel Clare" being assigned a "ghost" catalogue number seemingly out of nowhere almost a year after the releases sequentially before it came out!

KC and CQ 31473 = Ray Conniff's Godfather from Jul (Stereo) and Aug (Quad) 1972
and
31475 to 31478 are empty..! :yikes

(and 31650 to 31699 is one of those huge swathes of blanks you're talking about.. wow.. nothing.... 31851 to 31900 is another clutch of nothingness..!!)

[SIZE=-1]KC-31474[/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]Garfunkel[/SIZE] [SIZE=-1][LP] "Angel Clare" [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]Nov-1973[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]CQ-31474(Quadraphonic) [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]Art Garfunkel[/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]"Angel Clare" [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]Dec-1973[/SIZE]
 
QL is a wealth of knowledge on this stuff Adam.

It's almost like Columbia started an entire new numbering system at the start of quad, with the numbers starting at C 30000. So older releases which were remixed to quad got a new 30000 number as their earlier 4 digit catalog numbers were no longer relevant.

I have a feeling the switch to the C 30000 numbers was more about charging a higher list price for the albums than the start of quad.
Back in the day, new number series and prefixes were always accompanied by price changes for the new series - usually higher prices.
 
I have a feeling the switch to the C 30000 numbers was more about charging a higher list price for the albums than the start of quad.
Back in the day, new number series and prefixes were always accompanied by price changes for the new series - usually higher prices.

You're probably right, but it's still a strange coincidence that Columbia (with the C-30000, CQ-30000), RCA (ARD1-0000), and even Arista (A-0000) started new numbering catalog schemes when they started their quad product.
 
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