Can Vocalion Find Universal Music Quad Tapes for Multichannel SACD Release?

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fizzywiggs41

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If they could tap into the UMG Catalogue to mine for quads I would be somewhat happy.

They could issue some A&M Joe Cocker, Cat Stevens (a bit of a stretch, I know), Joan Baez, Quincy Jones, etc.

Or some scarcely available ABC Quads such as John Lee Hooker, B B King and many others (if quad tapes are still in existence that is).
 
If they could tap into the UMG Catalogue to mine for quads I would be somewhat happy.

They could issue some A&M Joe Cocker, Cat Stevens (a bit of a stretch, I know), Joan Baez, Quincy Jones, etc.

Or some scarcely available ABC Quads such as John Lee Hooker, B B King and many others (if quad tapes are still in existence that is).

That would be nice, but given the disastrous state of affairs regarding Universal's Quad tape Archive (or lack thereof) I think DV is wise to stick with Sony.
They have a well-archived & catalogued Quad tape library, and they are certainly not opposed to licensing all of these albums out to DV (for the right price, that is...) so I think DV will stick with them until they have exhausted all available resources.


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That would be nice, but given the disastrous state of affairs regarding Universal's Quad tape Archive (or lack thereof) I think DV is wise to stick with Sony.
They have a well-archived & catalogued Quad tape library, and they are certainly not opposed to licensing all of these albums out to DV (for the right price, that is...) so I think DV will stick with them until they have exhausted all available resources.

Yes. Universal is unable to find Surround Sound tapes for it's own use. I doubt Dutton Vocalion would fare differently if they were to ask.
 
Yes. Universal is unable to find Surround Sound tapes for it's own use. I doubt Dutton Vocalion would fare differently if they were to ask.

I really don't know of any instance where" Universal" actually had to hunt down QUAD tapes for release. :rolleyes:(well maybe Wakeman)

Let's not automatically decide for Vocalion that this would be a wasted opportunity. Surely there must be some UMG quad masters, even if rumours suggest there maybe few. This is a viable source from a very large label, in my opinion, Vocalion should at least persue this quad option. :D

And if it should come to pass that there is nothing they want to release because they can't find it, or don't want to release what UMG has to offer, then they could maybe, just maybe tap in to the wealth of 5.1 UMG masters. :smokin
 
I really don't know of any instance where" Universal" actually had to hunt down QUAD tapes for release. :rolleyes:(well maybe Wakeman)

Let's not automatically decide for Vocalion that this would be a wasted opportunity. Surely there must be some UMG quad masters, even if rumours suggest there maybe few. This is a viable source from a very large label, in my opinion, Vocalion should at least persue this quad option. :D

And if it should come to pass that there is nothing they want to release because they can't find it, or don't want to release what UMG has to offer, then they could maybe, just maybe tap in to the wealth of 5.1 UMG masters. :smokin

The only hope DV has for releasing any Quad mixes that Universal own would be those that originally existed under EMI before their dissolution at the end of 2012.
If it was that easy for labels to release Quad mixes from the master tapes that originally resided on labels like A&M and ABC, then it would already have been done.


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The only hope DV has for releasing any Quad mixes that Universal own would be those that originally existed under EMI before their dissolution at the end of 2012.
If it was that easy for labels to release Quad mixes from the master tapes that originally resided on labels like A&M and ABC, then it would already have been done.


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I really don't see that A.F. made much or any attempt to persue ABC/MCA ,IMPULSE, BLUESWAY, BLUETHUMB, A&M, MERCURY, POLYGRAM, LONDON, PARROT, DERAM,ETC Quad titles ?
Perhaps they and Vocalion will yet surprise us.;)
 
The only hope DV has for releasing any Quad mixes that Universal own would be those that originally existed under EMI before their dissolution at the end of 2012.
If it was that easy for labels to release Quad mixes from the master tapes that originally resided on labels like A&M and ABC, then it would already have been done.


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Seconding this...it's sort of a pet peeve of mine when people see a successful program of getting quad stuff released and suggest going into the vaults of other companies to find long-wanted treasures. If there's anything we've learned over the past 15 years of audiophile digital surround, it's that access to quad archives is incredibly company/division dependent. Pentatone has gotten more than anyone, and seems to have had the run of the Philips vaults but never got any access to Decca Quads, and only got limited access to the Deutsche Grammophon vaults for a year - even though the three labels are all owned by one company. The Vanguard quad vaults were opened in the early days of quad for a few places, most notably Silverline, but no-one seems to have issued anything from them for a decade. Ditto Vox and MFSL. And now Dutton has access to the RCA/Columbia vaults. Let's think about what awesome stuff they can get from there, instead of asking them to start over with a new label. There are folks here who are in touch with Dutton, they can pipe in if I'm off-base on this.

The second lesson is that if artist approval is needed, and the artist has a continuing career, it makes the task of getting the disc out an order of magnitude more complicated, as do any rights issues.
 
I really don't see that A.F. made much or any attempt to persue ABC/MCA ,IMPULSE, BLUESWAY, BLUETHUMB, A&M, MERCURY, POLYGRAM, LONDON, PARROT, DERAM,ETC Quad titles ?
Perhaps they and Vocalion will yet surprise us.;)

Just because you didn't see it happening doesn't mean it wasn't happening...
If AF failed to produce any Quad releases from Universal's library, there's a good reason for it!
Either they could not find what they were looking for, the quality did not meet their standards, or they were denied access.


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Just because you didn't see it happening doesn't mean it wasn't happening...
If AF failed to produce any Quad releases from Universal's library, there's a good reason for it!
Either they could not find what they were looking for, the quality did not meet their standards, or they were denied access.


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Perhaps.:)

But seeing is believing.




I just don't think we demonstrate a good example by being dismissive when "quad requesting " if we automatically assume the negative when it comes to quad accessible labels. We should be promoting these and all possible quad reissues. IMHO.
 
Perhaps.:)

But seeing is believing.




I just don't think we demonstrate a good example by being dismissive when "quad requesting " if we automatically assume the negative when it comes to quad accessible labels. We should be promoting these and all possible quad reissues. IMHO.

I don't think it's being dismissive so much as being pragmatic.
Anyway, I'm not going to worry about this anymore...


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Just because you didn't see it happening doesn't mean it wasn't happening...
If AF failed to produce any Quad releases from Universal's library, there's a good reason for it!
Either they could not find what they were looking for, the quality did not meet their standards, or they were denied access.


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I'd wonder now if many of the tapes owned by Universal have gone up in smoke? Remember that big fire in L.A. a couple of years ago? Apparently, that took out a lot more than they're letting on. Richard Carpenter believes that's where all the Carpenters multitracks were being stored before being moved to a safer location. In an interview he did not too long ago, he mentioned that when he did the remix project for the Carpenters SACD, everything was located and made available. When asked if he can ever go back to the multitracks for other projects, he said he couldn't as they burned in the Universal fire in Los Angeles. (Did they make digital copies? I do not know. But he is sure the tapes burned as he can no longer get access to them.)

Not to mention all the other fires Universal has had over the years. I've been hearing through the Buddy Holly circles that a large portion of Buddy's Master tapes are no longer extant again, due to fires.

Being the skeptical fool that I can be, I often wonder if these fires are intentional? A good way to get rid of unused articles and/or articles deemed no longer relevant often get burned under mysterious circumstances. Then, the corporation a) no longer has to pay for storage for said articles and b) gets a large cash settlement through insurance. Classy.

In regards to ABC Quads, unless the artists still have them, color them gone. 99% of that got binned during the Great ABC Purge in 1974. Mono tapes, Quad tapes, Session tapes and Multitracks all pitched. I also figure this is why the ABC Quad releases hit a brick wall. We got tons starting in '72 right through '74 and then a single release in 1975 - Three Dog Nights' "Coming Down Your Way". That's it. Other companies seemed to scale back Quad output but it seems ABC just shut it down cold turkey. Having no multitracks to go back to would definitely explain that.

More on point, I hope DV decides to go in a more pop-oriented direction. They may have more options open to them because of UK copyright and licensing than we do.
 
I'm thinking perhaps that they may be able to persue some" Tom Jones" or "Gilbert O'Sullivan "from the sub labels of LONDON Records ie, MAM or Parrot or the jazz labels/artists from the London catalogue. A lot of previously available QR Q8 titles from the quad era.
And they're all under the "Universal" umbrella of course.(y)


Just another avenue of quad for Vocalion to consider ?:)
 
I'm thinking perhaps that they may be able to persue some" Tom Jones" or "Gilbert O'Sullivan "from the sub labels of LONDON Records ie, MAM or Parrot or the jazz labels/artists from the London catalogue. A lot of previously available QR Q8 titles from the quad era.
And they're all under the "Universal" umbrella of course.(y)


Just another avenue of quad for Vocalion to consider ?:)

TOM JONES!! Oh hell yes! [emoji1319][emoji1319][emoji1319][emoji1319]


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I really don't see that A.F. made much or any attempt to persue ABC/MCA ,IMPULSE, BLUESWAY, BLUETHUMB, A&M, MERCURY, POLYGRAM, LONDON, PARROT, DERAM,ETC Quad titles ?

Audio Fidelity did make quite an effort to license Surround Sound albums from Universal Music. I know because I was involved in that process.

But as Rtbluray says, at some point you need to be pragmatic. If the Quad tapes are not available for SACD reissue and the Stereo tapes are, it's time to move ahead with the Stereo SACD reissue.
And that is what happened.
 
Audio Fidelity did make quite an effort to license Surround Sound albums from Universal Music. I know because I was involved in that process.

But as Rtbluray says, at some point you need to be pragmatic. If the Quad tapes are not available for SACD reissue and the Stereo tapes are, it's time to move ahead with the Stereo SACD reissue.
And that is what happened.

Yes but we only know of ABC/Dunhill, and some A&M attempts.

What of the many other labels that had quad titles that are now under the UMG family of labels.

We can be pragmatic or perhaps more precisely stoically predisposed but "Universal" has a very large representation now with all the prior quad released titles from the 70's. Therefore it's still a very viable source to be tapped by the likes of Vocalion.
Keeping in mind this is a request for quad titles FOR VOCALION,
Perhaps you can elaborate on what you know regarding the accessibility of titles(labels) that A.F. had difficulty obtaining, or are we to assume and therefore Vocalion for that matter, that only some ABC/DUNHILL and A&M label quads are next to impossible to obtain.? :confused

Thanks in advance , Brian (y)



fizzywiggs:sun
 
Many of my Vocalion CDs are early UK Decca material. Vocalion even use UK Decca style numbering (LK nnnn).

Surely Michael Dutton stands as good a chance of locating Universal material as anyone, indeed maybe better?
 
Surely Michael Dutton stands as good a chance of locating Universal material as anyone, indeed maybe better?

Remember that Universal itself is unable to find Surround Sound masters for re-release on anniversary editions of their own albums.
That helps to explain why the reissue labels, Vocalion included, are primarily releasing Surround remasters from the Sony Music catalog.
 
Remember that Universal itself is unable to find Surround Sound masters for re-release on anniversary editions of their own albums.
That helps to explain why the reissue labels, Vocalion included, are primarily releasing Surround remasters from the Sony Music catalog.

Many of the Decca quads 'Phase 4' were recorded in England so the multi masters are probably not in the Universal US vaults ....
The same could probably be said of Philips and Polydor titles ( in Dutch // German vaults)
Thoughts...????
 
Universal has released surround material including old quad masters such as Eric Clapton's 461 and Every Crowd, and a few others in recent years.
 
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