Labels Strive to Rectify Past Archival Problems
BY BILL HOLLAND

Today, catalog preservation is more of a priority for the major U.S. record companies than at any time in the history of the century-old industry.
But these efforts come too late for untold numbers of recordings, old and not so old, that have been thrown away, mislaid, left behind in warehouses, and even sold for scrap.
Seventy one vault-wise sources who agreed to discuss the issue with Billboard--sometimes on request of anonymity-- said that while most of the 3 million-plus heritage U.S. recordings owned by the major labels are secure in vaults, enough legacy material has been lost over the years to be disturbing.

Read entire article HERE



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2021-01-04 14:25 by schillid.

Ignorance is bliss!!! Except, eh, oops.

Wow, very, very interesting article. Thanks for posting.

That is amazing, what's in there, that article. Just think of those mindsets were present now, with the way streaming has removed the financial incentive(s) for labels to spend money to have artists/bands record: everything would be lost.

Not to talk about the fire that destroyed UMG's archive (before they started distributing RSR)...

Wow, that is a very interesting read. Very sad (but truly believable to) read that there were (including prominent) artists' recordings that either ended up being thrown away, or mislaid somewhere- and not correctly marked, or left behind somewhere lost in a warehouse, or even destroyed. Thanks for posting.

There was an organization that did extensive live broadcasts back in the 80s and 90s that has gone through different levels of corporate ownership. Now the recordings are stored in boxes in the attic of one office in DAT, CD Reel to Reel and a few other formats. Fortunately they have been "borrowed" and copied over the past 2 years. They are obviously not in wide distribution and many of these are famous shows that we all have as FM or in some cases Pre-FM recordings. Most is stuff few people care about but there are some real gems (whole shows where only an hour broadcast). At some point this will all be shared but for now these are just backup up in a few places.

I am sure there are other situations like this.

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1963luca0
Not to talk about the fire that destroyed UMG's archive (before they started distributing RSR)...

Universal's distribution of the Stones albums fortunately has nothing to do with Universal and their lack of care with storage because the Stones made sure to own everything master wise when they were able to, which goes back to late 1969, and, as seen in BEING MICK, they have the masters around.