| 1. |
Terminology:
I've
always
struggled
to
come
up
with
a
good
way
to clearly distinguish
between album reissues and albums that have been rerecorded and
rereleased under their original name. However, I think I've
finally arrived at something over the last several years that I'm
satisfied
with, and which will hopefully not be too confusing. So in my collection
page
list, the
following terminology will apply: (a) An album reissue, which is indicated by two dates with a slash (ex. 1982/2005) is meant to imply additional pressings, frequently limited edition, of a release that was out-of-print but made available again for commercial purchase by the official copyright owner. A reissue will typically duplicate the original release in every way except possibly mastering and possibly the ommission of a few tracks (if it's a reissue of multiple albums or partial albums in the same package) or the addition of new (bonus) tracks which may or may not be new recordings. Reissues are to be differentiated from CD repressings as noted in #2 below. (b) "Version" is meant to imply different commercial releases from the same recording session or possibly multiple recording sessions that were held within a short time span and typically involve the same players. Many artists have different language versions of some or most of their albums, typically limited to the artist's native language (if it's not English) and also an English language release. Other artists might hold a special recording session for the English release they ended up selling in North America or the U.S. and have a different recording session for the English or other language versions of their albums sold in European countries. Basically, the idea is that these different release variations are being sold at the same time and not after the original release version(s) have gone out-of-print and are no longer available. I will largely be using this term not so much to distinguish between regional releases where the bulk of the tracks are exactly the same but with a song or two difference, but rather where the recording sessions are different and the principle album tracks have obvious audible differences or vocal variations. The rare case of different versions of a compilation release may indicate significant differences in the track selection. Most record labels don't want to put out different versions of compilations since they are by their nature song collections from different recording sessions, and having multiple compilations with the same title but different song selections can lead to unnecessary confusion. Nevertheless, I do have a few instances of this even amongst the relatively few artists I collect in the large world of Christian music. One additional oddity is when different albums are released under the same album name (i.e. with completely different songs and presumably from different recording sessions). While this occurs very rarely, and is usually relegated to multiple self-titled releases by an artist/group, a different method would be used to distinguish between these releases besides calling the first album "version 1" and subsequent albums "version 2", "version 3", etc. I do not believe there are any instances of this occurence in my primary collection list at this time. (c) "Rerelease" is meant to imply a rerecording of a previously released album where a different (later) recording session is held for the purpose of rerecording all or most of the songs with current band members, if different from the original recordings, or with current session musicians at their disposal. These rerecorded versions of an album, if they are sold under the original album name, are usually done so after the original release is out-of-print and usually with new cover art for hopefully obvious reasons. Some rereleases will feature completely rerecorded tracks including vocals and all instrumentation, whereas others may mix original vocal tracks with newly recorded music or vice versa. At any rate, the idea is that these rereleases are supposed to be "new and improved" over the original release and not just tailored to giving multiple choices to different audiences or playing marketing gimmicks by dividing up the songs in a single recording session between multiple releases in order to encourage fans to buy multiple copies at the same time. Rerecorded rereleases will usually happen [a] when the recording artist also owns the copyright to his music and/or songs and is dissatisfied with the original album release for whatever reason (poor production, etc.), or [b] the recording artist is trying to gain a form of copyright for his older songs by creating and releasing a "new" (rerecorded) album featuring his original album songs on it. The latter will often happen when the artist wants the capability to sell more or all of his works independently but the original copyright owner of his early album(s) is either refusing to sell the copyright for the original recordings back to him or is making it cost prohibitive to do so. |
| 2. |
Dates: As stated above, two dates with a slash [ex. 1985/1993] indicates a reissue with the first year(s) being the year(s) of original release, and the second being the year of the reissue, if known. Two dates with the second date enclosed in angular brackets [ex. 1985 <1986>] indicates one of two things: [1] an import release, with the first date being the year the album was first released in its "home" country/countries, and the second date enclosed in brackets indicating the year (if known) that the import was released, or [2] a format (usually a CD) that was issued a year or more after the album was first released on its initial formats (typically LP and/or CS), or a CD repress that differs from the original CD issue(s) in some distinct way (different distributor, altered cover art or disc art, etc.). Many albums made from 1983 to 1985 were not released on CD in the U.S. until 1986 or 1987 when CDs began to be a commonly requested media format. Early issue CDs were frequently made in Japan and released as digipaks. (Nowadays, digipaks appear to be the reissue packaging method of choice since they are typically less expensive than jewel cases and do not require a front insert/booklet to be made, though many digipaks do have one.) Now that vinyl is coming back into popularity, many albums released after the mid to late 80s that were not originally sold on vinyl are being reissued in a special vinyl pressing. I am not a big vinyl collector, though, so I will rarely be buying new vinyl albums that are also available on CD. Thankfully, there are no rumors I've heard (yet) about a big comback for cassettes or 8-tracks! If an import was released in the same year as the original country release, then there won't be any brackets. As far as I am aware, all CD-R albums in my collection are "official" CD-Rs that were issued by the original/reissue label only in CD-R format. If any of my CD-R albums also exist in an original retail silver CD pressing, then I'd greatly appreciate being notified so I can begin seeking one of those copies. The MP3 graphic next to an album is symbolic of a release that, to my knowledge, is/was only made available as a digital download. If an album is available to purchase as a physical disc, I will typically refrain from purchasing a digital copy in favor of obtaining a physical CD copy even if the disc goes OOP before I have a chance to get one. However, some limited edition CD pressings by once popular artists (Grammatrain, etc.) are proving over the last several years to be almost nonexistent in the resale market even shortly after selling out, so I will probably be buying digital copies more frequently as I try to finish up my digital archives for each artist I am collecting. The "MP3" image is not meant to indicate that I only own a release in the MP3 file format, but simply that I own it in some type of digital file format (MP3, FLAC, etc.) |
| 3. |
New Additions to the List: A
yellow asterisk
(*)
indicates
a new addition since last update, on the off chance that you're actually
"following"
this
list.
New
additions
include
both
new
titles
and
additional
or
different versions or
reissues of a title already in my list. |
| 4. |
Album
Info Pages: From this point on, my album info pages will not
be individually linked to titles on the collection page, but will only
be linked on the
discography
pages. The format images (CD, CS, digital) now each have a target link going to the artist's/group's
discography
listing
in
the ECMD. |
|
Back to Collection Page |