STILL MORE POLICY STUFF!!

Douglass Fake · **Joined:** Sat Nov 19, 2005 3:48 pm **Posts:** 2773

Here's more stuff from my latest corner you might want to read. In here, you can have a place to offer feedback... though the topic is probably getting enough mileage in other threads already. But feel free to add comments if you wish.

9/8/11

STILL MORE POLICY STUFF!!

With two days past and myself, Roger, Jeff, George and Steve... and even Joe (when we could tear him away from working on CD art) all spending every hour available either processing sales or babbling about our policy changes, we've made time to start implementing our plans. Given the feedback (mostly positive), here are our next steps in getting CDs to as many people as is practical while honoring the AFM and studio policies already in place. They're making this music possible, of course. (And, by the way, the feedback from those peerless musicians of the AFM is heartwarming.) Anyway, here goes round two.

We've already locked down our terminology, or branding if you will, that will appear on newly printed inlay cards for the second batch of EXPLORERS as well as on future releases. We're not huge fans of people buying and instantly re-selling our CDs at inflated prices even before we begin shipping the discs out but we understand the nature of business and say 'more power to them' if folks want to invest in their futures by chancing their cash on soundtracks. Investments help keep our free enterprise system chugging along. So we're literally branding any "second editions" and whatnot accordingly. I myself collect "first editions", so this lets me continue doing so. If your EXPLORERS has the original 3000 number on it, yep, it's a "first edition". Just like the world of books and whatever. But PLEASE don't simply label these things "limited editions" any more, and here's our reasoning why.

EVERYTHING'S becoming a limited edition. Those two words have become meaningless. The terminolgy was never intended to be a marketing tool but was designed by it's "authors" to facilitate the release of a small quantity of albums into the hands of dedicated fans while keeping the costs feasible. That was it! Somehow, it's just grown into a monster eating itself alive by labels everywhere branding everything "limited", though the actual market interest may be smaller than the printed number indicated! Even major labels issue stuff and drop it without fanfare when sales recede. The net result is now a non-stop barrage of really worthy soundtracks masquerading as "limited" editions, all zooming towards the same small audience struggling to prioritize in the first place, be it Goldsmith or Fidenco, Bernstein or Plumeri. It's insane! Now, we know we can't have our cake and eat it, too. But maybe we can do something to help keep the lunatics from running the asylum. So... look for branding that distinguishes first editions from second editions and whatever. And PLEASE keep in mind: we have enough smarts to usually be in the ball park so don't often expect first printings, then second printings, then third ones and so forth. Usually one additional batch will do.

Finally, PLEASE think about the following because I have for three or four years now. No matter how CDs are branded, and how much a customer buys with the understanding of getting something limited, labels everywhere are RE-ISSUING stuff left and right. If you bought the Varese Sarabande CD Club issue of FLESH + BLOOD for it's unique appeal, you later found Prometheus improving on it and issuing it again. Frustrated? Well, after that disappeared, we improved on it yet again. And THAT disappeared. No doubt some enterprising label is readying it a fourth time. That spectacular limited CASINO ROYALE is coming out again soon. Heck, few things aren't. And - unlike rare original posters or prints that usually can't be improved upon - with CDs, each subsequent "reissue of a reissue" gets better! Think COMMANDO this week. So maybe the lunatics will keep on running the asylum afterall. I don't know. But I'm glad to know that while what we're doing may be brazen, it's helping us get more music out to you people. So stay tuned.
--Doug

redokt64 · **Posted:** Thu Sep 08, 2011 3:27 am

Thanks Doug... Nice to see you expand out the "rules" of the new policy and what it all means. Been a fan of Intrada for 26 years and it only gets better and better.

Richard

Althazan · **Joined:** Fri Apr 24, 2009 11:16 am **Posts:** 39

Bravo, Doug & Team! It's really great move! Clear and simple, just perfect!

T. Newman Fan · **Posted:** Thu Sep 08, 2011 6:13 am

That all makes perfect sense.

The recent release of Commando is a prime example as to why your policy makes perfect sense. For instance, many people in the US who were seriously afflicted by the hurricane likely didn't have a window of opportunity for ordering it. It must have been annoying to have lost power or undergo something more serious and then soon realize that the disc sold out in around a day's time, and immediately have grossly inflated prices.

Commando is not going to get any better than it is now, so waiting for a re-issue would be even more bothersome in this case.

Jay · **Joined:** Mon Jul 26, 2010 9:10 am **Posts:** 331

What label is releasing Casino Royale again?

Ivan-007 · **Joined:** Thu Sep 02, 2010 12:48 am **Posts:** 78

Larry Deutchman · **Joined:** Mon Sep 11, 2006 9:53 am **Posts:** 219

To all of you at Intrada:

Bravo for your candor!
Bravo for your insights!
Bravo for your vision!
Bravo for your love of the art form!
Bravo for viewing your customer as a fellow lover of the art form rather than merely as a consumer!
Bravo for balancing your role as business men with your role as curators and gate keepers of cultural treasures!

Alan · **Posted:** Thu Sep 08, 2011 10:37 am

3000 seems a funny old amount now. Too many for most releases & not enough for the few big hitters.

Cesare · **Posted:** Thu Sep 08, 2011 10:50 am

Very well!!!!
Now that it is clear that re-prints will be easily identifiabe as such, can we have a re-print of "Delta Force" and "Inchon", pretty please?
(and also "9 o 5" while you're at it)

Thanks!

Cesare

bruce marshall · **Joined:** Wed Mar 15, 2006 8:16 pm **Posts:** 775

I think there should be a Republican style debate on the subject.
I would love to see Fake, Kendall Kimmell, Thaxton, MV et. al on stage together argui :lol:

ng the merits of limited editions!
Unlike the political version , i would actually WATCH this one
LOL!

tharpdevenport · **Posted:** Thu Sep 08, 2011 12:59 pm

If we can't quote Rush Limbaugh here, we certainly can't have Republican debates here. But the free market and selling and profitting is okay.

Anyway, I wanted to head off a path I think I see coming. I fear more harm from it than good. What I am talking about is large -- many months, or half a year, whatever -- early announcements so people can plan their expenses in advance since we get such an onslaught. I remember a couple times that happening. Though apparently no one consults Kimmel, which is always fun to watch.

We've had these before, but always in one, two, or small amounts. The laregest was FSM about a year ago announcing a handful of titles early. Some labels have announced really early, too, like: Intrada ("Road House" -- I hope they find that missing cue; and Feilding's last score); FSM ("Poltergeist" 2CD and another title I forget the name of); SAE accidently spilling the bean on FSM doing "Gremlins", which is now looking to come out indeed year's end); and labels like LLLR and Quartet pre-announcing at events like Ubenda. I only wish tge Varese Club would do that sometimes (hell, isn't September the next striking date?)

But let's face it -- and this is in no way what so ever derogatory or negative -- Intrada and La La Land have been the go-to guys for in-demand and Holy Grails as of the passed, oh, three years. "Back to the Future", "First Blood", "Patton", "The Great Escape", "Innerspace", "The Journey of Natty Gann", "Star Trek V", "Batman", "Home Alone", "Predator", "Days of Our Lives" - just to name a few.
Okay, maybe not so much "Days of Our Lives"...

Sure, FSM has had some, but not so much.

Let's do a hypothetical situation. Let us say Intrada pre-announces "Highlander", "Starship Troopers", "The River Wild", "The Incredibles", some random Goldsmith title, a half dozen other popular things. LLLR pre-announces "Judge Dredd", "The A-Team" box set, a random Williams title, "The Hunt For Red October", other stuff.
Suddenly, FSM, Music Box Records, Quartet, others, see a slight decline in sales. Then a bigger one at selling points.

The pre-announcements are now common place. Sales drop. We'll take FSM here. They want to experience the increase in revenue flow. Suddenly, instead of that classic Max Steiner score, beloved Franz Waxman, or random golden or silver age title -- which mivht stick around for a few years, get pushed to the wayside. Something newer, more recent, like an '80's title, is done. More are done then, since the trick worked, and it would have to be done if everybody can plan way ahead on expenses and there are at least one dozen labels now.

I always hark on FSM ever since seeing Lukas talk about financial woes, and that in order to maintain things two to three CDs a month were necessary to release; what do we see from them now? One here and there. Then the losses he took on the Ron Jones box. I fear for the future of FSM. Half their titles have no sold out, some over ten years or sitting there.

I worry about the money of all smaller labels, even ones I've never boughten from, like Howlin' Wolf Records.

And if you think a label can't fold, remember Percepto -- GONE.

JGOnline · **Posted:** Thu Sep 08, 2011 1:16 pm

Great news that Explorers has caused a re-think and limited edition cds won't be so limited anymore. Well done to all to make this happen. True fans shouldn't miss out anymore. But think how many more sales there would be if those file sharing websites and blogs were shutdown. Film music could easily sell 10,000 copies of everything if the thieves who steel music were stopped.

tarasis · **Posted:** Thu Sep 08, 2011 2:01 pm

tarasis · **Posted:** Thu Sep 08, 2011 2:14 pm

tharpdevenport · **Posted:** Thu Sep 08, 2011 2:17 pm

MV was joking. They're not doing "Ghostbusters".

I imagine, worst case scenario, Varese kept the rights to that, too.

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