Intrada Soundtrack Forum

I'm sorry to disagree with you, Nicolai, but I think there are a lot of soundtrack collectors out there in the world as evidenced by Sony and Warner Bros., for example, two corporate mega-giants, continuing to release limited quantities of vinyl soundtracks in stunning gatefold covers.

All three of the new Batman series, the last Superman, Watchmen, Pan's Labyrinth, 300, the first 5 Bonds were re-released recently, and the list keeps growing (ST: Into The Dark comes out next week) with some new labels copying VS's old business model: lots of horror and genre titles done up in new, flashy covers and heavy vinyl, a must for the true audiophile.

I, for one, support these "gestures" because I always have, going back to the days when Screen Archives, Intrada and VS. were starting out. Their product was different than the big record companies, they were soundtrack labels and it was exciting with these upstarts in the mix and doing stuff the corporate conglomerate couldn't even fathom, only it's come back around for some strange reason, who knows? but for purely selfish reasons, I say "keep 'em comin'." "Why not more?"

Look, I'm not comparing Intrada with Sony/Legacy or Warner Bros./WaterTower, they probably don't risk much pressing 5,000 albums but I like that they give the consumer a choice.

Kids today are diggin it because they heard m m my generation spinning our records on direct drive turntables, amped by Technics, while they were still in their nappies.

There's that nostalgia thing in there for sure, but they want to hear it like they used to hear it when they were little, (that's my guess) and there's only one way to get that sound- the one they grew up on- and that's from vinyl.

Star Wars was such an album, and there's nothing like that first Star Wars album. Except, of course, for the next five, only Star Wars III wasn't released on vinyl. Somebody at Sony must have been asleep or in a galaxy far, far away. That's what I call a grail.

Choice is always great if the company selling the product is in the position to offer it. The big companies will certainly always look for ways to make a bit more money from their catalogue. For the more mainstream stuff, it appears that the consortium of Sony Music, Universal Music and Warner Music are now really pushing high-resolution audio downloads and streamlined equipment to play them. For example, Sony just announced a couple of discless stereo players that support all of the high-resolution PCM and DSD formats, the latter of which was used for SACD releases and provides more "analog" (i.e., smoother) waveforms due to its very high sample rate (their intention is to sell the DSD music all over again in the form of downloads).

Of course, all of this download stuff is beyond the scope of what the specialist soundtrack labels can do unless they own the music outright. The music they own long-term tends to be newer digitally-recorded scores anyway. It is because of the specialist labels that we get not only the great obscure soundtracks that were never before released, but also the expanded soundtracks that require multiple clearances due to past albums. I couldn't imagine the film studios and large record labels working together on an almost regular basis to release such currently unpopular music as older soundtracks without a specialist label expertly acting as the catalyst.

Oh, and I think Nicolai's point is valid. I'd wager that the Bond/Batman/Superman/300/blah, blah soundtracks sell a heck of a lot more copies than the vast majority of soundtracks that the specialist labels have been allowed to release. Who other than very few people would buy a copy of Sebastian only on vinyl while refusing a CD copy? Which soundtracks should Intrada decide to release on vinyl? They obviously can't reasonably do it for their entire output.