Double pack with a photograph...

It seems that the record industry is reissuing old tunes with glossy new packaging now more than ever and given their sorry state of affairs who can really blame them? The tapes are in the vaults, nostalgia is always orbiting around the fringes of any scene, and the “vintage” craze has been expanded to include anything released before 1994.

In 1987, UK artists “The Smiths” released their last studio effort, entitled “Strangeways Here We Come”. 25 years later, the entire Smiths catalog is being reissued by Rhino Records in multiple box set formats, on both vinyl and CD. After reading about this, I decided to plop my original vinyl copy of “Strangeways” down on the turntable. As I listened, two thoughts came to mind. First and foremost, this was an amazing record by an incredible band. Secondly, I got to thinking how listening to music (at least during my lifetime) has come full circle. I started out with a transistor radio and one single earpiece. The sound was tinny, crappy, and interrupted by static, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything. I would adjust the tuning knob with the precision of a surgeon while rotating and twisting that little solid state box in order to try and get the best reception.

No matter what you tried it sounded like shit, but who really cared? We certainly didn’t, because this was the ultimate in entertainment. The only way to top it was to grab a record, place the needle on the groove and then sit down in one place and listen to it without doing anything else. My, how times have changed. Today, music is constantly droning on in the background of our collective lives, and other than the lack of static, today’s mp3 players and portable devices don’t really sound all that much better than those cheap transistor radios.

Getting back to The Smiths, there was a song on that last album of theirs called “Paint A Vulgar Picture”. The song included among other things a bit of a backhanded swipe at the music business, and how they recycle the songs of days gone by. The lyric goes “Reissue, reissue, repackage…re-evaluate the songs…double pack with a photograph…extra track and a tacky badge..”

These lyrics ask the question, “Is all this necessary?” Well, it depends. In the case of The Smiths, it’s all about availability. At some point over the last 10 years or so, most of the record buying public has come around to realizing that most CD’s released since the birth of the format sound like complete garbage. Shrill, over compressed, treble heavy hunks of plastic that work better as a drink coaster than they do as a listening experience. The digital files don’t sound much better because they are being mastered to be played on mp3 players and tiny computer speakers. I’m no vinyl purist, and I have plenty of CDs and digital files. So I completely understand and for the most part am willing to trade sound quality for convenience. Still, when I played that “Strangeways” vinyl over good headphones, I got a sonic kick to the gut that nothing else in any other format even comes close to achieving.

So unless you’re lucky enough to already own Smiths records on vinyl, these reissues will be welcomed as superior alternatives to the CDs sold in stores and online. Even the new CDs will probably be an upgrade as the trend in re-mastering now tries to emulate the vinyl experience instead of pushing everything in the mix up so loudly. The movement towards flat mastering began in Japan, as miniature replicas of classic LPs are being reissued in limited quantities on CD format.

These rare collectibles feature incredible attention to the most minute details involving packaging, artwork and most important, sound quality. A Japanese reissue of Led Zeppelin 3 comes with the original “spinning wheel” album jacket complete with die cut holes in the cover. More importantly, the sound kicks the collective asses of anything else you can find domestically.

There are other instances where even the original vinyl never made the grade. Elvis Costello and the Attractions 1980 release “Get Happy” had 10 songs crammed onto each side of the record, and the sound quality suffered as a result. Earlier this year, Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab re-issued the record as a double 45 rpm vinyl collectible, and the difference is like night and day. Even the Ryko and Rhino CD re-issues cannot match it. Comparing them side by side, every version released up till now is plagued with muddy bass, tinny vocals and no discernible midrange to speak of.

Another fortunate occurrence taking place with the resurrection of vinyl is the growing appreciation of mono mixes over the stereo ones. There is no hard and fast rule here and the better mix is ultimately the one that just plain sounds better. However in many instances, the mono wins out. Although stereo technology hails back to the late 1950’s, it was initially utilized for recordings of large orchestras. Pop music for the most part would be primarily mixed for mono for another decade or so. The records that were mixed for stereo in the ‘60’s were often done quickly and without much thought put into what should go where . Mono was the preferred format so it obviously took up the most time and effort into getting the blend just right.

Still another element to consider is the inferior quality of much of the vinyl manufactured in the US during the 1970’s. During the energy crisis, the industry attempted to cut its costs by mixing the petroleum based vinyl with other raw materials. This would sometimes detract from sound quality, and almost always affect the products durability. Many music fans as a result, gravitated towards vinyl imported from the United Kingdom and other countries.

Inevitably, it would seem that no matter who your favorite artist is or what era floats your boat, there’s a re-issue out there for you. Completists will moan and groan as their self proclaimed status forces them to shell out coin again and again for what is basically the same music. Meanwhile, the record industry can capitalize on their unfortunate history of not getting it right by offering sonic upgrades of all kinds for future generations. The most amusing aspect of all of this is how they are now being delivered in a format that they themselves had once proclaimed to be dead and gone.