Online Vinyl Deals

MikeH said:
just FYI--rough trade has been having some bad inventory issues and have been cancelling a lot of orders from that sale.
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Yeah, I've been waiting for almost a month on my order.

I received tracking info for part of the order almost three weeks ago - but it says the items are still sitting at the USPS. I sent a note to CS and they admitted there were issues with inventory. They said the first part of the order should eventually be delivered - but it's completely up to the USPS as to when they will be shipped. Apparently, when RT drops a huge sale shipment on the USPS it's no longer RT's issue.

RT said that if I don't receive anything by Feb. 3 they would consider the order "Lost" and would cancel ...

... and then suddenly the first part of my order showed up at my door yesterday without any advance heads-up. 🤷‍♂️
 
Saw this yesterday and looks like the discounted price ($27.04) is still active--for the jazzy-Sinatra fans among you:

Amazon product ASIN B01B4SII96
Best I can tell it's this one, which would be a decent deal, but who ever knows...

www.discogs.com

Frank Sinatra - Sinatra At The Sands

View credits, reviews, tracks and shop for the 2016 Vinyl release of "Sinatra At The Sands" on Discogs.
www.discogs.com www.discogs.com
 
Russ I said:
Amazon product ASIN B076W8Y6BB
Amazon price is $22.97. Barcode from this discogs listing is a match:

www.discogs.com

The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

View credits, reviews, tracks and shop for the 2017 Vinyl release of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" on Discogs.
www.discogs.com www.discogs.com
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The copy I received matches the listing below. Cleaned and listened and I'm very glad I bought it.

www.discogs.com

The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

View credits, reviews, tracks and shop for the 2017 Vinyl release of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" on Discogs.
www.discogs.com www.discogs.com
 
Russ I said:
Amazon product ASIN B076W8Y6BB
Amazon price is $22.97. Barcode from this discogs listing is a match:

www.discogs.com

The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

View credits, reviews, tracks and shop for the 2017 Vinyl release of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" on Discogs.
www.discogs.com www.discogs.com
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[pls note this is just an FYI w/ questions about the two QRP-pressed versions on Discogs; not in any way a complaint about your post or a suggestion that you did or said anything wrong!]

I purchased this and picked it up today. Fwiw, mine is not that Discogs listing, but it is the other QRP-pressed 2017 Anniversary version listed on Discogs, with the “Room30” in runout.

As far as I can tell, the difference is that the one you linked to was mastered at Optimal in Germany and has Optimal’s number stamped in the runout. Mine apparently was not mastered at Optimal.

I know this gets into technical stuff that’s not my strong suit for sure. Both versions have the same mastering engineer (MIke’s Showell) and otherwise seem identical. Now I’m curious about this now, and I can’t find anything about it online. Where was mine mastered? How would they be different?
 
Portland Sheriff said:
[pls note this is just an FYI w/ questions about the two QRP-pressed versions on Discogs; not in any way a complaint about your post or a suggestion that you did or said anything wrong!]

I purchased this and picked it up today. Fwiw, mine is not that Discogs listing, but it is the other QRP-pressed 2017 Anniversary version listed on Discogs, with the “Room30” in runout.

As far as I can tell, the difference is that the one you linked to was mastered at Optimal in Germany and has Optimal’s number stamped in the runout. Mine apparently was not mastered at Optimal.

I know this gets into technical stuff that’s not my strong suit for sure. Both versions have the same mastering engineer (MIke’s Showell) and otherwise seem identical. Now I’m curious about this now, and I can’t find anything about it online. Where was mine mastered? How would they be different?
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Interesting. Does yours have the "Made in Canada" sticker on the back? The copy I received has that sticker, as shown in the photos of the pressing I linked to. Also has Room 30 in the runout.

EDIT: This is the one I linked to.
 
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Russ I said:
Interesting. Does yours have the "Made in Canada" sticker on the back? The copy I received has that sticker, as shown in the photos of the pressing I linked to. Also has Room 30 in the runout.

EDIT: This is the one I linked to.
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Weird. When I click on the link in the original post that led me to make the purchase it takes me to the US/Optimal. I e checked it a few times.
 
Portland Sheriff said:
Weird. When I click on the link in the original post that led me to make the purchase it takes me to the US/Optimal. I e checked it a few times.
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Okay, now I understand. In the initial post about the deal, I linked to the discogs pressing that seemed the likeliest match to the Amazon listing. Then, once I'd received my copy from Amazon, I linked to the discogs pressing that best matched the album I'd received (which is also the link I included in my most recent post). Sorry if my original post was misleading. But it still looks like you and I received different pressings.
 
Russ I said:
Okay, now I understand. In the initial post about the deal, I linked to the discogs pressing that seemed the likeliest match to the Amazon listing. Then, once I'd received my copy from Amazon, I linked to the discogs pressing that best matched the album I'd received (which is also the link I included in my most recent post). Sorry if my original post was misleading. But it still looks like you and I received different pressings.
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No problem! I didn’t realize there were two posts/links in question, so thank you for clarifying.

That still leaves open my questions/curiosity about the two U.S. QRP pressings, with the same mix and mastering engineer. One is mastered at Optimal and has an Optimal number pressed in the runout. The other — the one I just got from Amazon — has no Discogs information about where it was mastered and, instead of the Optimal number pressed into it, has “Room30” etched in the runout.

If anyone has any insight on this, pls chime in. It’s not a problem — I’m just interested in understanding why this would happen when they were ultimately pressed at the same place and how they may sound different (if at all).

Fwiw, my press is silent and sounds really good, but, in fairness, I don’t have anything to compare it to.
 
Portland Sheriff said:
No problem! I didn’t realize there were two posts/links in question, so thank you for clarifying.

That still leaves open my questions/curiosity about the two U.S. QRP pressings, with the same mix and mastering engineer. One is mastered at Optimal and has an Optimal number pressed in the runout. The other — the one I just got from Amazon — has no Discogs information about where it was mastered and, instead of the Optimal number pressed into it, has “Room30” etched in the runout.

If anyone has any insight on this, pls chime in. It’s not a problem — I’m just interested in understanding why this would happen when they were ultimately pressed at the same place and how they may sound different (if at all).

Fwiw, my press is silent and sounds really good, but, in fairness, I don’t have anything to compare it to.
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The image below shows the runout information from the pressing I think I have. I just found something on reddit that says the "Miles" refers to Miles Showell, mastering engineer at Abbey Road Studios, and "Room 30" is the mastering suite at Abbey Road. Logical conclusion would be that it was both mixed and mastered at Abbey Road. But I have no idea why there would be different mastering locations to create different versions of the same mix. I agree it would be kind of fun to get the whole story on this.

(But to complicate matters, my copy of The Beatles and Esher Demos has BOTH the Room 30 and Optimal Media designations in the deadwax.)

Screen Shot 2022-01-30 at 8.32.01 PM.png
 
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Russ I said:
The image below shows the runout information from the pressing I think I have. I just found something on reddit that says the "Miles" refers to Miles Showell, mastering engineer at Abbey Road Studios, and "Room 30" is the mastering suite at Abbey Road. Logical conclusion would be that it was both mixed and mastered at Abbey Road. But I have no idea why there would be different mastering locations to create different versions of the same mix. I agree it would be kind of fun to get the whole story on this.

(But to complicate matters, my copy of The Beatles and Esher Demos has BOTH the Room 30 and Optimal Media designations in the deadwax.)

View attachment 126929
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I think typically you’d have the initial deadwax cut into the lacquer showing who cut it, then optimal adds their runout stamp when pressing. So my guess is Room 30 is where the lacquer was cut (at. Abbey Road by Miles Showell) and optimal deadwax means PRESSED at optimal.
 
MikeH said:
I think typically you’d have the initial deadwax cut into the lacquer showing who cut it, then optimal adds their runout stamp when pressing. So my guess is Room 30 is where the lacquer was cut (at. Abbey Road by Miles Showell) and optimal deadwax means PRESSED at optimal.
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That makes sense to me, but here's some of the info. for the one that has the Optimal indentifier in the deadwax. Suggests is was mastered at Optimal, lacquer cut by Miles (presumably at Abbey Road), but pressed at Quality.

Screen Shot 2022-01-30 at 11.28.47 PM.png
 
Russ I said:
That makes sense to me, but here's some of the info. for the one that has the Optimal indentifier in the deadwax. Suggests is was mastered at Optimal, lacquer cut by Miles (presumably at Abbey Road), but pressed at Quality.

View attachment 126944
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My guess is that it’s just wrong…if it has that BH71657, that means it was plated at optimal . B means vinyl, H is the year it was pressed (A was 2010, B 2011, etc). The next string is the internal plating number so they can find the metalwork later, then the side and if there’s an A1 that means it’s the first stamper. None of that deadwax means mastered at optimal.

The album was digitally remixed, then miles masters for vinyl and cuts a lacquer from it. I couldn’t see any scenario where optimal would get it and have a no-name engineer master for vinyl and send it back to Miles to cut it…

Edit: just looked through the release notes on discogs and saw this:

“This QRP pressing contains Optimal's matrix scheme, so I added that to the "Mastered At" field since there's no Plated or Processed by option...similar to how the matrix scheme is added when, for example, RTI has a matrix scheme in the deadwax.”
 
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