Vinyl Me Please Anthology

wynn72 said:
Yeah, I dont watch the unboxings (just VMP hype to me), but enjoy the podcasts, even the Storf ones. To me he's a fine interviewer and I mainly listen for the insight of the people he's talking to, not him.
End of the day though, the podcasts are just a plus. I'm definitely never relistening to them so the box sets in my collection are really what I'm putting down the money for. I've always been a sucker for a good box set, think the packaging is qualify, I've really enjoyed the record selection so far. Especially something like Ghostly where I was pretty unfamiliar with the label beforehand, so the curation is a big selling point for me.
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At the end of the day your happiness is all that matters, and we really shouldn't have to put members on the spot to justify their purchases, because Music makes everyone feel differently even if thats buying it from different sources.

I was a part of the Ghostly experience and I didn't do nearly enough to bring great conversations around the records they curated nor the label as a whole, which is something I kind of regret, but I would like to see this thread in the future become something like that, for those that order Stax, hope your stir the conversation into more of a learning experience for others, and not just a display of affection towards a shiny box.
 
Teeeee said:
Thank you for asking that.

And I was going to ask about Stax. Are there not any women that could be included? I honestly don't know, it's a legit question. @TCell - you seem pretty knowledgeable about it. Was Stax just not known to have many women artists?
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Storf said they couldn't do Carla Thomas or The Staple Singers as those have been recently reissued. Stax seems a very male heavy label. From the Stax list, there's only three other female artists I can see: Jean Knight, Mable John, and Shirley Brown.
 
mdmost said:
Storf said they couldn't do Carla Thomas or The Staple Singers as those have been recently reissued. Stax seems a very male heavy label. From the Stax list, there's only three other female artists I can see: Jean Knight, Mable John, and Shirley Brown.
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This makes me think about how strange their focus for the anthology is. On one hand, they seem like they are trying to sell it as a definitive overview/sampling of the label subject of the box, but passing over definitive albums because they have been reissued "recently", bizzarely not counting other boxsets (like the Otis one), seems to me like it would be in direct conflict with that goal.
 
Storf's always seemed like a deep cuts kind of guy with a goal to get albums remastered and reissued that he enjoys. I'm sure there's also some parameters the label restricts VMP to.
 
Slim given they learned from their dumb mistake of sending these out piecemeal.
 
mdmost said:
Storf said they couldn't do Carla Thomas or The Staple Singers as those have been recently reissued. Stax seems a very male heavy label. From the Stax list, there's only three other female artists I can see: Jean Knight, Mable John, and Shirley Brown.
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I am not hugely familiar with the complete history of Stax so it really was an honest question. When I think of Stax I think of Otis and Isaac and exactly 0 women come to mind. Thank you for the honest answer back. :)
 
Teeeee said:
Thank you for asking that.

And I was going to ask about Stax. Are there not any women that could be included? I honestly don't know, it's a legit question. @TCell - you seem pretty knowledgeable about it. Was Stax just not known to have many women artists?
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I figured I would clarify before commenting that it appears the only way to include women in anthology is to have one dedicated to the women of a specific label.
 
JonnyH said:
I figured I would clarify before commenting that it appears the only way to include women in anthology is to have one dedicated to the women of a specific label.
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I'm going to give voldemort the benefit of the doubt because this is only their 4th anthology. (I'm not sure why I'm giving them the benefit of any doubt though, they have 4 years worth of track records with me and they don't deserve that benefit but I'm feeling generous today). I know nothing about Ghostly, maybe there aren't many female artists on the label (which if so, shame on Ghostly!). Blue Note and Stax aren't known for their female artists.

It will be a watch for me at this point.
 
JonnyH said:
I figured I would clarify before commenting that it appears the only way to include women in anthology is to have one dedicated to the women of a specific label.
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That may be true but that's a bit unfair given the second Stax release Storf did was Carla Thomas which came after an Alice Coltrane Classics selection. Also a tad bit ironic given there was derision over VMP even doing a "Women of Motown" Anthology as the verbage was offensive to some.
 
Teeeee said:
Thank you for asking that.

And I was going to ask about Stax. Are there not any women that could be included? I honestly don't know, it's a legit question. @TCell - you seem pretty knowledgeable about it. Was Stax just not known to have many women artists?
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The most important woman at Stax was Estelle Axton, who was the co-founder of Stax (with her brother Jim Stewart, hence the name St-Ax) and fundamental in it's early growth.

As others have said, the two star female artists at Stax were Carla Thomas and then Mavis Staples, both of who whom VMP has released albums by in the past, and have a multitude of recent reissues by. And while I know there's the new Staples Singers box set ($150), I am surprised they didn't do Mavis' Only For the Lonely, which isn't part of the Staples box and hasn't had a reissue.

The other notable female performers at Stax (Shirley Brown, Jean Knight), had "Hit singles w/ filler" albums that could've been included. Jean Knight's Mr. Big Stuff album hasn't been reissued. I legitimately don't understand why this wasn't a pick over whatever the Eddie Floyd album is. And Brown's Woman to Woman was reissued in 2013 so they probably could've included with the Anthology. Feel free to include it in your BYO Stax Anthology, as it's still available online at a reasonable cost.

TL : DR - I understand why they went all male, but there were probably a couple albums they could've swapped in if they wanted, in Jean Knight's Mr. Big Stuff and/or Mavis Staples' Only For the Lonely.
 
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Storf's answer:

storfer

Official VMP Employee2 points·6 minutes ago

  1. I would argue there are no second tier Eddie Floyd releases.
  2. The last one we carried in the store, and the other two Stax has plans with. And we already did the Carla Thomas album that would have made the most sense for Classics. Wasn't an intentional thing to do all men, just ended up that way. Where Women of Motown felt like a guiding principle that gave the box set a cohesive form for celebrating Motown, the Stax box is celebrating Stax, which had something like 98% men on its roster. Just sheer odds thing happening, really.
 
mdmost said:
Storf's answer:

storfer

Official VMP Employee2 points·6 minutes ago

  1. I would argue there are no second tier Eddie Floyd releases.
  2. The last one we carried in the store, and the other two Stax has plans with. And we already did the Carla Thomas album that would have made the most sense for Classics. Wasn't an intentional thing to do all men, just ended up that way. Where Women of Motown felt like a guiding principle that gave the box set a cohesive form for celebrating Motown, the Stax box is celebrating Stax, which had something like 98% men on its roster. Just sheer odds thing happening, really.
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Yeah, I can't really fault voldemort for not having women in the Ghostly or Stax box sets when the actual label did nothing to advance women in the industry.

That being said, it would be nice to see voldemort supporting labels that support and actively advance women.
 
botherly said:
Any individual Otis albums you'd recommend instead of the full box?
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Lonely & Blue: The Deepest Soul of Otis Redding. I love pretty much everything he's put out, but this compilation is one of my favorite albums of all time. Not a greatest hits comp, but rather a themed comp. It's amazing, and can be had for cheap:

Otis Redding - Lonely & Blue: The Deepest Soul Of Otis Redding [LP] - Amazon.com Music

Otis Redding - Lonely & Blue: The Deepest Soul Of Otis Redding [LP] - Amazon.com Music
www.amazon.com
 
Teeeee said:
Yeah, I can't really fault voldemort for not having women in the Ghostly or Stax box sets when the actual label did nothing to advance women in the industry.

That being said, it would be nice to see voldemort supporting labels that support and actively advance women.
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Which labels would that be exactly?
 
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