I slightly empathize with not always using tape as labels don't always send out the analog masters, and even with them there can be drama like what Intervention ran into with their planned release of Starfish by The Church. Totally feel that if all VMP has to work with is high-rez files, it's imperative they send it to a proper engineer (they have used many of the good ones in the past) rather than sending it to GZ and cutting two corners at once.
Unfortunately I think this lazy approach to hip-hop reissues is just passing the low bar set over the years by Get on Down (who gets a pass due to their scale IMO) and emulated on bigger reissue series like DisRespect The Classics. On the other hand, the VMP Classics track is competing with MoFi, AP, Music Matters, Tone Poet, Pure Pleasures, Speaker's Corner etc, so they have to up their game to compete for the attention. It's just kind of frustrating as a hip-hop fan to have to choose between second-rate reissues or $50–$200 clean OG copies.