domestic (United States) or import CDs

[Steve Savicki]

Going back to FORD's comment in my "5 demises of rock and roll" thread about how the music market is controlled and run, I was curious, does anyone buy import CDs over domestics?

I personally find the compilations of imports to be very good and sometimes priced even cheaper than American CDs.

I mean today, I just think American CDs just... suck.

[FORD]

Some cases, you just HAVE to buy the imports. For example, look what the labels did to the Beatles, early Rolling Stones, and Bon Scott era Ac/Dc albums. The American releases are not the same as what was marketed in the country of origin.

Capitol remedied the Beatles discrepancies in 1987, when they released the Beatles catalog on CD, using the original British Parlaphone/EMI formats. What's weird is that they have now reversed that decision and are issuing the butchered "American versions" on CD.

The Stones London/Abcko catalog from the 60's is about the same. When Allen Klein released the second remastering of these albums in 2002, he left the US releases as is - but also included the UK versions of "Out of Our Heads" and "Aftermath".

The fair thing to do in this case would have been to just issue one CD and put all the tracks in that were on both versions of the album.

As for AC/DC - If you asked their American fans in 1980 how many albums Ac/Dc had recorded before Bon Scott died, they would have told you that 4 albums had been recorded. But that's because the band's first two albums were merged into one for the US market, and their third album "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap" wasn't even released until 1981 - and even then in a significantly altered form.

Screw that, I'll stick with the originals....

[rustoffa]

Plenty of variables involved...

Some imports are complete shite.

Alot of the older releases are only attainable that way.

Man, I paid dearly tryin' to complete my SWEET collection.

[ODShowtime]

I just want to know why record companies think Japan, Australia and Europe are they only places that want extra live tracks on singles. WTF is that all about?