The UK cover, nothing different in any of the first three editions.
As many of you probably already know, after this album was published, it was also right away withdrawn from the market because of a "pastiche" in the mixng of some songs. This regarded only the stereo copy, not the mono, of course. What you see below is the first published stereo label.
Then came the second label,...
...and the third (foto above)
So, the only way to recognize what version of the album is the one that suffered from withdrawal (apart from listening carefully to it), remains the label, because there are no differencies in the matrix code that you find written in the trail-off vinyl. Many collectors often say "the Island originals are on pink rim label", yes, but it depends, we must always distinguish....
Above: the version on the sunrays Island label (again a pink rim) - in this case, my copy is the German one.
********************************
The album was also issued more or less worldwide, and also in Italy, the first edition was in stereo for the Ricordi International label in 1969, in a curious version: the cover is not gatefold and as you can see, there are pictures of all members except Mick Abrahams... In so many years of collecting-listening-playing-reading music, let me tell you now that I know some paparazzi "journalists" and "critics" which would be happy to write something like "Could it be that Ian Anderson already decided to fire Abrahams and couldn't stand to have him on the Italian cover sleeve??? " Yes, that's what certain people did and still do on magazines today, unfortunately, and believe me: when they write such bullshit, they really DO MEAN it :-) Also this early Ricordi Italian version presents the wrong "pastiched" stereo mixage, but no one ever took care to withdraw it - LOL. Years later there was a second edition on Island, with regular gatefold cover and everything like the original UK issue.
The Italian Ricordi covers (above) and the label (below)
Your COUNTESS
No comments:
Post a Comment