Post by pg on Jan 4, 2024 14:38:45 GMT
Yes, I'm having another go at this nonsense...
Somebody on ebay sold two ANATO copies recently - both advertised as "first pressings", but with some variation between them. Links are one and Two
Now, as a good seller, they take photos of all relevant parts and quote all matrix numbers, from which we can see:
- Only one has a copyright note under the crest on the front cover (left hand side)
- The inner is curved at the corners on the same copy, but has three (!) angular cuts on the other.
- The printing on the inner seems glossier on the round-inner, although admittedly this could be caused by camera flash
- The matrix numbers are different - rounded inner has YAX 5053 3 / 5054 4 and only the latter is marked BLAIRS. The angular-cut inner has YAX 5053 4 / 5054 4 and both are marked BLAIRS
I can't see any other differences.
What does this all mean? My standard assumption would be that the suffix on the YAX number would indicate distinct master plates, and be sequential, so more than one instance could be part of the first pressing (one each for multiple production lines), so both of the above would have gone down the same "B side production line".
Except - there are other etchings - PDG / 257 on one and 1.1 on the other. Based on the ever-reliable Wikipedia, these may be factory (record plant) identifiers, although if that were the case, surely they'd be the same on both sides, which they never are (as far as I can see). Meanwhile, on Discogs, this page suggests something more sensible, as it's at least consistent with PDG and 5 (mother 5, stamper 601, although EMI apparently only had 140 presses....), and a stretch could be made for the other side (also mother 5, but via stamp 257 (numbered explicitly, or possibly mis-read by the ebay person)). Stretching further could bring us to "HHT" and "HHO" instead of "1.1 1.1 T".
Lending weight to the above theory, this copy is YAX 3 / 3 with only side 2 noted as Blair
What of "BLAIRS"? Chris Blair was the mastering engineer at Abbey Road from 1969 to 2005, so it would be something of a surprise if he hadn't cut YAX 5053 3. Either he didn't "sign" that one, or again, the seller missed it. Judging by this listing, it became "MR BLAIR'S CUT" on YAX 5053 6
The copyright note is quite interesting, though. The ORIGINAL crest (designed by FM) was copyrighted in 1975, but that logo doesn't appear on ANATO. Did the band try to copyright David Costa's artwork? I can't read the text, but it does appear on other copies (not many of them, but some), and seems to line up with the round-cut inner. In the absence of any other information, I theorise that the copyright note was very early, and a particular machine (maybe outsourced, given the variation in inners). Once noticed as unnecessary / unwanted, the master was changed for further printing (or that outsourced supplier just wasn't used any further).
There appear to be two major variants of the inner sleeve - rounded and with 3 corners cut off. I saw one with all four corners cut, and what look like later, paper versions that are neither cut nor rounded - I think this ties up with the later addition of the bar code.
What would constitute a first pressing? ANATO was obviously a big seller in 1975, and stayed on the catalogue unchanged until the bar code was added to the sleeve in 1979, and the highest YAX suffix I've seen is 6. I imagine the stampers were kept in some sort of archive, and re-used whenever more copies were needed, gradually being discarded when they wore out. The two initial sleeve types (with / without copyright, and rounded / cut inner) seem to have existed in parallel, so unless anyone knows any different, my best guess would be that the lowest YAX suffix combo you can find (which appears to be 2 / 2, as there are no 1 suffixes at all that I can see) is definitely early. Anuy other combo OCULD be early, but is more likely to result from the 2 stamper wearing out and being supplanted by a later stamper.
For reference, my copy -
No copyright on front cover (which is embossed, obviously)
3 corners cut inner sleeve
Side 1 matrix - 5053 2 BLAIRS 4 GPP
Side 2 matrix - 5054 3 BLAIRS 3 ADH
Somebody on ebay sold two ANATO copies recently - both advertised as "first pressings", but with some variation between them. Links are one and Two
Now, as a good seller, they take photos of all relevant parts and quote all matrix numbers, from which we can see:
- Only one has a copyright note under the crest on the front cover (left hand side)
- The inner is curved at the corners on the same copy, but has three (!) angular cuts on the other.
- The printing on the inner seems glossier on the round-inner, although admittedly this could be caused by camera flash
- The matrix numbers are different - rounded inner has YAX 5053 3 / 5054 4 and only the latter is marked BLAIRS. The angular-cut inner has YAX 5053 4 / 5054 4 and both are marked BLAIRS
I can't see any other differences.
What does this all mean? My standard assumption would be that the suffix on the YAX number would indicate distinct master plates, and be sequential, so more than one instance could be part of the first pressing (one each for multiple production lines), so both of the above would have gone down the same "B side production line".
Except - there are other etchings - PDG / 257 on one and 1.1 on the other. Based on the ever-reliable Wikipedia, these may be factory (record plant) identifiers, although if that were the case, surely they'd be the same on both sides, which they never are (as far as I can see). Meanwhile, on Discogs, this page suggests something more sensible, as it's at least consistent with PDG and 5 (mother 5, stamper 601, although EMI apparently only had 140 presses....), and a stretch could be made for the other side (also mother 5, but via stamp 257 (numbered explicitly, or possibly mis-read by the ebay person)). Stretching further could bring us to "HHT" and "HHO" instead of "1.1 1.1 T".
Lending weight to the above theory, this copy is YAX 3 / 3 with only side 2 noted as Blair
What of "BLAIRS"? Chris Blair was the mastering engineer at Abbey Road from 1969 to 2005, so it would be something of a surprise if he hadn't cut YAX 5053 3. Either he didn't "sign" that one, or again, the seller missed it. Judging by this listing, it became "MR BLAIR'S CUT" on YAX 5053 6
The copyright note is quite interesting, though. The ORIGINAL crest (designed by FM) was copyrighted in 1975, but that logo doesn't appear on ANATO. Did the band try to copyright David Costa's artwork? I can't read the text, but it does appear on other copies (not many of them, but some), and seems to line up with the round-cut inner. In the absence of any other information, I theorise that the copyright note was very early, and a particular machine (maybe outsourced, given the variation in inners). Once noticed as unnecessary / unwanted, the master was changed for further printing (or that outsourced supplier just wasn't used any further).
There appear to be two major variants of the inner sleeve - rounded and with 3 corners cut off. I saw one with all four corners cut, and what look like later, paper versions that are neither cut nor rounded - I think this ties up with the later addition of the bar code.
What would constitute a first pressing? ANATO was obviously a big seller in 1975, and stayed on the catalogue unchanged until the bar code was added to the sleeve in 1979, and the highest YAX suffix I've seen is 6. I imagine the stampers were kept in some sort of archive, and re-used whenever more copies were needed, gradually being discarded when they wore out. The two initial sleeve types (with / without copyright, and rounded / cut inner) seem to have existed in parallel, so unless anyone knows any different, my best guess would be that the lowest YAX suffix combo you can find (which appears to be 2 / 2, as there are no 1 suffixes at all that I can see) is definitely early. Anuy other combo OCULD be early, but is more likely to result from the 2 stamper wearing out and being supplanted by a later stamper.
For reference, my copy -
No copyright on front cover (which is embossed, obviously)
3 corners cut inner sleeve
Side 1 matrix - 5053 2 BLAIRS 4 GPP
Side 2 matrix - 5054 3 BLAIRS 3 ADH
