Upcoming FTD Release "Summer Of '76"

[emjel]

Make the remaining soundboards available for download and be done with it. We're not getting any younger.

Hundreds of mediocre-to-substandard soundboard recordings from the summer of 1974 - 1977? Who would want to sit through such dreck? A few choice soundboard recordings, carefully chosen, as well as tour compilations would have been the most sensible approach. But FTD deviated from any such attempts long ago, and the early years of FTD's selections were uneven at best. That said, the Summer Of '76 is the perfect example of how the soundboard series has veered terribly off course.

The 3CD soundboard series is FTD's answer to continuous demands and changing economic realities.

People close to the label didn't deny possible controversies around the release of "Summer Of '76". Frankly this release is an easy target to point out the label's missteps. There are enough fans and collectors out there, who'd prefer complete performances over tour compilations and bonus songs any day of the week (this fan included).

Introducing 3cd sets of repetitive concerts for £50 is NOT a response to changing economic realities.- unless that response was made by someone out of their mind.

Yeah it is.

"Times are hard for our customers. Energy bills are soaring, and there is a cost of living crisis."
"Right. So let's give them the more expensive cd releases of subpar shows. That will help."

Yeah and a lot of that has to do with crappy economic decisions that people make all the time. On both personal and national levels. If you can't pay your energy bills, maybe you shouldn't spend whatever money still happens to be in your wallet on things you don't really need.

People spend their money on cars, pets, trips, vacations, drugs and other non-essentials. If you don't do any of that, you sure got a few bucks left to spend on something you really want to spend it on. Like on a 3CD set of repetitive concerts.

Are you trying to suggest that £50 Elvis CD sets fall into the category of "essential purchases" then.

Your argument and lesson on home economics is really quite weak in relation to buying expensive Elvis soundboard CDs against the point that PMP is making.

To start with, people who are struggling to pay their energy bills are extremely unlikely to go out buying cars which is not the kind of thing someone does on some kind of regular basis and which people can cut back on and if people are blowing their money on the other kind of things you suggest, the thought that they would change their spending habits to buy a £50 Elvis soundboard set is highly remote. They’d just buy the release anyway. And when you suggest that some people could cut out buying drugs, it could be argued that for some, buying Elvis FTD releases and even other Elvis releases is just like a drug in itself.

PMP is talking about those who do take economic decisions seriously and have already taken action to try and cut back on expensive non essentials, in other words, they could probably afford a single CD soundboard set at £20, but a 3 CD set at £50 which basically contains shows that are repetitive can make things difficult for them and are therefore unlikely to buy.

This in turn means less sales for FTD and if FTD then decide to cut back on the pressing numbers of each release to reduce costs, yet make a profit, eventually the economy of scale will kick in meaning that for FTD to make a reasonable profit on each release, they will have to raise their prices again.

When financial times are hard for people and a business wants to attract sales, a business should try to offer things at reasonable prices to attract sales and at best keep sales steady. FTD seem to have gone in the opposite direction of going from more affordable single or double CD soundboard sets to more expensive 3 or 4 CD sets that contain shows that are just repetitive with Elvis in autopilot mode and that only the real die hard collectors who must own everything feel they need.

A few decades ago, Ernst was of the opinion that he was not interested in fleecing customers by putting out releases where fans had to buy a new album just to get one unreleased song because he felt it was not the right thing to do. Now he seems to have gone into reverse mode and not only are we getting expensive CD sets that contain repetitive shows, we are also seeing limited numbered edition vinyl albums coming out in fancy coloured pressings that have already been released on regular black vinyl. Yes, it could be argued that it is good business practice for FTD to do that to improve its revenue stream, but as I wrote, it goes against what Ernst firmly believed in years ago and for some fans who have taken the decision to buy every FTD release for their collection , but who are now struggling financially, it seems he is putting a bit of a financial burden on those fans and collectors.

[pmp]

Make the remaining soundboards available for download and be done with it. We're not getting any younger.

Hundreds of mediocre-to-substandard soundboard recordings from the summer of 1974 - 1977? Who would want to sit through such dreck? A few choice soundboard recordings, carefully chosen, as well as tour compilations would have been the most sensible approach. But FTD deviated from any such attempts long ago, and the early years of FTD's selections were uneven at best. That said, the Summer Of '76 is the perfect example of how the soundboard series has veered terribly off course.

The 3CD soundboard series is FTD's answer to continuous demands and changing economic realities.

People close to the label didn't deny possible controversies around the release of "Summer Of '76". Frankly this release is an easy target to point out the label's missteps. There are enough fans and collectors out there, who'd prefer complete performances over tour compilations and bonus songs any day of the week (this fan included).

Introducing 3cd sets of repetitive concerts for £50 is NOT a response to changing economic realities.- unless that response was made by someone out of their mind.

Yeah it is.

"Times are hard for our customers. Energy bills are soaring, and there is a cost of living crisis."
"Right. So let's give them the more expensive cd releases of subpar shows. That will help."

Yeah and a lot of that has to do with crappy economic decisions that people make all the time. On both personal and national levels. If you can't pay your energy bills, maybe you shouldn't spend whatever money still happens to be in your wallet on things you don't really need.

People spend their money on cars, pets, trips, vacations, drugs and other non-essentials. If you don't do any of that, you sure got a few bucks left to spend on something you really want to spend it on. Like on a 3CD set of repetitive concerts.

So you really think that the response to a cost of living crisis in a company producing non-essential products is to put the price up by about 40% and to tell their potential buyers to not go on a family holiday so that Dad can buy crap concerts at the wrong speed for an exorbitant price?

A good job you're not running Sony or they would go broke.

[pmp]

Make the remaining soundboards available for download and be done with it. We're not getting any younger.

Hundreds of mediocre-to-substandard soundboard recordings from the summer of 1974 - 1977? Who would want to sit through such dreck? A few choice soundboard recordings, carefully chosen, as well as tour compilations would have been the most sensible approach. But FTD deviated from any such attempts long ago, and the early years of FTD's selections were uneven at best. That said, the Summer Of '76 is the perfect example of how the soundboard series has veered terribly off course.

The 3CD soundboard series is FTD's answer to continuous demands and changing economic realities.

People close to the label didn't deny possible controversies around the release of "Summer Of '76". Frankly this release is an easy target to point out the label's missteps. There are enough fans and collectors out there, who'd prefer complete performances over tour compilations and bonus songs any day of the week (this fan included).

Introducing 3cd sets of repetitive concerts for £50 is NOT a response to changing economic realities.- unless that response was made by someone out of their mind.

Yeah it is.

"Times are hard for our customers. Energy bills are soaring, and there is a cost of living crisis."
"Right. So let's give them the more expensive cd releases of subpar shows. That will help."

Yeah and a lot of that has to do with crappy economic decisions that people make all the time. On both personal and national levels. If you can't pay your energy bills, maybe you shouldn't spend whatever money still happens to be in your wallet on things you don't really need.

People spend their money on cars, pets, trips, vacations, drugs and other non-essentials. If you don't do any of that, you sure got a few bucks left to spend on something you really want to spend it on. Like on a 3CD set of repetitive concerts.

Are you trying to suggest that £50 Elvis CD sets fall into the category of "essential purchases" then.

Your argument and lesson on home economics is really quite weak in relation to buying expensive Elvis soundboard CDs against the point that PMP is making.

To start with, people who are struggling to pay their energy bills are extremely unlikely to go out buying cars which is not the kind of thing someone does on some kind of regular basis and which people can cut back on and if people are blowing their money on the other kind of things you suggest, the thought that they would change their spending habits to buy a £50 Elvis soundboard set is highly remote. They’d just buy the release anyway. And when you suggest that some people could cut out buying drugs, it could be argued that for some, buying Elvis FTD releases and even other Elvis releases is just like a drug in itself.

PMP is talking about those who do take economic decisions seriously and have already taken action to try and cut back on expensive non essentials, in other words, they could probably afford a single CD soundboard set at £20, but a 3 CD set at £50 which basically contains shows that are repetitive can make things difficult for them and are therefore unlikely to buy.

This in turn means less sales for FTD and if FTD then decide to cut back on the pressing numbers of each release to reduce costs, yet make a profit, eventually the economy of scale will kick in meaning that for FTD to make a reasonable profit on each release, they will have to raise their prices again.

When financial times are hard for people and a business wants to attract sales, a business should try to offer things at reasonable prices to attract sales and at best keep sales steady. FTD seem to have gone in the opposite direction of going from more affordable single or double CD soundboard sets to more expensive 3 or 4 CD sets that contain shows that are just repetitive with Elvis in autopilot mode and that only the real die hard collectors who must own everything feel they need.

A few decades ago, Ernst was of the opinion that he was not interested in fleecing customers by putting out releases where fans had to buy a new album just to get one unreleased song because he felt it was not the right thing to do. Now he seems to have gone into reverse mode and not only are we getting expensive CD sets that contain repetitive shows, we are also seeing limited numbered edition vinyl albums coming out in fancy coloured pressings that have already been released on regular black vinyl. Yes, it could be argued that it is good business practice for FTD to do that to improve its revenue stream, but as I wrote, it goes against what Ernst firmly believed in years ago and for some fans who have taken the decision to buy every FTD release for their collection , but who are now struggling financially, it seems he is putting a bit of a financial burden on those fans and collectors.

Sense at last!

[pmp]

I just received the album and gave it a spin. It starts with the afternoon show Elvis gave on July 24th in Charleston. The man is in clear frame of mind and quite vivid considering the year and the time of the day. However, his voice already shows signs of weakness and he cuts the show short by omitting "Polk Salad Annie" and "Hound Dog". In general the show is acceptable. The second disc takes us to Springfield, where the king performed on July 29th. When he welcomes the crowd after "I Got A Woman" he sounds intoxicated, his monologue about the band playing softball is quite pointless and he slurrs his speech a bit. His voice has sounds more rough than in Charleston and Elvis obviously has problems hitting and holding notes. By August 1st (Hampton Roads) his voice is shot. He sounds hoarse, has trouble to hit and hold notes and even during fast songs like "Jailhouse Rock" his voice squeaks at times. But he awake and in good mood. If his voice had been in good condition, this would have been a nice 1976 show.

So one of the best things about this set is that Elvis is "awake?".

[Domino]

This was the most disappointing set yet.In one of the concerts I would have thought it was Charlie singing .Just didn't sound like Elvis.There really isn't any excuse for releasing Elvis at his worst.If that's all there is left then say so and that will just leave the one's that have to have everything.If there's a few good one's left then release them and just concentrate on sessions until there's nothing left and then close the vault.

[minkahed]

This was the most disappointing set yet.In one of the concerts I would have thought it was Charlie singing .Just didn't sound like Elvis.There really isn't any excuse for releasing Elvis at his worst.If that's all there is left then say so and that will just leave the one's that have to have everything.If there's a few good one's left then release them and just concentrate on sessions until there's nothing left and then close the vault.

I agree with this sentiment.

[A. C. van Kuijk]

So one of the best things about this set is that Elvis is "awake?"

Unfortunately YES.