Pro cd-r releases???

I wasnt sure where to post this so i put it here. Would you buy a pro cd-r release of a demo or ep? Or are you against those?

I have received mixed reviews about them, some like some dislike.

They would be advertised as pro cd-rs and be priced no more than $7.

THoughts on this topic? I for one dont mind them for demos or eps, no albums though.

I'm not sure why people are so stingy on this subject. In my experience, it's very hard (if not impossible) to tell an audible difference between a silver-pressed CD and a professionally pressed CD-R.

I should note that I don't consider myself an audiophile, so I don't know the specific differences in quality. I just enjoy a certain base level of sound quality in the music I listen to, and I've had no issues with quality regarding pro CD-R's.

It's more a matter of principle than audio quality, although audio quality can also come into play depending on the source the CD-R is burnt from e.g. if it's not burnt from a lossless source then it will sound like garbage and nothing like the original album.

I am against buying CD-Rs because I do not see it as a means of supporting the band. Even if the band does not get a great share of the profit it means the band continues to at least have a recording contract and keeps their name alive.

Concerts and selling merchandise is all good but you need a complete package and without label support it is not so easy to get a band's name out there.

That's just my take on the whole situation.

There is no difference in sound quality (providing the source is lossless), however the shelf-life of a CD is hypothetically longer. I've never had a problem with CD-Rs though, I have some from 1997 that still work perfectly. I have talked to others that have had them fail, but that seems to be rather uncommon.

The other thing I was going to add - $7.00 is expensive for a CD-R and whether advertised as such or not - it is still a rip off.

Think about it - you can buy brand new original discs for that much. Places like Mad Rush Media and a few others tend to sell a lot of albums for around 7 - 8 bucks. All originals.

If you really cannot afford expensive European imports, you can always try the Latin pressings which have slightly lower quality packaging but they are nevertheless original and licensed by the parent label.

And if all else fails there is also Spotify, which costs like 12 bucks per month and you can stream nearly everything under the sun including some lesser known / obscure bands.

Whichever way I look at it, selling CD-Rs is a total rip off. It rips the band, it rips the fans and it hurts the music industry further. Not to mention that it is also illegal - so even if you are advertising the albums as CD-Rs you are fresh out of luck because that does not disclaim your responsibility in front of the law. Sure it is honest but it is also terribly stupid - you just become a massive target for RIAA and anyone else interested at taking a shot at you.

Don't mean to be harsh but seriously, anyone selling CD-Rs maybe should stay in school a bit longer, get a decent job, and buy the CDs (if you are really a collector). Don't hurt those of us who are actually making a living and like this hobby because all that piracy is doing is further taking away the physical format in favour of streaming and paid digital downloads.

Even demos and EPs are licenced so the fact that it wouldn't be for albums would make almost no difference. For as long as you do not own the rights to the music, no matter what format it is in, you cannot sell it and make any sort of profit off it.

For a demo, a silver oressed cdr is fine.

I have nothing against it. It's good for albums that have a very small demand. My copy of Wayne - Metal Church is one such album and I have no issue with it. I myself have released music through amazon's createspace which uses cd-r format and have been happy with their work

Also, how would a band releasing their own music that they hold all rights to in cd-r format be illegal?

For short runs, a CDR run is fine. It's not like you are pressing them on your PC and writing your band name with a marker. That how we did band demos back in the day before the affordable pro-CDRs were available. The print on the top is professionally pressed, the CD is professionally pressed, go for it. I've never had problems with them. I have bootleg CD burns from the 90's that still work fine. I've never had one fail.

ultmetal wrote:

For short runs, a CDR run is fine. It's not like you are pressing them on your PC and writing your band name with a marker. That how we did band demos back in the day before the affordable pro-CDRs were available. The print on the top is professionally pressed, the CD is professionally pressed, go for it. I've never had problems with them. I have bootleg CD burns from the 90's that still work fine. I've never had one fail.

This...

Alex Dee Rokket wrote:

The other thing I was going to add - $7.00 is expensive for a CD-R and whether advertised as such or not - it is still a rip off.

Think about it - you can buy brand new original discs for that much. Places like Mad Rush Media and a few others tend to sell a lot of albums for around 7 - 8 bucks. All originals.

If you really cannot afford expensive European imports, you can always try the Latin pressings which have slightly lower quality packaging but they are nevertheless original and licensed by the parent label.

And if all else fails there is also Spotify, which costs like 12 bucks per month and you can stream nearly everything under the sun including some lesser known / obscure bands.

Whichever way I look at it, selling CD-Rs is a total rip off. It rips the band, it rips the fans and it hurts the music industry further. Not to mention that it is also illegal - so even if you are advertising the albums as CD-Rs you are fresh out of luck because that does not disclaim your responsibility in front of the law. Sure it is honest but it is also terribly stupid - you just become a massive target for RIAA and anyone else interested at taking a shot at you.

Don't mean to be harsh but seriously, anyone selling CD-Rs maybe should stay in school a bit longer, get a decent job, and buy the CDs (if you are really a collector). Don't hurt those of us who are actually making a living and like this hobby because all that piracy is doing is further taking away the physical format in favour of streaming and paid digital downloads.

Even demos and EPs are licenced so the fact that it wouldn't be for albums would make almost no difference. For as long as you do not own the rights to the music, no matter what format it is in, you cannot sell it and make any sort of profit off it.

I don't see the illegality of it if you have properly licensed the music from the band. They are professional done and look exactly like a silver cd release, except its a cd-r. It's not some hand burned piece of junk of unlicensed music that i sold to a friend for a few bucks.

Also if it was so highly illegal, then how come EVERY pressing plant i have ever looked into gives you the option to do pro cd-r??? Usually this is the case if you want less than 300 discs.

Quite frankly I, and seems to me like everyone else, doesnt understand where youre coming from on this topic.


Also, you want to talk about hurting bands? THings like Spotify and other digital media is hurting bands and sales of physical merchandise. Places like Itunes have really taken a smurf poo on the music industry. And if your goal is to make money within the metal community, then you better go join Metallica or other mainstream crap. The important thing here is getting underground bands music out and into the public (legally of course) and to have fun.

The point is not the format the music is released on. If a band wants to release music on CD-R that is their choice of distribution.

The point is the licensing rights that attach to the product. By default, unless you own the rights to the music you cannot do much else with it other than listen to the album for your own enjoyment. If you want to legally sell someone else's copyright materail then you need a licence that allows you to do that. It doesn't necessarily matter how or what format will be used for as long as you have the correct legal licence to do so.

Almost everything released out there has a copyright that someone else owns. Even a demo and certainly even an EP. The fact that something is out of print doesn't mean that you can automatically have the legal right to sell that music.

Spotify and itunes are indeed taking away from the physical sale of albums but again both services have a licence to legally sell songs and stream music.

There are many labels that specialise in hard to find metal albums and most posters on here will know the ones. I find it doubtful that given the amount of collectors here anyone would support the view of selling CDRs.

as long as the band is the one licensing the cd, I dont have an issue. I am not sure i would buy one but i dont think it is illegal if the band owns the rights and chooses to issue the album as a cdr.

exact33 wrote:

as long as the band is the one licensing the cd, I dont have an issue. I am not sure i would buy one but i dont think it is illegal if the band owns the rights and chooses to issue the album as a cdr.

You are correct it is not an issue what format the band chooses. If Scott wants to print an EP on 300 pro CD-Rs for Ultimatum that is fine because he owns the music.

However, if someone else comes along and without having the licence to sell Scott's music says - well it was on limited distribution i will print another 300 and sell them then it is illegal and both Scott and the label miss out.

Alex Dee Rokket wrote:

exact33 wrote:

as long as the band is the one licensing the cd, I dont have an issue. I am not sure i would buy one but i dont think it is illegal if the band owns the rights and chooses to issue the album as a cdr.

You are correct it is not an issue what format the band chooses. If Scott wants to print an EP on 300 pro CD-Rs for Ultimatum that is fine because he owns the music.

However, if someone else comes along and without having the licence to sell Scott's music says - well it was on limited distribution i will print another 300 and sell them then it is illegal and both Scott and the label miss out.

absolutely. I dont buy cdrs even if they oop if its not from the band.

Alex Dee Rokket wrote:

The point is not the format the music is released on. If a band wants to release music on CD-R that is their choice of distribution.

The point is the licensing rights that attach to the product. By default, unless you own the rights to the music you cannot do much else with it other than listen to the album for your own enjoyment. If you want to legally sell someone else's copyright materail then you need a licence that allows you to do that. It doesn't necessarily matter how or what format will be used for as long as you have the correct legal licence to do so.

Almost everything released out there has a copyright that someone else owns. Even a demo and certainly even an EP. The fact that something is out of print doesn't mean that you can automatically have the legal right to sell that music.

Spotify and itunes are indeed taking away from the physical sale of albums but again both services have a licence to legally sell songs and stream music.

There are many labels that specialise in hard to find metal albums and most posters on here will know the ones. I find it doubtful that given the amount of collectors here anyone would support the view of selling CDRs.

This whole topic i started with an intention of seeing what people would think of me releasing a COMPLETELY licensed and legal product on pro cd-r from a band. There was never going to be any illegal sales of a random album. Im completely against bootlegging of albums. This was merely just an idea to see if people had a problem buying professionally done cd-r of legally licensed music.

Disregarding Alex Dee Rokket's who is obviously confused. I'd say do not go the pro-CDR route. The bands can get away with it, but when a label produces CDR release, it always gets questioned and people stray away from such products in general. If you want to be taken seriously, avoid the CDRs

Think about it, there's nothing appealing in a CDR with one-page "booklet" even if sold for $7, which is not exactly a cheap price for EP/demo release...

You can get 500 factory made cds for under $1000 nowadays, it makes a lot more sense to do that than pay $300 for 100 CDRs...

My apologies people - when I read the initial topic my understanding was that this was some bootlegging operation.

Didn't realise you were strictly talking about the format itself.

I agree got really confused there...

Amazon offers alot of "print on demand" titles on CD-R, they are licensed directly from the label. These items are small-selling titles the record label doesn't believe they would get a return on their investment by pressing a full run. These are usually albums that were in print at one time on CD but have long since gone OOP.

I've never bought any though because they are always full price (and sometimes as high as $16 per disc) and it's just not worth it for that format.

I'm not against the print on demand thing, but yeah their pricing is a bit high. And most that I've found had a seller offering the actual release for less.

I've only ever bought one pro cd-r that a band put out. I wouldn't even of noticed it was a cd-r if it hadn't been labeled as such. The labeling and art was very well done. Sounded perfectly fine too. So I guess my criteria for getting future ones would be availability and the effort the band makes in packaging it.

Thank you everyone for your input, thats all I was trying to do: just see everyones opinions. And what ive concluded from inquiries on a few forums and are facebook, no one agrees haha It seems to be split about 50/50 between the metal community.

jstate wrote:

I'm not against the print on demand thing, but yeah their pricing is a bit high. And most that I've found had a seller offering the actual release for less.

I've only ever bought one pro cd-r that a band put out. I wouldn't even of noticed it was a cd-r if it hadn't been labeled as such. The labeling and art was very well done. Sounded perfectly fine too. So I guess my criteria for getting future ones would be availability and the effort the band makes in packaging it.

I'm pretty much in that boat too. So far, there hasn't been a title that I desperately wanted so badly that I'd take the pro cdr-route. I can usually find the real deal, and most times, much cheaper. But I guess if I had no other option, I'd go with it. As long as they're done profesionally and look good, I'm ok with it.

S.D. wrote:

There is no difference in sound quality (providing the source is lossless), however the shelf-life of a CD is hypothetically longer. I've never had a problem with CD-Rs though, I have some from 1997 that still work perfectly. I have talked to others that have had them fail, but that seems to be rather uncommon.

Rather uncommon for those without a lot of CDs, I assume, because I've had a ton fail on me. Rare stuff, too. I feel bad for bands storing unreleased music on CDRs, because they won't be dusting of CDRs in 30 years like they do tape.

If it's the band who is releasing the CDR, then in my opinion, it is the official release, so I have no problem with it whatsoever.

Of course, growing up into punk rock and hardcore, you often got the demo or "album" from a band, and they would have just recorded over a batch of whatever free promo tapes their friend who worked at a record store gave them...so you know, I'm open. Music is music, and as long as the band is getting the support, I'm okay anything just about.

I remember those demos! Haha. Bands just took random cassettes from other bands and dubbed over them, then slapped a sticker on it.

But those tapes still play, huh?