Recently, a lot has been made of the fact that Artists are now re-recording and releasing their older, successful tracks. Some people believe that it’s so the artists may reimagine them, do certain things to enhance them, or give them a better feel by reconstructing them in a way that takes into account their new found knowledge they’ve learned since the initial recording and inception of the songs, however, none of that is the case.
Bands like U2, Taylor Swift, Squeeze, and many many more such as Wang Chung, have all re-recorded their songs and are releasing special multi song sets to capture a great share of the sales, streams and licensing revenues the labels have had control of up to now. These recuts allow the artists a chance to regain control of their music, if they cannot have the actual masters back.
If the labels won’t give them back, then they will re-cut them so they can license them out themselves without sharing with the labels.
You can imagine that the initial signing royalties and money they received, were most likely not that great, and the amount of incentives that the record labels offered to them in the way of money for actual placements and other licensing efforts such as TV shows, etc., we’re not as lucriative for the artist in the early stages and their careers as when they became more successful.
You would think this is a good idea for artists to pursue, however, while I don’t have the stats to back it up, in most cases, people still prefer the originals over any recuts or re-recordings, because of the magic they had, the incredible outpouring of passion that went into the original recordings, the feel and eveything about them is hard if not impossible to ever duplicate.
The public tends to stay with the tried and true when it comes to classics and they can hear the differences which is why the originals are best in most cases.
Those are my thoughts.
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