...you can tell an original if the color front wraps around partly to the back....
Not always so. The Merc's are the most pressing dependent label I know and early tends to be better but is not always. You have to learn to look at stampers if you want to find the best pressings of these. One example is the Birds SR90153. The RFR1 is the later pressing but looks like a nice early issue with it's deep maroon label. It's not. The eary issue is the FR1 and is much better sounding.
An example where the early edition is not prefered is the SR90300 - Prokofiev's PC #3. They sold a bunch of these and there are many stampers out there. The prefered stamper is the RFR8. The other odd thing with this disc is the RFR8 cover is a bit different on the back than other stampers. On the RFR8, there are three small pictures near the bottom of the cover. On other stampers, there are only two pictures. There isn't a color back edition of this either.
A couple of other generalizations on the Merc's. The Columbia record club editions stink. These have CBRFR or CTRFR stampers. The vendor labeled disc also tend to be substandard when compared to the non-vendor label. Just to make things more difficult, some disc's are extremely hard to find in a non-vendor issue.
Not always so. The Merc's are the most pressing dependent label I know and early tends to be better but is not always. You have to learn to look at stampers if you want to find the best pressings of these. One example is the Birds SR90153. The RFR1 is the later pressing but looks like a nice early issue with it's deep maroon label. It's not. The eary issue is the FR1 and is much better sounding.
An example where the early edition is not prefered is the SR90300 - Prokofiev's PC #3. They sold a bunch of these and there are many stampers out there. The prefered stamper is the RFR8. The other odd thing with this disc is the RFR8 cover is a bit different on the back than other stampers. On the RFR8, there are three small pictures near the bottom of the cover. On other stampers, there are only two pictures. There isn't a color back edition of this either.
A couple of other generalizations on the Merc's. The Columbia record club editions stink. These have CBRFR or CTRFR stampers. The vendor labeled disc also tend to be substandard when compared to the non-vendor label. Just to make things more difficult, some disc's are extremely hard to find in a non-vendor issue.
