how were copies of vinyl made in "third-party" countries

Then there is the fact that each engineer who cut a lacquer for a company was free to change the sound contained in the tape he received, adding reverb, compression, frequency response manipulation, fade outs, etc.

@bdp24  I was not aware of this. I know the engineer had free reign to make changes for technical reasons; eg, using compression so that a bass heavy passage wouldn't affect the other grooves, length of run-in and run-out grooves, limiting peaks and transients. It doesn't seem right that he could make non-technical tweaks that change the creative decisions made by the production team.

@grislybutter (now THERE'S a handle!): I'm lucky to have two local record shops that specialized in used LP's, and one antique mall with an incredible LP booth. I regularly find LP's from the 1950's through the 80's, in from VG+ to near Mint condition, usually priced from $5 to $10. And a coupla times per year Music Millennium in Portland has a sidewalk sale, where most LP's are $2! You have to dig through box after box, but that's part of the used LP game.

I bought and sold records in Goldmine Record Collectors Magazine in the late-70's into the 80's. It was a small community, the dealers very dependable as far as grading and condition. Ebay and even Discogs is very hit-and-miss, you never know what you're going to get. You would think Near Mint means Near Mint, but to some sellers it apparently doesn't. I prefer to buy in person, but there are some titles you are never going to find locally.

@bdp24 if you are lucky enough to have big record stores in your city, you are lucky enough!

I recently discovered a store in my town with 1000s of 45s in boxes. It takes 15 min to go through one. 50 boxes at least. If only someone cataloged it, or sorted at least? I guess browsing is part of the fun

This meaningless grading of used records has only been happening since the vinyl resurgence. In the original era of vinyl, the grade of a used record meant something. There were no internet sales and used record shops knew how to grade using the Goldmine scale (or their own). Most shops would let you preview a record.

@lowrider57: Chad Kassem licensed the rights to reissue Tea For The Tillerman by Cat Stevens, and hired Bernie Grundman to do the mastering (he has his own facility in Los Angeles). The original UK "pink label" Island Records LP has long been an audiophile grail, included in Harry Pearson’s Super Disc list.

Chad got a call from Bernie, telling him he had made a startling discovery: the original Island/A &M lacquer was cut assuming the master tape was Dolby A encoded. It wasn’t! With Dolby A engaged in playback of the master tape, the Dolby equalization curve significantly rolled off high frequencies, drastically changing the sound of, amongst other things, Cat’s Ovation acoustic guitar. The Ovation has not a wooden body, but a plastic one, and is an unusually bright sounding guitar. Not on all previous LP’s and CD’s!

I didn’t own a pink label Island copy, but rather a slightly later-70’s "Palm Tree" UK Island, so I assumed the issue I had with the LP---a lack of high frequency overtones in the cymbals, and a lack of punch in the kick drum (missing high frequencies rob a kick drum of it’s attack characteristics. My LP didn’t imo live up to it’s reputation)---was because of the pressing. As an illustration of why Chad Kassem and his Analogue Productions/QRP team make better LP’s than does Mobile Fidelity, MoFi didn’t realize the Dolby issue when they remastered the tape they received, releasing the album on LP and CD with therefore compromised sound quality.

So Chad had Bernie cut the album "flat" (no Dolby A), and the resulting test pressing sounded very, very bright to Chad. Chad gave Michael Fremer a call, appraising him of the situation. Chad told Michael he wasn’t sure audiophiles would like such a bright sounding LP, but Fremer told him "Hey, that’s what the recording sounds like." Chad had Bernie do a cut with the high frequencies brought down in level somewhat (via equalization, not Dolby circuitry), and send both version to Fremer to listen to. Michael encouraged Chad to release the LP with it’s recorded, non-EQ’d sound. Available on a single 33-1/3 RPM LP, or in a 2-LP 45 RPM set. An absolutely incredible sounding LP!