Hi all,
I've been following many discussions on this forum and have learned much about analog playback. My level of ignorance made me hesitate to join the forum, because I really didn't know how to contribute anything useful.
The reason I decided to change my mind is this question, which hits on a topic on which I do have some knowledge and experience that is perhaps worth sharing. So, ahum, here goes my first post on audiogon! Hopefully I can return something useful to the members of this forum.
Over the years there has been much overheated debate amongst collectors about this decca / london issue, which is financially spiked. Dealers ask a premium for early SXL's, while the equivalent London bluebacks cost only a fraction. So it has long been denied that these pressings are identical. But they are. They were both pressed in the same Decca pressing facility in the UK, using the same vinyl and the same masterings, lacquers and stampers. The only difference is the label (decca had to change the name for legal reasons only because there already existed a Decca label in the US) and the cover art (these were manufactured in the US, probably to cut on transport cost). Both these pressings even have the 2 letter UK text code (RT, ET, ZT, OT, MT, KT, etc.) that was required for the internal UK market until around 1970. So if Decca ever had any intention to differentiate between these pressings and be able to tell them apart, it would have been easy to just omit this tax code on the London labeled export pressings, since this code would have no significance in the US market.
But the conclusive evidence was delivered a couple of years ago when a test pressing slip surfaced that proves that both pressings are identical. It even shows in that particular case that the London CS release actually preceeded the Decca SXL release. The slip states that the London is scheduled for export release on November 9th 1962, while the release date for the Decca says: 'home market to be advised'. The record in question is the famous Borodin Quartet recording of Shostakovich & Borodin Quartets. The Decca ED1 pressing (SXL 6036) will probably cost at least $250, while the equivalent London (CS 6338) can be found for around $25.
Has this evidence changed anything in the marketplace? Not really. The early SXL's have appreciated in value, while the price of the London's has more or less stayed where it was. So the smart collector goes for the London bluebacks, no question about it.
I've compared many SXL's and CS's of the same recordings with the same lacquers and stampers and I can vouche that they sound identical. Any audible differences that do occur can be contributed to differences in condition and playing history, not to some concious decision on Decca's part to make inferior pressings for the US (as some SXL 'experts' want us to believe).
But the SXL's have more snob appeal, that's for sure ;-)
