Warner Brothers "Loss Leaders"

[atrocity]

I still can't believe I didn't scare up 20 bucks and buy the Loss Leaders, back then.

I found all the ones I didn't already have and digitized the lot within the last few years if anyone needs anything specific. Only one skip anywhere, on the Todd Rundgren track on Hard Goods.

There's disagreement about whether the ECM one really counts and in fact I don't have that one.

 

[timbre4]

Those albums were well-loved discovery vehicles!

 

[kap'n krunch]

My front door neighbor from the 70-80s gave me this in 76.. I still have it...
It was my gateway drug to a lot of stuff!

 

[par4ken]

In the mid seventies I picked up the odd Warner and/or Reprise labelled album (from the cut out bin) that had the Loss Leaders inner sleeve. I contemplated purchasing some of them but because the sleeve was dated 1974 it was by then a couple of years outdated. I didn't know if the offer was still valid, so didn't bother. Since I've picked up a few on eBay or Discogs paying far more than the original $2.00. In hind site I should've risked $20.00, I'm sure the money would've been returned if the offer was no longer valid.

It was a very cool idea, even if you only liked one or two songs from each album the hope was that you would purchase the actual album(s)!

 

[mlrocker]

I listened to some of these "Loss Leaders" on youtube.

 

[kenm]

Here's a suggestion for ForagingRhino that might be interesting to some.

How many of you old timers remember the LP series put out by WB in the '69-'75 era? They were, as I recall, Double LP's sold via mail order for $2 (!!) and included tracks from a large array of WEA artists. It's quite true that many fans discovered artists by purchasing these samplers. I know I had a few like "The Big Ball" and "Schlagers" (or something like that)

Anyway, how cool would it be to release a QUADIO LOSS-LEADER, as a way to pull the very best tracks off of the WB Quadradisc catalog, albums that would not merit having a full blown release, but maybe having a track or two the deserve to be preserved in quad for the future audio listeners. Examples are "Pick Up the Pieces" from AWB, "Killing Me Softly" by Roberta Flack, a Spinners hit or two from "The Spinners", "Send in the Clowns" from Judy, "Never Let Her Go" from David Gates (the song), all of the 'good' tracks from LPs that would NEVER have a chance to get a QUADIO release. I am sure that we all could come up with a list of WEA Quadradisc tracks that would make the list, but with the world moving away from disc based music, unless WB/Rhino chooses to sell quad downloads of the '70s quads, this might be the last chance to get some of these songs out to the world.

Of course it wouldn't be a $2 release, or a LOSS LEADER, but they could package it as an homage to that piece of WEA History. I think it would be sweet.

What do you all think? How about some suggestions for a track list. Remember use only WEA titles released as Q8's or CD-4 LPs. Suggesting stuff that was never released by WB would be a waste of space.

Use to get a newsletter of Quad releases and on I remember but never released was Atlantic Crossing by Rod Stewart, cover showed CD-4.

 

[esimms86]

In the mid seventies I picked up the odd Warner and/or Reprise labelled album (from the cut out bin) that had the Loss Leaders inner sleeve. I contemplated purchasing some of them but because the sleeve was dated 1974 it was by then a couple of years outdated. I didn't know if the offer was still valid, so didn't bother. Since I've picked up a few on eBay or Discogs paying far more than the original $2.00. In hind site I should've risked $20.00, I'm sure the money would've been returned if the offer was no longer valid.

It was a very cool idea, even if you only liked one or two songs from each album the hope was that you would purchase the actual album(s)!

Back in the day, that was my introduction to Black Sabbath. I've been "Paranoid" ever since LOL.