Many people have unofficial audio recordings - but I think mine are some of the best around. Not only that, I am one of the best people to deal with. Here's why:
1) I've been collecting for well over 20 years now - and have dealt with many satisfied people - I've never had an unhappy person I've dealt with.
2) When I obtained many of my audios (in the days before CD's), I tried to get as many as I could on good brand chrome/metal cassettes, rather than normal cassettes, which I stored in a cool, dark place away from dust and sunlight. These cost more, but lasted much longer than normal cassettes. This meant that as technology moved ahead and I came to transfer them onto CD, the sound quality had largely remained the same - unlike many people who had their old recordings on normal cassette, and found they deteriorated over the years. Remember - virtually all unauthorised audio that dates from the late 80's / early 90's and earlier, would originally have been recorded by someone, somewhere on cassette.
3) When transferring from cassette to CD, I use a high end audio editing program to 'clean up' the recording - removing hiss, and pops and clicks, and maximising the volume over the dynamic range (being careful to avoid distortion or clipping or damaging the original sound).
4) When burning the CD-R, I always use a slow burning speed on a good brand CD writer (this means less jitter and deviation in the CD laser when writing). I use good brand CD-R's, usually Mitsubishi or TDK. The burning software then verifies the written data, and then I play the disc through my own CD player afterwards as a double-check. Although every CD player is different, this means the chances of you receiving a disc that doesn't play are extremely low. If for any reason you do get a disc that won't play, I'll happily send you a replacement.
5) Each disc has CD text enabled - meaning when you play it in a CD text compatible player, the correct artist and song will be displayed. Many people don't bother doing this!
6) Track listings are accurate - each concert is split into the correct tracks at the right time (some people don't bother doing this, meaning you can't fast-forward between songs).
7) I always include printed covers with the CD-R's (unless requested otherwise) as I think this looks much more professional than either a hand-written note, or nothing.
8) Every audio I have, I have listened to in full - and graded it myself according to my rating system. I've also attempted to confirm date/venue/city details if possible.
9) I have many hundreds of audios available - there are few, if any, traders who have the range of audios like I do.
10) I will always post the audios promptly, and well packaged so they don't get damaged in transit. I used to trade with some people who just chucked the stuff in a normal envelope - the covers used to get damaged in transit - that used to annoy me!
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