ABSTRACT
An imprint marketed since 1953 in America originally under an agreement between Philips and Columbia. The offerings are both classical and popular. One release of special interest was The Four Seasons by Darius Milhaud, conducted by the composer (#BC 1069; 1960). Teen idol Bobby Vinton was a mainstay of the label in the late 1950s and early 1960s. By the early 1960s, Epic was primarily used for pop and country acts. During the mid-1960s British Invasion, acts like the Dave Clark Five, the Yardbirds, and the Hollies were featured on the label. In the later 1960s, Nashville-based producer Billy Sherrill built the label’s country line through hits from artists like George Jones and Tammy Wynette. From the late
1970s the label’s biggest star was Michael Jackson, whose Thriller album has posted more sales than any other LP. The label also had a major seller with the British punk group the Clash’s 1988 album, London Calling (CASH CD2/Epic 36328), which is considered one of greatest of all rock albums. In the 1990s, the label built its rap and R&B list through signings of groups like Bone Thugs-N-Harmony and Eazy-E, as well as mainstream chanteuses Celine Dion and Gloria Estefan. Singer-dancer Jennifer Lopez became a major hitmaker for the label in the later 1990s and early 2000s. In 1994, corporate owner Sony Music reorganized its family of labels into four label groups; the Epic label group currently consists of Epic, Legacy (devoted to reissues of earlier
Columbia label recordings), Sony Wonder (children’s music), and a few other specialty imprints. [Website: https://www.epicrecords.com./]
REV. FRANK HOFFMANN
Equalization can be applied to sound recordings at either the recording end or at the playback end. 1. Recording end. The process by which a master tape or master disc is edited in such a way that it will sound better after the material is transferred to the final product. The term “pre-equalization” is used to describe the alterations made during recording, and with the older, analog technology, such alterations were made in the recording studio to add emphasis or reduce emphasis in certain parts of the audio frequency spectrum (to achieve flat overall characteristics), to minimize distortion, and to limit surface noise. A plot of the relative emphasis given to the various frequencies is known as the recording curve or recording characteristic. The reduction is accomplished by lowering or raising the signal level in the appropriate segment(s) of the spectrum. Discs in the electric era, from 1925, were made with treble emphasis, the bass range being restricted to save groove space. Thus the compensation intended by the equalization circuits was to restore the original characteristics of the signal, eliminating the artificial boost in the treble and enhancing the low frequencies that had been attenuated.
