First pop Compact Disc ever sold - back in the 80's

One of the earliest I've come across is from late 1982 - Toto 4, It sounds horrific. Others from around that time included Simon and Garfunkel's Bridge over Troubled Water. Love Over Gold and Jean Michel Jarre's output and the Saturday Night Fever OST were in the first wave of releases in the UK in March 1983.

It was a George Duke record. "Dream On"(??) I believe.

Ron The Mon

...erm... thanks to all of you for your inputs - your unanimity is downright stunning !

Cheese - may all beings be happy

I seem to remember a trivia quiz where this was asked, and the answer was Dire Straits "B.I.A".

I also remember "Thriller" being released as a
'Picture CD'. Wow! What a concept that was back then, a CD with a picture on it.
My overriding thought at the time was Why? you can't see it when it's in the machine!

Andy

I don't think the first CD could have been "Brothers in Arms" because it was released well after CD's debut. I remember several Supertramp albums being available, Roxy Music's "Avalon," and the first Talking Heads album being available when I first went browsing. "Thriller" was one disc I heard demo'd back in 1982/83 against the LP version. Can't be certain it's the official "first CD," but it's certainly one of the early ones. I also remember a Telarc 1812 overture CD that seemed to be demo'd everywhere, too. Couldn't get enough of the cannon's, I guess.

Mike

I thought it was Steely Dan's Greatest Hits, although I may be wrong. I purchased a copy myself backin 1984. I was given a newer version of this CD by a friend a couple of years back, and I've also have a remastered version of Aja. When I compare the newer ones to the old release, the quality is remarkably similar. I suspect that someone tried to get that one right the first time.

Which reminds me, it really pisses me off that so many CDs were released with crap mastering the first time, and they're "fixing" them now and expecting us to pay again. You should be allowed to trade in an old one for a new one, free of charge. And I think it should come with a written apology too!

-=> Mike Hanson <=-

Well, Donald, Walter and their engineer Roger Nichols are big fans of digital, they wouldn't use anything else and get touchy about their digital recording being released on LP.

Back in 1981 all the Steely Dan masters were transfered to digital (3M - 50 kHz 16 bit FWIW). Now although the analogue masters were not destroyed (but they were said to be in bad shape a the time of this transfer)they have not been used for any release post 1981 (to my knowledge). Even the Mo-fi Steely Dan CDs have a debateable history (not from the original masters allegedly).

So the reason why the 1984 CDs and the more recent one are similar is becuase they are from the same tape! The latter one most likely had 'No-Noise' or 'CEDAR' applied to it to get rid of static crakles that plagued a few of their releases.

I have the Gold version of 'Steely Dan's 'Decade' and the remastered Katy Lied and Aja. The brand new re-master (not the box set) of Aja sounds better to me, and the sleeve notes say that a 're-archiving' from the master tapes has gone on (althopugh they couldn't find the multitracks to some songs). These may or may not be the analogue tapes. Katy Lied sounds the same to me. Maybe they only did a couple of albums?

See www.rogernichols.com for an interesting read.

PS Brother in Arms was the first CD single.

[This message was edited by Martin M on TUESDAY 03 July 2001 at 21:12.]

"Brothers In Arms" was the first CD to sell one
million copies. This is well documented. When CD
was first released CBS, Sony, etc. tried to put
out new records which weren't selling well to
bolster sales of CDs and records. Most of these
releases have been out of print since their
initial debut. It wasn't until a year or so later
that "Greatest Hits" records or re-releases seemed to be CDs best attraction.
In Detroit, George Duke had the first available
commercial release. In other words, if you went to any record store, you could only buy George Duke
on CD!!! I have an e-mail in to George to confirm
this and will report back.
As to Michael Jackson: I remember an article in
Billboard back in 1987 stating that this was the
first year that all CDs combined, ever sold to date, had finally out-sold the LPs of "Thriller" sold worldwide. At that point in time, that is how few CDs were sold!!

Ron The Mon
(Who Still Doesn't Own A CD Player)

Bros is arms was definitely not amongst the first - it had not been released (was not released until 1985). Perhaps many here are confused, as this album (and Dire Straits' Tour sponsored by Philips Compact Disc) was used in promotion of the 'second generation' of Philips CD players.

Ahhh the 1812 on Telarc with those bloody stupid digital cannon. You might recal the proud audiophools at the time decree "oh you must be careful with that, the digital cannon are so pure you're likely to blow the speakers!". Blerrrk.

IIRC Rickee Lee Jones was an early relaease, as was DOnald Fagen's The Nightfly - although I suspect neither of these were in the first release. Dire Straits Making Movies and Love over gold were also in there early on. I definitely remember Thriller being in there - you gotta hit the middle of the road first, eh.

For the truely fanatical amongst you, I suggest searching Japanese audio websites - there's probably a 1982 catalogue scanned there somewhere. Or your audio mag library will have the ads.

Rico - all your base are belong to us.

The track 'Brothers in Arms' was the first CD single, the album 'Brothers in Arms' was definitely not the first CD per se.

I just received an e-mail back from George Duke and he says he doesn't know exactly what was first. In fact he couldn't remember which record of his was released on CD first!

Ron The Mon,
Still Curious

...why this should be important anyway, was it not the case that no one album was issued but that a number of albums would have been issued simultaneously in the new medium?

cheers

Nigel

According to Sony (who should know really), the first commercially available CD was 52nd Street by Billy Joel in support of the CD launch in Japan in October 1982.

Guess what is on SACD too....