There's no way to release more Jan's music from Miami Vice


Crockettt

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Recently i spoke with Jan's manager Elliott Sears and he told me there's no way to release more Jan's music from Miami Vice. :( Come on Jan we are all waiting for your unreleased stuff from Vice. The (In)Complete Collection is a joke, because the first disc contains music that had already been released on previous soundtracks. It should be a compilation album with only unreleased stuff. :( We received only 21 unreleased track, though six of them were previously released on flexi disc in Keyboard Magazine (Airport Swap, Golden Triangle, Shadow In The Dark) and on "The Last Frontier VHS" (Candy - Original Version from Prodigal Son, Voodoo Dance - Original Version used in Calderone's Demise and The Afternoon Plane, and The Great Boat Race - Original Version from The Great McCarthy). The Last Frontier VHS also included two other unreleased cues from episodes Dutch Oven & The Fix: Tension a.k.a Trudy's Theme and Wiretap. Why these tracks aren't available on Complete Collection? :/

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Wait I'm confused, when you spoke to the manager didn't he tell you why he can't release them?It could be that he doesn't own the rights to them anymore but Universal does, in that case he'd have to buy it back first before he could release it.

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Wait I'm confused' date=' when you spoke to the manager didn't he tell you why he can't release them?It could be that he doesn't own the rights to them anymore but Universal does, in that case he'd have to buy it back first before he could release it.[/quote']Yes, he didn't tell me why Jan can't release more tracks. Hammer don't have to buy rights to his music. He just can re-record the music as he did with "Complete Collection".
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Yes' date=' he didn't tell me why Jan can't release more tracks. Hammer don't have to buy rights to his music. He just can re-record the music as he did with "Complete Collection".[/quote']I agree just re-record some of the unreleased classic tunes . The Complete Collection and Miami Vice albums must be Jan's best sellers.:thumbsup::D
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Anyway nice try Crockettt. I don't claim to understand music copyright law but if he sold the rights, he might not be able to legally re-record the same music without paying a fee.

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Anyway nice try Crockettt. I don't claim to understand music copyright law but if he sold the rights' date=' he might not be able to legally re-record the same music without paying a fee.[/quote']I cant see Hammer would have sold the rights - they were his compositions and he released under Mca back in the day . Hammer surely would benefit from sales from another MV album . :thumbsup::D
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I cant see Hammer would have sold the rights - they were his compositions and he released under Mca back in the day . Hammer surely would benefit from sales from another MV album . :thumbsup::D

He didn't sell them Matt, he never owned them to begin with. MCA / Universal hired him to score the show and therefore owns his music composed for the show. That's why his tracks were on the "Miami Vice" soundtrack album.I also spoke to Elliot Sears a few years ago. he told me that "The Complete Collection" was far from a financial success. Yes we all love and want Jan's music but the album was bought by a very small group of fans (Vice fans). It's simply not worth the effort to re-record 30 year old music for a small group of fans.
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  • 2 months later...
He didn't sell them Matt' date=' he never owned them to begin with. MCA / Universal hired him to score the show and therefore owns his music composed for the show. That's why his tracks were on the "Miami Vice" soundtrack album.I also spoke to Elliot Sears a few years ago. he told me that "The Complete Collection" was far from a financial success. Yes we all love and want Jan's music but the album was bought by a very small group of fans (Vice fans). It's simply not worth the effort to re-record 30 year old music for a small group of fans.[/quote']My frustration here is directed at the manager. It's very easy for him to use the old "not profitable" excuse (perhaps the oldest excuse in the entertainment business). But given the shitty marketing done for the album -- and didn't the label go belly-up shortly after release? -- he's being a bit disingenuous.Even outside the realm of Vice fans, Jan's Vice music is recognized as some of the best TV score in history. There is a massive fanbase of film and tv scores -- any film and tv scores -- out there.
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There is a massive fanbase of film and tv scores -- any film and tv scores -- out there.

Excellent point. I've seen some movie/TV scores out there that seem like total "Huh?" releases to me, but people seem to love 'em. I think a lot of it comes down to the marketing. Get some samples or something out there, let people know what is. Furthermore, I would guess that with how big "retro" is nowadays as well as some of the modern electronic pop music I've heard that there could be a definite market for JH's music. It certainly stands the test of time (IMO), and while I'd never think it'd be an instant 5 million seller or anything like that (is anything an instant 5 million seller anymore?), I think they could see some decent sales nevertheless.Or maybe I've just got my Vice-Goggles on, I don't know.
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A shame as there are so many cues out there crying to be released - I suppose we should be grateful we even got the 2002 Complete Collection I know I am :thumbsup::cool::D

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  • 4 months later...
  • 2 months later...

If Jan wants to, it is certainly within his power to cover some of the cues that didn't make the "ultimate collection" and release them via digital format only. He just needs positive, savvy people surrounding him that will believe in it and promote it, for free (on places like Facebook, twitter, soundcloud and tumblr). There's a whole new generation of people out there who are currently making synth driven music under the genre "new retro wave" and "synthwave" etc. If they know the original master (Jan) was coming out with more stuff, they'd buy, because they buy new retro wave artists with a fraction of Jan's fame and output. If there's a will, there's a way.

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If Jan wants to, it is certainly within his power to cover some of the cues that didn't make the "ultimate collection" and release them via digital format only. He just needs positive, savvy people surrounding him that will believe in it and promote it, for free (on places like Facebook, twitter, soundcloud and tumblr). There's a whole new generation of people out there who are currently making synth driven music under the genre "new retro wave" and "synthwave" etc. If they know the original master (Jan) was coming out with more stuff, they'd buy, because they buy new retro wave artists with a fraction of Jan's fame and output. If there's a will, there's a way.

 

 

Very good point to release tracks he hasnt previously is a great way forward - his themes are so emotive they would be popular - just not sure how positive his Manager is on this subject not very i would suspect :D  :)

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These days you DON'T need a manager unless you're a huge mess and dramatic and need damage control, which we know isn't Jan. You can get information and product out to hundreds and thousands of people within seconds by your own means for zero or almost zero cost. I have a tumblr with almost 9k followers. Put up an album promo and BAM 9k worth of people know about it. if the album is for sale at 9.99 per digital copy and even just a third of my followers end up buying, that's $30k in gross revenue. Providing you did not do an expensive (and needless) CD pressing. Now, i'm a nobody so I can't sell music on my name alone. But a lot of folk, especially young and old synth folk, know JAN HAMMER, so the name helps a ton.

Edited by coolrunninman
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  • 2 years later...

I wished he just picked up his reel tapes and pass them to commercial CDs "as is". I know it's not gonna happen. But I do love the fragments. Consider "Helicopter" from Golden Triangle 2: it's about half a minute of the purest Vice possible!

Other "fragmentary" examples come to my mind (forgive me for the names given): "Bogota" on Milk Run, "The Revillas" on Prodigal Son, the "Going Nuts" fragments on Lend Me An Ear/Missing Hours/Mirror Image (funny isn't it? unconsciously or not, Jan must have nailed the common ground of mental disturbance on all the 3 episodes!). I love them all, and there's no need to turn them into 3-minute cues. After all, Jan has a lot or "full" Vice pieces already, so it's nice to have fragments as well.

Another interesting discussion (to me). Jan used to recycle material and organically added things to it, but would he keep the older versions? For instance, he added a piano theme to "Brenda" and that became "Theresa", Things like that happened a lot along the series. But did he keep the original "Brenda" version (that question applies to all other cases like that)? Hope so!

 

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When I talked to Elliot Sears years ago, it came up that the cues belong to Universal, and it's kind of a big deal to "release" them. I don't know all the legal-ese, but it seems that we live in a "give em what they want" society, now, more than ever. Anyway, they weren't very pleased with my endeavors either :) 

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Given that "The Complete Collection" CD is selling for $150 used on Amazon, we know that there would be some demand to buy the CD brand new at a normal retail price.  They've produced the album and cleared the rights, so all they have to do is run off a new printing.  And yet they haven't.  Basically, there is money just lying on the ground as they walk by but they're too lazy to bend over and pick it up.

Not very inspiring.

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1 hour ago, nofretz said:

Tommy, are you talking about re-releasing the CC, or a new cd of unreleased cues?

I'm talking about re-releasing the CC.  If they're too lazy to do that, it's hard to see something newer being published.

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Gotcha.

Did anyone hear about Phil Collins donating that boat load of Alamo artifacts he'd collected over the years to the monument in Texas? I'm thinking Jan should come to his senses and surrender the MV tapes to me. I mean, c'mon!! :) Everybody's doing it!

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On 7/14/2016 at 4:44 AM, nofretz said:

Gotcha.

Did anyone hear about Phil Collins donating that boat load of Alamo artifacts he'd collected over the years to the monument in Texas? I'm thinking Jan should come to his senses and surrender the MV tapes to me. I mean, c'mon!!  Everybody's doing it!

Ha ha !

Great point - I really hope we see more of Hammer's music released - is Elliott Sears still his agent !?

:D:D

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I was shocked to find out the other day that the "Complete Collection" now sells for well over $100 on eBay... I bought it right the week it came out in 2002 (I think I even pre-ordered it at amazon), and it was barely $20, IIRC...

But yeah, a "Complete Collection vol. 2" would be awesome. There's got to be almost another two dozen scores from the whole series that were never released. Very good ones too. I'd pay another 20 to 30 dollars any day to have them on CD.

But  I can kinda see why a Complete Collection vol. 2 hasn't happened, or won't happen. If the Complete Collection wasn't a financial success, and with all the work that has to go into reworking the old cues on a computer and making them sound "crisp" and engaging. At the end of the day, you are indeed making a CD for a small group of die-hard fans.

Or maybe just make it a downloadable album? That way you could at least sidestep the cost of creating a physical CD. Surely, hosting a downloadable album at amazon is much less expensive?

Edited by Daytona74
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