Revinylization

Rhino Records started in 1978 as an eclectic indie label specializing in compilations and offbeat reissues. Its emblem was a scowling rhinoceros-human hybrid with a record spinning on the tip of its horn (footnote 1). Time Warner acquired the label during the 1990s, and today Warner Music uses it as its chief nonclassical reissue vehicle.

As a back-catalog label, Rhino was active early in the vinyl revival—and it continues to be. Rhino quickly learned that a popular older album, when released as a high-quality physical artifact—whether it's an LP, a CD box, a multichannel Blu-ray audio disc, or a combination of formats—engages fans more than merely dropping a new remaster onto streaming. I spoke with Rhino's president, Mark Pinkus, about the company's three-tier vinyl strategy soon after the company announced the third of those tiers, a new, lower-priced all-analog vinyl line called Rhino Reserve.

"First and foremost, Rhino is fully committed to vinyl," Pinkus told me. He noted the success of the label's other two all-analog series: the premium-priced Atlantic 75 series, consisting of 45rpm dual-LP albums produced in association with Chad Kassem's Analogue Productions, manufactured at Kassem's Quality Record Pressings plant in Salina, Kansas; and Rhino High Fidelity, 33 1/3 single LPs cut to lacquer by Kevin Gray and manufactured at Optimal in Germany, packaged in deluxe gatefold jackets with a four-page booklet. The Atlantic 75 albums retail for $60–$65; forthcoming titles include more from Yes plus several from Genesis, Coltrane, Foreigner, and Crosby, Stills & Nash. Rhino High Fidelity titles retail for $39.98; forthcoming High Fidelity titles are hush-hush.

Vinyl releases from the new Rhino Reserve series retail for $32. They're packaged in regular "board-printed," single-disc jackets and manufactured at Fidelity Record Pressing, which is owned by Mobile Fidelity's parent company and run by industry veteran Rick Hashimoto. The first two titles, cut from the master tapes by Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman Mastering, are Southern Nights by Allen Toussaint and Game, Dames and Guitar Thangs by Eddie Hazel. Forthcoming titles have not been announced.

The title track of Toussaint's album is a dreamy soul-psychedelic masterpiece. Hazel, perhaps best known for his guitar solo on Funkadelic's "Maggot Brain" (footnote 2), took his covers of The Mamas and the Papas' "California Dreaming" and the Beatles' "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" in new guitar-shredding directions. Also noteworthy on Hazel's record are Bernie Worrell's keyboard sounds, always part of the Funkadelic stew, later heard in Talking Heads' "large band" phase. Cutting to the chase, both albums sound fantastic. The copies I received had no audible crackle or groove "whoosh." These are not audiophile recordings, but they sound damn fun, down and dirty, like mid-'70s funk-soul records ought to sound.

Although the first two titles lean funk/soul, Pinkus said that "Rhino Reserve will cover all genres, [and] there will be a consistent flow of Reserve titles in 2025." Rhino High Fidelity will maintain its focus on rock, with Atlantic jazz titles included from time to time. The Atlantic 75 series will continue, with 100 new titles planned, Pinkus said.

What about the problem of long wait times for the most desirable vinyl records? Pinkus says that's in the past, for now. "During COVID, there was a huge run on vinyl, a huge run on the plants, and there was a huge delay getting represses," Pinkus said. "Now we are not running out of our top titles anymore. We have solved our capacity problems." The opening of Fidelity Pressing helped.

Rhino High Fidelity titles are limited-edition and numbered. Quite a few have sold out. Among recent reissues, I enjoyed Television's second album, Adventure, and Faces' Ooh La La, the title track sung by Rolling Stone Ronnie Wood and featured in a TV commercial for Amazon's Echo Dot.

I asked Pinkus: Who is the Rhino vinyl consumer? He said the "older audience," mainly male audiophiles who grew up listening to records, "isn't going away." What excites him is the "new audience," younger people like his three 20-something daughters, which he said skews more female than the traditional audiophile record collector. "Streaming kids" as he calls them "are definitely buying records and record players." His message to music fans of all ages: "Stream what you like, buy"—as physical media—"what you love."

"Physical media" isn't just vinyl. Other physical formats have appeal. Rhino is continuing to put out deluxe reissues of well-loved albums that include several media formats in one package. For instance, deluxe versions of Yes's The Yes Album and Fragile were released as four-CD, one-LP, one Blu-ray sets, the LPs cut from the new digital remasters. Anniversary reissues of the Doors' catalog included newly remastered CDs, collections of outtakes and alternate mixes, some live recordings, and LPs cut from new Plangent Process (digital) transfers of original master tapes. Some reissues have included LPs with alternate takes or mixes.

These days, many master tapes aren't allowed out of vaults, and new transfers are made to HD digital either at the vaults or within hand-carrying distance. Does Pinkus worry about sending Warner's priceless tapes around the country for the advantages, marketing or otherwise, that all-analog offers? "We are very cognizant about what tapes can and cannot be worked with, and we are careful about where we'll send a tape," he said. He added that all the tapes are captured in HD before they leave the vault, so that even if, God forbid, the tapes are damaged or lost, the music will continue to exist.

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Footnote 1: See bsnpubs.com/warner/rhino/01rhino000.html. My first exposure to the label was RNLP 003, its third release, Saturday Night Pogo, via my older brother.

Footnote 2: See open.qobuz.com/track/159412881.