| Main Pressing plants Pennyroyal Tea Test pressings Collection |
| Rainbo Records | |||||
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Founded in 1939. Moved to Canoga Park in May 2006, but they were located at Santa Monica while pressing their thre Nirvana releases; In Utero clear LP (test pressing), Eight Songs For Greg Sage & The Wipers 4x7" box set (test pressing), and Oh, The Guilt 7" single. They add an R (for 7") or an S (for 10" and 12") followed by five digits to the matrix codes on the releases they press, either by inscribing it in the lacquer (the signature appears deep) or in the mother plates (the signature appears faint). They do this simply to keep track of them, except if the customer would ask them not to. Rainbo usually makes five test pressings, four which they give to the customer and one which they keep in their files for six months before it is discarded. Obviously more were made for the Eight Songs test pressing, as there are more than five registered owners. No test pressing has surfaced for Oh, The Guilt. Oh, The Guilt TG83 USA matrix The black US Oh, The Guilt 7" is also semingly odd. The matrix codes have both the R-code and an L-code. The French 7" on blue vinyl also has the L-code, but not the R-code. The lacquers were most likely made by K Disc. Side B has RE1-A written by the mastering engineer, which means the first cut was faulty. The L-code identifies the company responsible for processing the fathers and maybe the mothers, Lee Plating. The L-code is deep, so they must have added it to the lacquer, meaning all subsequent metal plates will have it. They made one set of mothers which they sent to the French plant, DFI. The French plant did some minor additions to the mother plates, before creating stampers and then records. The DFI 93-1 parts are clearly weaker, which means it was etched onto metal. The ones pressed by Rainbo also have the L-code, so they must have received either the father plates from Lee, or Lee made them a set of mothers, too. Either way, Rainbo added an R-code followed by RE-1 to the mother plates. The RE-1 part means remake 1, and that's the part I'm not completely sure about. It may follow from the RE1-A from the mastering stage, simply meaning the first mothers Rainbo received (or made) were made from the faulty cut, and the new ones were named RE-1 as they were the first remake. Still, RE1-A from the mastering stage should be enough. Maybe it means Rainbo made the mothers themselves (it doesn't really make sense that Rainbo would etch RE-1 into the mothers if they didn't make them themselves), but the first ones turned out bad, even though the master was good. Either way, it's a good example on how to track the various parts of the production, which companies were involved, and finally to determine which company actually pressed the records. |
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 1. French 7", side A: DFI 93-1 TG 83 A L-40697 Shows the weaker DFI 93-1 part added by the French plant. The catalog number appears weaker on the picture than what it really is.  2. French 7", side B: DFI 93-1 TG 83 B RE1-A L-40697-X Same as above, but with the RE1-A part written by the mastering engineer, and also shows that TG 83 A/B really is smooth and deep.  3. US 7", side A: TG 83 A L-40697 R-15194 Shows the weak R-code, and the L-code which you may compare to the French A-side; completely identical.  4. US 7", side B: TG 83 B RE1-A R-15195-RE-1 L-40697-X Shows the weak R-code and RE-1. Thanks to Enrico Vincenzi (images 1-4). | |||||
| Main Pressing plants Pennyroyal Tea Test pressings Collection |
