EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

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Aussie0zborn
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EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 17010Unread post Aussie0zborn
Fri Nov 11, 2011 4:33 pm

While old pressing plants get demolished and sold to developers, the original site of the EMI Greece record factory (better known here as EMI Columbia, or in Greek just "Columbia") is once again being pushed for conversion to a museum due to its historical significance. This was proposed some years ago and in true Greek style... nothing happened. The topic has come up again now amidst the country's economc woes.

EMI's joint venture here with Lambropoulos Brothers to form EMI-Lambropoulos Bros. Ltd (in Greek : EMIAL S.A., the AL standing for 'Brothers Lambropoulos') in 1928 gave Greece its first recording studio and probably even pressing plant when it opened in 1931.

The 14 acre site originally had two buildings with another six buildings added over the years. The plant was closed in 1991 and in 2005 demolition work began with the developer forced to stop work through the intervention of the Ministry of Culture. Building 'A' and the central gate were classified as monuments, because of their particular architecture, their industrial and historical importance. Further demolition work in 2007 was halted after protests from local residents. Most of the buildings have been demolished and reduced to rubble, while some key buildings still stand.

The central gates were a landmark in Athens and most of Greece's more important composers, lyricists and artists passed through them at one time or another. A radio station recently held a concert at the site but visiting is very dangerous as it is home to vagrants, illegal immigrants and junkies.

While it might be too late to save it the way it could have been saved, the idea put forward is a good one but a country that has cut salaraies, pensions, etc as part of an austerity measure and has an official unemployment rate of 16-18% is hardly in a position to restore something like this but it is pleasing to note that they see the value of recorded music (when it was recorded onto vinyl, that is). It will be interesting to see if the current push to turn the site into a museum and artistic space yields anything.

According to the photo tours below, an EMI manual press and and EMI silvering machine and a similar looking machine were still there in 2005. A visit in the next few days accompanied by my Albanian friends will confirm if this gear is still there.

The recording studio is long gone, unfortunately, and there may not be enough equipment left to fill a museum but at least someone sees the value of recorded music and its contribution to modern society.

Image

See a Photo Tour from 2005 here :

http://www.uer.ca/locations/show.asp?locid=23112

See a Photo Tour from 2008 here :

http://www.uer.ca/forum_showthread.asp?fid=1&threadid=93464

Read about the architecture here :

http://www.greekarchitects.gr/en/%CE%BF%CE%BB%CE%B5%CF%82-2010/columbia-interventions-for-its-reuse-and-re-establishment-id3976

Read a recent media report here (In Greek) :

http://www.athinorama.gr/arts/articles/?id=10967
Last edited by Aussie0zborn on Sun Nov 13, 2011 6:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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fraggle
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Post: # 17028Unread post fraggle
Sat Nov 12, 2011 7:42 pm

"in true Greek style... nothing happened"
lol :)

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Nickou
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Post: # 17030Unread post Nickou
Sun Nov 13, 2011 6:20 am

I have some elements of the EMI plant of barcelona
when they closed ,they putted all the machines in the street ... !

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dietrich10
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Post: # 17032Unread post dietrich10
Sun Nov 13, 2011 10:17 am

are the presses in possession of a fellow troll? :shock:
cutting lacquers-vms70 system

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Nickou
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Post: # 17033Unread post Nickou
Sun Nov 13, 2011 10:23 am

no , they were sold for the metal , some fairchild also ...

actualy the desk in in the living room of one of the guy who was working there ...
I saw it one time , I think it is nearly complete ...or complete ...
it is a older model than the one they have at abbey road

but there is pressing machine in america latina ... also vms80 ...

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Phinster
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Post: # 17034Unread post Phinster
Sun Nov 13, 2011 11:31 am

lets hope all of Greece doesn't become a museum... :(

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Aussie0zborn
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Post: # 17086Unread post Aussie0zborn
Sun Nov 20, 2011 12:13 am

Ok so the building is totally empty - all the gear has gone but a full and proper inspection of Building B was not possible seeing as four junkies made it difficult.

It's going to be hard for them to make a museum at the site of the factory when there is no factory equipment to display. And that was the last EMI manual record press that we know of. A good idea but probably way too late.

Will post some photos soon.

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subkontrabob
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Post: # 17107Unread post subkontrabob
Mon Nov 21, 2011 5:10 pm

capitalism sucks! :cry:

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Aussie0zborn
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Post: # 22336Unread post Aussie0zborn
Sun Dec 30, 2012 7:42 am

Just found out there is an EMI manual press at Vinyl Factory, London. They plan to restore it. Good to see someone sees the value in such things.

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Re: EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 22757Unread post piaptk
Wed Jan 23, 2013 1:57 pm

Seeing old buildings in a state like that is depressing. When I was in high school, we broke into an abandoned print shop that hadn't been used since the 50s. Same thing, junkies, tweakers, squatters, taggers had gone in and destroyed it... there were enormous piles of lead type everywhere...
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Re: EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 25794Unread post jesusfwrl
Wed Jun 05, 2013 10:19 am

Did you ever find out what happened to the equipment that was in there?
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Re: EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 25809Unread post Aussie0zborn
Thu Jun 06, 2013 11:20 am

No, there was nobody to ask while I was there. The lady at the Ministry of Culture and the journalist reporting on it did not return any emails.

The story is that when EMI UK closed their vinyl plant and scrapped their presses, there was a huge outcry that forced them to bring presses in from other countries to re-open the UK plant. Greece was mentioned here so maybe thats where the automatic presses went.

The interesting thing to note is that EMI Greece pressed records for most of the Middle Eastern countries such as Egypt and Lebanon. Once EMI stopped vinyl production, Greece's first CD plant, Digital Press Hellas bought the PolyGram Greece vinyl factory (GPI, SA) and captured the midlle eastern vinyl market. So being located in a small country, EMI Greece had a wide reach outside of its geographic borders.

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Gus
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Re: EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 25840Unread post Gus
Fri Jun 07, 2013 1:37 pm

I live very near to Columbia factory in Athens,Greece
it was one of the biggest culture crimes because our politicians does not save this historical building... :cry:

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Re: EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 25848Unread post Aussie0zborn
Fri Jun 07, 2013 10:32 pm

Yes I agree. Converting the site is a good idea but it's obviously way too late now.

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Re: EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 25949Unread post jesusfwrl
Wed Jun 12, 2013 8:36 pm

Interesting to know that they were serving such a large market. I do have some records that were pressed there and, compared to the same record pressed in the UK for instance, the quality is far inferior. Talking to some friends in Greece, while the plant was still operational, it was widely considered to not produce good quality records, so music lovers in Greece would often prefer to buy imported records at much higher prices. There was such a market for it that there were specialist record stores offering this service, locating and ordering in albums that were not pressed at the Greek factory.

I'm not sure how true this is as I only have very few records pressed there, but they all seem to be of equally bad quality. Background noise, distortion and limited frequency response. The material also seems different, so it might just have been the vinyl recipe causing the issue.
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Re: EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 25959Unread post mossboss
Thu Jun 13, 2013 1:42 am

These records pressed at Columbia Greece most likely matched the quality of the average record player around these parts of the world
Just to put it into perspective no doubt there where as they still is audiophiles but that would not sustain a pressing plant
From personal experience there even recently the music played is generally no Fi or at best very low Fi It also apparent they also play at very high volume levels with most equipment that I heard generating a high level of distortion
In live venues it is generally better however not what Any one would call a good sound lots of squealing from feedback as well as once again high volume levels with most players of instruments churning up the volume control on the input side of their equipment giving the sound mixer if there is a person there a hard time adjusting his console
Argh it appears that so long there is music coming out to their ears they don't seem to generally care
Only deducing the above from many visits there not an expert on the quality of the records coming out of the plant in the past but the ones I have managed to listen to are quite poor indeed
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Re: EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 26006Unread post jesusfwrl
Fri Jun 14, 2013 12:47 pm

I wasn't referring to records of Greek music, I doubt I have many of these in my collection. One example that I have in both a Greek and a UK version that I was listening to recently, is Alice Cooper's Love it to death. It sounds almost like it wasn't cut from the same master tapes!

As for Greek music, or music that was recorded and mastered in Greece, I know what you mean about the culture. There is a sort of distinctive "sound" consisting of overdistorted everything, bad acoustics in the spaces where recording took place, and a universal abuse of reverb (especially on vocals) making every singer sound like they're singing from outer space.. There has never been many good recording studios over there and the few that existed (some surviving nowadays) have always been far more expensive than what most local musicians or smaller labels would like to pay. There were always several smaller project studios, often owned by musicians, that offered affordable recordings of varying quality. Everything from good to horrible. At the moment as far as I know there's only one dedicated mastering facility in the country. However, most project studios also offer "mastering"... I think it is much worse nowadays than when the plant was still operating.
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Re: EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 26009Unread post studiorp
Fri Jun 14, 2013 1:15 pm

I have a lp of Zambetas songs, original of Melophone .
Sound interesting, but with all respect not the best, though the music is wonderful for me.

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Re: EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 26028Unread post mossboss
Sat Jun 15, 2013 2:20 am

Yeah right they generally produced pretty average records regardless of who the artist was or where they got mastered recorded etc
The biggest runs on vinyl was on 7" due to the proliferation of juke boxes there
There would not have been a place that served alcohol or food that did not have a juke box
And quality ha!
It turns it does not jump it makes noise what else do you want?.
Not that the music whether Greek or otherwise was bad but records? That's another story
I happen to have a little collection of lp's and singles they are quite average at best or really bad at worst
Fable was not much better either so no point in comparing the two
Not what one would call good pressings that's for sure
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Re: EMI Greece Vinyl Factory To Become Museum?

Post: # 40543Unread post Gus
Wed Feb 10, 2016 7:40 pm

A short video documentary from 2010 on the illegal immigrants living at the EMI Columbia factory.


https://vimeo.com/18019608

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