I picked up a MINT copy of Nazareth - Hair Of The Dog LP for $5 today at the local chattanooga market downtown....good food. It has a gold stamp on the back cover that reads "Not For Sale Demostration". It is a circular stamp. Anyone have a an idea what these mean? Are they just copies sent out to radio stations back in the day for airing or were they sent to record shops to play when people were shopping or ??? Thanks.

Yes.

Your assumption is correct. Often you will find them in plain packaging labeled "Radio Station Copy" or something similar. Many times they will have a very simple label as well. Some are (like the copy you have) normal retail packaging with a NFS stamp.

I have found several with DJ stamps on the record labels, as well.

Does it have a plain white label, without any graphic elements, only black text?
Or is the label the same as the 'stock copy'?

To answer your original question it could be either/or, a 'radio station copy' or, for 'in store play'. There are a few different subdivisions/categories of the more general term. 'promotional record'. It kinda depends on a few things.

Record stores got them too. To play in the store. I have quite a few myself.

the band has access to them as well, I once knew Chris Nicks, Stevies brother, who got us signed white jacket copies of rumours and Fleetwood Mac ST...IIRC the label was plain white as well.. my Ex got them in the split which was ok since she was a huge fan and i got them with her in mind anyway.

All of the above are correct. Each company had it's own policy and they all differed in small ways. I was a record buyer for a large music store and the salesmen were always handy with freebies and stock to trade for other salesmen's copies. I used to get hundreds of these a year and the quality is often superior to regular stock copies, at least the Promo labels not just the stamped ones!!

the band has access to them as well, I once knew Chris Nicks, Stevies brother, who got us signed white jacket copies of rumours and Fleetwood Mac ST...IIRC the label was plain white as well.. my Ex got them in the split which was ok since she was a huge fan and i got them with her in mind anyway.
Yes, and the price/costs/fees of these 'promo records', in effect were paid for by the artists themselves, whether they were aware of that fact or not!

Here's a quick guide:
http://members.tripod.com/~Vinylville/faq-8.html

Cool, thanks. That's kind of what I thought as I have dozens of CD promo's in the collection. I buy almost 99% of all my media used unless I don;t have a choice.

The LP has all of the artwork and is in excellent condition.

I actually searched these out in the 80's in NYC, had ton's of LP stores,lot's of radio stations still spining, though not as much, alot of them went straight to the used store, cheap, always seemed to be high quality pressings like the first batches, you know before the stamper wore out. I've played these against bought new versions from Tower Records :yikes: I'm old, and 75% of the time the promo wins, some of the ones from the 60's and early 70's had big white lables stuck on the cover with playlist with song times or a log for how many times a hit was played, for the royalites ya know:D I liked the hand written notes by the DJ's in the comment area too but, I scratch my ass in public so don't listen to me:D
Craig

big white lables stuck on the cover with playlist with song times or a log for how many times a hit was played, for the royalites ya know:D I liked the hand written notes by the DJ's in the comment area too but, I scratch my ass in public so don't listen to me:D
Craig

To figure royalties, BMI and ASCAP would send out log sheets to Radio Stations. Every song played during a certain period would have to be logged. It was a real pain.

I would occasionally answer a trivia question thrown out by the DJ and win an album. They were always promo copies. At a garage sale this weekend, I picked up a very nice box set of opera CD's that were marked not for sale. (I don't know if the performances are good, my brother's the opera fan) The guy having the sale said his wife is an opera singer.

Regards,

D-Ray

i've picked a few of these up here and there as well as some stamped something along the line of being government property? whatever that means maybe for sale on a PX? I don't know

You guys aren't suppose to have those. Send them to me and I'll properly dispose of them.

Hurry, before they find out!

I think all the promo's I have are the commercial packaging w/ a stamp "For promotional use only, Not for resale".

I think they've all been notched or have a hole punch through the UPC code

In the AM Radio days, sometimes the 45 RPM promos were cut HOT meaning at a high level, to make them cut through the interference.

We'd often get multiple copies of LPs at the radio station I worked at.
A few.....followed me home.

Steve

In the AM Radio days, sometimes the 45 RPM promos were cut HOT meaning at a high level, to make them cut through the interference.

That is an interesting thought. I have a copy of "The Push Stars - after the party" on CD that seems really "HOT" during playback. It is a promo CD. ???