German Elvis LP Labels

Label guide for German Elvis pressings - LP's

For a long time there has not been a common description among collectors to determine German LP pressings, except for a very complicated one introduced by Peter Baumann with his Book "Elvis On Vinyl teil 3". This guide is a hopefully the solution to this. Since the LP and single labels do follow the same patterns regarding the evolution it is adviced to read the single and EP label guide first. This LP guide is actually based on the single and EP guide and is a result of collectors requests for an LP label guide for this WEB-site. For LP's as singles there's some quick rules that can help you place the record to a certain period of time.

RCA with Lines and Long Play (1956-1958)
RCA with Lines (1959-1960)
RCA (1960-1963)
Small RCA Victor (1963-1964)
Large RCA Victor (1964-1968)
Orange label with new RCA logo (1968-1981)
Black label with new RCA logo (1982-1983)
Black label with silver ring (1983-199?)

The label guide shown here, is a systematically list of the information given in the book "Elvis On Vinyl" and my own label guide. But everything is based on and adjusted to Wolfgang Kühnel and Helmut Radermacher's work way back in 1985. I have listed the abbreviations used in "Elvis on vinyl Teil 3" together with my own abbreviations. At the same time I have tried to make it fit the allready known abbreviations from our Elvis-bible "Rillen Revue" and the 45 label guide. This has been done to make as less confusion as possible.

After a long time of consideration I wanted to completely drop the Baumann sn3++ and rename them as sr=silver ring A, B, C and D. The reason for this is that there were to many sn variations in Baumanns books that had little in common, like sn4, sn5 and sn6 for instance. In addition, many UK collectors has now adopted the "New German a),b),c) and d)" abbreviations after Paul Alner used this in his great book "Elvis On Record". So why not just try to make the UK and German collectors understand each other easily. And that's how the srA, B, C and D labels were born. At the moment the old names are in brackets and I cannot force collectors to use the new ones, but time will tell how these new names will be recieved among collectors.

By introducing two new v2 labels I might for the first time show a label guide for LP's that makes even the mid 60's releases fit perfectly into a release order and maintain the 45 label system. Instead of Baumanns v2, v3 and v4 we now have v2a, v2b, v2c, v3 and v4. Many collectors have been puzzled by the "v2" editions of LPM/LSP 3553. And why "Living Stereo" on several v3 releases and not on all v2's. Why large side numbers on v2 labels when v3 could still be found with small side numbers. Now everything falls into its rightful place with this new label guide.

A final note: Be aware that the s4 label is used differently for LP's and 45's. Both labels were short lived and can be seen as a transition label between s3 and s5 for both LP's and 45's.

And now to label guide!

s1	s3 Long Play	s3	s4

1956 Baumann: s1	1957-1958 Baumann: s3 Long Play	1959 Baumann: s3	1959 Baumann: Not covered
s5	s5 Living Stereo	s6 glossy	s6 glossy Living Stereo

1960 Baumann: s5	1960 Baumann: s5 Living Stereo	1960-1962 Baumann: s6	1960-1962 Baumann: s6 Living Stereo
s6	s6 Living Stereo	v1	v1 Living Stereo

1962-1963 Baumann: s6	1962-1963 Baumann: s6 Living Stereo	1963-1964 Baumann: v1	1963-1964 Baumann: v1 Living Stereo
v2a	v2a Living Stereo

1964 Baumann: v2	1964 Baumann: v2 Living Stereo
v2b	v2b Living Stereo	v2b Stereo

1964-1965 Baumann: v3	1964-1965 Baumann: v3 Living Stereo	1964-1965 Baumann: v3 Stereo
v2c	v2c Stereo

1966 Baumann: v2	1966 Baumann: v2 Stereo
v3	v3 Stereo	v4	v4 Stereo

1966 Baumann: v4	1966 Baumann: v4 Stereo	1967-1968 Baumann: v4	1967-1968 Baumann: v4 Stereo
o1	o2	o3	o4

1969-1970 Baumann: o1	1970-1974 Baumann: o2-o3	1975-1976 Baumann: o4-o6	1977-1981 Baumann: o7
b1	b2	b3	b4

1969-1970 Baumann: b1	1970-1974 Baumann: b2-b3	1975-1976 Baumann: b4-b6	1977-1981 Baumann: b7
sn1	sn2

1982-1983 Baumann: sn1	1983 Baumann: sn2
srA (sn3)	srB (sn4)	srC (sn6)

1983-1984(?) Baumann: sn3	1984(?)-1986(?) Baumann: sn4	1987(?)-1988 Baumann: sn6
srD (sn9)	BMG 1 (not named yet)

1988-199? Baumann: sn9	199?-199? Baumann: Not covered
SPECIAL LABELS
Old RCA 1 (RCA)	Old RCA 2 (BMG)	Old RCA 3 (BMG)

1986 Old UK style Baumann: sn5	1988 Old UK style Baumann: sn7	1990 Old UK style Baumann: sn8
I Was The One	Blue UK Elvis	50th Anniversary

1983 Baumann: Elvis 1	1984 Baumann: Elvis 2	1984-1985 Baumann: Elvis 3
Collectors Gold	Complete 50's Masters

1991 Baumann: Elvis 4	1992 Baumann: Elvis 5