RECORD CRACK: Taiwan pressing of War’s “Why Can’t We Be Friends”

Taiwan vinyl pressings are terrible. If you wanted a quality pressing, some could opt for a Japanese or German pressing, or honor the “get the pressing from the home country of the artist” theory. A lot of times the Taiwan pressings seem like they were made from recycled vinyl, similar to what many Jamaican labels have done, or simply from sub-standard material. The material to produce the covers were flimsy, merely the same material used to make movie posters, and put into a plastic sleeve. The benefit if a Taiwan pressing? Sometimes the cover art would be different, or they’d use the negatives and templates in a different way than the normal Western pressing. In some instances, like the cover for Black Sabbath’s Master Of Reality, the photo of the band in a forest/near trees becomes the cover.

At the time, there were no official major label distributors in Taiwan but they were given master tapes and cover art, only for it to look different. If a cover was die-cut or had embossed graphics, you would not get that on a Taiwan pressing. However, I just discovered this on a website. This is the cover for War’s Why Can’t We Be Friends (catalog # SB-3104). We know the cover for the drawing of a big white face, big smile with a gold tooth. This is not that, nor is it the poster that came with the album. It looks like the United Artists or Far Out staff in a parking lot, celebrating the release of the album. The other interesting thing is that it says “Coming June 16″. Checking Wikipedia, the page there shows the album was released in June 1975, so I added the 16th so that people will now be able to know when it was released.

Since I don’t have this album with me, nor have I ever seen this photo, I have to ask: where is this photo from and where was it taken? Since it says “Coming June 16″, was this from an advertisement for the album or a press release? Most album covers do not place the release date on the front, because you’d already have the album, it wouldn’t matter. Now, I do have the music tablature book for The World Is A Ghetto album, did this photo originate for a book that may have been for this album? If anyone knows the source of the pic, please reply to this article below. Thank you.