Why has my label been cut up?

[Turboellis]

Was just listening to Bowie's Low LP and noticed (but not for the 1st time, obviously) that someone had cut the Victor logo and the Nipper logo from both sides, as in attached photo. Would that have been a licensing thing, or was the previous Japanese owner of this LP a nut job?

[Turboellis]

Just found another Bowie pressing (UK pressing but previously owned by a Japanese friend) with the Victor logo blacked out. No-one knows anything about why all the information on my LP labels is gradually disappearing?

[Turboellis]

I'm guessing that RCA didn't have the rights to the Victor brand in Japan, or something along those lines.

[bongolia]

Yeah it's copyright. EMI owned the "Nipper" logo except for the US where RCA did.

Another one is US imports of Columbia titles to Europe - EMI owned the "Columbia" name outside the US so all instances of that word had to be covered up. My "Lady in Satin" has something like 15 stickers on it (6 "Columbia"s on each label!)

A lot of this sort of thing dates back to the 30s (i think, might be 40s? can't find the date now) - under anti-monopoly laws the big record companies were split up - which is why UK Decca is totally separate from US Decca etc.

[Turboellis]

Thanks for confirming. It didn't look like wanton disfigurementation, though the result is the same.

I don't think it changes the music, though i'm not totally sure ...