"The record re-issue is part of a collaboration between Peter Hale, manager of the Ginsberg estate and Nina Kossoff, of Esther Creative Group...Ginsberg fans weren’t that interested in paying for an electronic download, when there were plenty of free or pirated recordings out there. Kossoff explained the same phenomenon applies to the contemporary music scene. When 'paying for music' means listening to ad-enabled Spotify and Pandora, artists have to find profits elsewhere: concert sales, t-shirts, posters and books. So what, then, could be done for Allen in the digital age? Ironically, the answer was to return to the era of physical media, from whence Ginsberg came. She and Hale have re-released First Blues on vinyl –faithful to the original, right down to the newspaper insert and the typos on the packaging. Anyone who buys one of these limited-edition records also gets a free link to download the tracks digitally. And it appears to have worked. They sold out of records before the Housing Works event even started." (February 2013)
