The first rock bootleg is said to be Bob Dylan's Great White Wonder double LP, released in 1969. (There is an excellent book by Clinton Heylin on the history of bootlegs that is still available in paperback. Bootlegs were a curiosity to some and an Indiana Jones-type treasure to others, with quality that varied from label to label in regards to packaging and sound. The first bootleg LPs were produced with plain white cardboard jackets, with info customarily printed on paper inserts that wrapped around them. Labels such as TMOQ (Trade Mark of Quality), TAKRL (The Amazing Kornyphone Record Label), and Wizardo produced many great Pink Floyd releases, which were of great interest to me.

The first bootleg I ever came across was called Knobs, a so-so quality recording of Pink Floyd from Wembley 1977. I accidentally discovered this while flipping through the Pink Floyd LPs in my usual record haunt. I was amazed to find a live recording from this tour, and happily plunked down twice the price of my usual purchase to add this to my collection. When I got home and played it, I was shocked to find the sound quality severely lacking, especially since the band was known for its great audio production work. But as the record played on and my expectations leveled off, I started to get into the music and performance. All of a sudden, my brain had adjusted to the poor audio quality and I was really digging this show.

It wasn't until my next trip back to that record shop that it was explained to me the nature of this album, and why it bore a sticker reading "Import: No Returns". The store manager then pointed me to a magazine rack where I purchased my first copy of Hot Wacks, a quarterly magazine that listed all new bootleg releases. Hot Wacks would eventually publish a huge book containing all information from their past quarterlies, and every so often would update the big volume. Between the listings in Hot Wacks and the recently-published Pink Floyd book by Miles (which contained a bootleg discography in its index section) I learned of the treasure trove of Pink Floyd recordings that I definitely had to have. But how did one go about finding these rare gems? Today, almost all of these recordings are a simple mouse click, but back in the early days, you had to be an archeologist!

Bootlegs were generally sold in head shops and 'Mom and Pop' record stores since no major chains would carry them. My local record/head shop would usually stock the latest boots, but finding those old ones was a real challenge. Bootleg records were always produced in a very limited quantity (500-1,000) and once they were gone, that was it. Record and tape collectors used to place ads in Goldmine Magazine (which is probably still around) stating what they were looking for. For a while, advertisers were able to sneak in bootleg listings along with the hundreds of other items they had to offer. (It wasn't until the '80s that these blatant listings were halted.) Then you had to physically write to these people, mail a letter, and hope that they would write back, usually taking about 2 weeks until a trade was finally established. Then there was the matter of dubbing your tapes. One had to account for a variety of cassette manufacturers (TDK and Maxell were my favorites), and tape quality (normal, chrome, feri-chrome, metal), and every trader had their individual preferences. The actual dubbing process was usually done in real time, and you had to manually establish recording levels and flip the tape over at the halfway mark. This was the best way to increase your tape collection back in the '70s and '80s.

The real fun however, was the hunt for those rare bootleg records, those early pressings and limited series. Besides my local record shop, there were also my favorite stores in New York City's Greenwich Village. My dad has lived there since 1974 and when I visited him I'd always save a day for going on a safari through that area. It was like being in bootleg heaven and I would always blow a good couple of hundred dollars in a single day.

One of my favorite stories is how I found Raving and Drooling, a bootleg from the 1974 tour that I was always looking for but had never found. One day I woke up to a dissipating dream of actually finding this record. I remember waking up and thinking that I was holding it my hands just a few seconds ago and now its gone! I had to think outside of the box. I grabbed the South Florida Yellow Pages and literally called every record store in the book. I began by asking if they sold 'imports', and if they said 'yes' I would follow up with a question and a wink that would usually lead me closer to the truth. A few actually said, "You mean bootlegs? Sure... just got some new ones in." It was quite a drive to Coral Gables, but I finally found Bananas, which became my newest favorite record store/head shop. I not only found Raving and Drooling (as a double LP released on the Beacon Island label), but quite a few other early gems (like the triple LP Crackers). Yes, part of the thrill of these bootlegs was the quest to hunt them down—and when you did find them, the feeling was amazing. My other great bootleg adventure occurred when I visited London in 1990. Some of the outdoor flea markets, like Camden Lock (hope I got this right!) had so much great old stuff that I went weak in the knees quite a few times.

For me, the thrill of finding these hidden treasures was a big part of the fun behind them. But the most important thing was being able to be transported to a show that was before my time and in a place that I couldn't possibly have been. Bootlegs allowed me explore the live history of my favorite bands, and introduced me to some lifelong friends along the way.

In the 1990s, the vinyl bootleg LP began to disappear into obscurity. With the advent of small DAT recorders and Mini Discs, the history of bootlegs was about to be rewritten once again.

While attending a record convention in 1990, I saw something that was soon to change everything: bootleg CDs. In fact, I found a Pink Floyd boot called Eclipse, which combined the 1970 and 1971 John Peel BBC broadcasts. I was extremely excited to imagine the pristine quality of this gem, and rushed home to listen to it. What a disappointment to find that it was copied directly from the scratchy and poppy vinyl LPs that had been previously released. I then had a vision: this new format would simply be recycling all of the previous vinyl releases. Hardcore collectors would buy these anyway, but I was very upset to think that most fans would be shelling out their hard-earned cash for the same old same old.

I used to read all the regular trade papers and magazines such as Goldmine, and there was also a quarterly newsletter, called ICE, that had a section titled 'Going Underground' dedicated to new bootleg releases. In one issue there was an interview with Rinaldo Tagliabue, president of Great Dane Records in Milan. Rinaldo was a Springsteen fanatic and was known for producing high quality releases. In the interview he explained why it was legal to produce and release these CDs in Europe and other countries through a loophole in the copyright laws. The Eclipse CD that I had recently bought was a Great Dane release, and listed the address of the company on the rear jewel case artwork. I wrote a letter to Rinaldo telling him about my large Floyd collection, and sent a couple of tapes with some sample recordings. My thought was that if I could step in and provide some kind of quality control, at least I could help give the fans something that would be worth buying.

Within a couple of months, Staying Home to Watch the Rain (Hollywood Bowl 1972) was released. I can't tell you how exciting it was to receive a box from Italy that is filled with a bootleg that I helped produce! Over the next 4 years, I would release over a dozen Floyd titles through Great Dane, all with full-color booklets (written by me) about the show and time period. This kind of professional quality was just about as good as you could get at the time. I had worked out a deal where I would never receive any payment from Great Dane; that's not what I was doing this for anyway. Instead, Rinaldo would send me anything I wanted from his catalogue. Talk about being a kid in a candy shop! Along with 25 copies of my own titles (which I gave to friends and used to trade for other boots), I got tons of Springsteen, Zeppelin, the Who, Genesis, and Beatles releases.

The thing I'm most proud of though was a Pink Floyd box set that I produced called Total Eclipse, a 4CD retrospective of the group's career up to that time.

Great Dane closed its doors when the Gatt Treaty was signed, making it illegal to produce their releases in Europe and many other countries. It was a good run, but it was time to move on.

I was then approached by a slightly shady character that knew of my work with Great Dane who wanted me to work on a project with him. The elaborate release that he had in mind would include a large, full-color book and three classic Floyd shows from 1975, 1977, and 1980. It didn't take much to get me interested in this new project (which I christened The Azimuth Coordinator). But the production turned out to be a bit of a train wreck, and I was very sorry that I ever got involved. Again, money was not the motivation; it was the elaborate production that gained my interest, and the packaging ultimately fell short in the end.

The follow up to the failed Azimuth Coordinator project was to be a release of the 1971 Peel broadcast, of which I had the original BBC transcription LPs. But when things started to go wrong with Azimuth Coordinator, I held back sending out my master for production, which pretty much sent the project's producer through the roof. I thought he was going to have a stroke over the phone. I hung up and never heard from him again.

I sent the DAT tape from the BBC LP to Jeff Jensen (who at the time was the editor of Brain Damage magazine), which he used to produce into CDs and sold them through Brain Damage. A short time later, Jeff disappeared with a lot of people's subscription money, and the once-respected fanzine folded. Called Meddler, this was the first and only Harvested release that was ever sold, and there was still a big problem with this release. Somewhere along the way it was converted to mono and was not produced in stereo as it should have been. This was the last straw for me. If I couldn't have total control over this stuff and if I couldn't give it away for free then I wasn't going to have anything to do with it anymore.

During this time I found the Pink Floyd RoIO Database and met its creators. I would send them info on all the Great Dane and subsequent releases and give them all of the details to post on their website. This is where I met Mr. Phloyd, a talented fan who had the software to remaster audio and burn CDs, and also the patience to put up with my demands of quality control. We decided that it was time to take matters into our own hands and start to re-release the best possible recordings from each of the Floyd's tours. This was the real birth of Harvested Records. The first thing that we needed to correct was the 1970 Peel show and so our first official catalogue release was renamed Meddled. I was learning Photoshop and was able to now create artwork for this and other releases.

I was also inspired by the new spirit of trading that was buzzing around the Internet. Many collectors were using a process called a 'Tree'. This is where one person would share a recording and a list of people would sign up and be organized to pass it on, forming branches (who would share) and leaves (who could not share, but would receive copies anyway, albeit last on the list). I loved this idea, but was not interested in the organization of the Tree structure; it was just too much work. This is where I came up with the idea of 'Weeds' and the weeding process. I would send off a copy to a few folks who would promise to pass this on to three others and so on, spreading like an uncontrollable weed throughout the world. I loved this idea, and soon realized that this was the way it was always meant to be. And I got to coin a popular term to boot (pun intended)!

It wasn't long before I learned to use Sound Forge and Cool Edit Pro and was soon able to remaster and burn CDs on my own. One Harvested fan named Ed would often complain about the barely audible clicks that would be generated by some of my edits. Ed soon volunteered to be my go-to quality control guy and would comb through every CD before it was released, taking dozens of hours to make sure they were up to his standards. Ed also archived all of these releases into the Shorten (.shn) format, and generated MD5 checksum files to ensure their integrity through the weeding process. Harvested was always bigger than just me, and now Ed was (and still is) an integral part of the team.

I have made great friends through Harvested. Joining Ed was MOB (master of speed correction), and more recently Si (on the DVD side of things). Along with Steve B, JME, Rudy and a host of others, Harvested has come to represent the true spirit of bootleg recordings, altruistically spreading the love of this great live music to the fans. I'm proud to have all of these guys on board with me.

Over the years, I'd like to think that I have inspired others to follow in my footsteps. Rather than being in competition, my brothers in arms now include labels such as Free Range Pigs, Pigs On The Wing, Cochon Productions, Hop The Pond, and Household Objects, just to name a few.

When I look back almost 30 years to that fateful day when I found that copy of Knobs, it fills me with great pride to see the path that I ended up following. With Internet resources like Yeeshkul! and Dime (among many others), Pink Floyd collectors have ready access to recordings that would have required the expertise of an audio-archeologist to find just a decade ago. The thrill and charm of those original adventures are now relics of the past, but perhaps a more important thing has now taken its place: the wide and almost instant access to everything that myself and others have always worked for. I just hope that anyone who never recorded anything on an audio cassette appreciates this!

And finally, I would be remiss to exclude a huge thanks to all those who have covertly recorded these shows throughout the years. Although I have never done this myself, I would not be writing any of this if these daring men didn't have the balls to do what they did to begin with. So to all those out there who have sacrificed in order to bring us these historical documents, I dedicate this to you.

Now I'm going to listen to Knobs.

It wasn't until my Freshman year at Rochester Institute of Technology that I finally realized that bootlegs are not really bad things to collect. I had done much online research on my favorite band and came across the Pink Floyd RoIO Database. I enjoyed reading many reviews and suggestions from traders and collectors. I also found that the term 'bootleg' was to be avoided, as it deals with the sales of the recordings. For those trading for free, the accepted term is 'Recording of Illegitimate Origins' (RoIO). I learned that RoIO trading will not take sales away from bands because the fans are loyal and will trade without any money exchanged. In fact, ROIO trading can help promote bands!

But talk about bad timing... I wish I had come across the site before buying one at a campus bootleg fair. At one of these fairs (held monthly in the cafeteria) I found a cassette of a Pink Floyd Wall-era show and had to have it. The deal was two cassettes for $15. I went on and bought it along with a Led Zeppelin live cassette. I was disappointed mainly because the Pink Floyd cassette wasn't complete, the songs were recorded out of order to fit on the limited cassette timeframe, and the actual date and venue of the show was unknown. Once I came upon the RoIO Database, I never bought bootlegs again.

I didn't have my own computer then, and did all of my RoIO research at the school's computer lab. It wasn't until the fall of 1998, when I transferred to Eastern Kentucky University that I finally bought my own computer. I began to read more and more RoIO Database entries as well as individual traders' websites. I had fun reading site called the Digital Floyd Project. I loved the idea of good fans taking actual bootlegs, remastering them, create new artwork, and then circulate them for free.

Finally, in the spring of 1999, I was ready to trade. I wanted to find a live performance of The Wall, this time complete and on CD. I found a trader that was so kind that he didn't want any blank CDRs from me. All he wanted was for me to send him my blanks, and he burned the show onto my blanks (as I didn't have my own CD burner until 2001) and sent them back to me. He was very kind throughout the whole process and explained a few tips and pointers. So my very first RoIO was a concert that took place at Nassau Coliseum in New York on February 28, 1980. The RoIO title is unknown and I still take it out and listen to it sometimes to reminisce about my first venture into trading.

I traded with many users off the RoIO Database's 'traders list' throughout 1999 and early 2000. Then I just got too busy with college and had to halt trading in early 2000. But I kept doing research and kept notes on many RoIOs that I wanted when I eventually would return to trading. I even wrote to RoIO remasterers in order to expand my Wish List.

I collected mostly the David Gilmour-led era recordings because I like The Division Bell and the 1994 tour. Don't get me wrong; I am a huge fan of Roger Waters and many classic albums such as Dark Side and Animals. But I liked the newer stuff because it came out in my Freshman year at high school, during one of the hardest times of my life. My family had been telling me for years that A Momentary Lapse of Reason was the Floyd's last album, made just to prove that Pink Floyd could go on after Roger left. I refused to believe that, and hoped that there would be another album. The Division Bell was a wish come true, and I love it more than A Momentary Lapse of Reason. This album and tour have huge personal meaning to me, hence my huge numbers of RoIOs from those shows.

Then sometime in early 2002, I found a website called 'RoIO at DALNET' (which now seems to be defunct) that actually circulates RoIOs using a mIRC client to facilitate online trading via downloads. Again, I was busy and wasn't able to participate. My luck came when in the summer of 2002, during my summer semester, I had time to do the download trades. I personally like the downloading better because there is no waiting on the mail, it is faster and more direct, and you can chat with other traders while downloading. My RoIO collection began to grow quickly until I decided to move back home in October 2004, and got stuck with dialup service. My downloads have ceased since 2004, but I still participate in an occasional one-off snail mail trade, including a few vine trades. I now have around 50 shows, and about 75% of those are the post-split Floyd tours and Roger Waters solo tours.

My main criterion is completeness. I have to have RoIOs that are complete from beginning to end. I don't like RoIOs that start a few minutes—or even seconds—late and end a few seconds early. I don't like any cuts or tape-flips. I'm very anal and specific when looking for RoIOs to add to my collection. Like I said, I do a lot of research on my Wish List.

Other important criteria are sound quality, unique performances, and rarities. I always get the ones with extremely good sound quality. I like looking for unique and rare performances, such as the only time a certain song was performed, or the best performance of a favorite song. I sometimes get the very newest shows to add to my collection, as for example, I recently received a vine for an ultimate David Gilmour On An Island tour 16-disc set, including both audio and DVD files.

I've come a long way from the young boy who thought that collectors of live concert recordings were hurting their favorite bands and were just lining the pockets of criminals. I have made many friends in the trading community, our shared interests providing a common bond between us. I have only been trading for the seven years and having only 50 RoIOs, so I am still a newbie. But here's a newbie's advice to other budding collectors: Avoid buying bootlegs at all costs! Search the Internet and seek out traders that share common interests with you. They'll take care of you! Not only will you get these shows for free, but you will find that the recordings that are produced by the fans for the fans are far superior to anything a profiteer would sell you.

The history of the word "RoIO" is intimately connected to Pink Floyd and its fans. In the late 1980s, a university student who called himself "JCO" ran a Pink Floyd e-mail list called Eclipse, but in the summer of 1991 he graduated and discovered that it was not feasible to maintain the list long distance. Eclipse simply ceased to be, leaving its subscribers in the lurch. After a few attempts to revive the list failed, a former member of Eclipse named H.W. "bear" Neff started a temporary replacement e-mail list called Echoes. Echoes grew and grew, aided by the 1994 release of The Division Bell and the subsequent world tour, and eventually became on of the largest and most popular online Pink Floyd fan groups.

The rest is history. Almost.

Echoes' first post was made on November 14, 1991, and by January 1992 the list was well-populated and in full swing. One of the most common topics of conversation was bootlegs—where to find them, how to properly identify them, and so on. Collectors wanted other fans' opinions on sound quality and completeness before making the significant monetary investment that was often required.

An active Dutch contingent on Echoes supplied a lot of information about the flurry of bootlegs being released (leading one American subscriber to remark, "Keep it coming most of all from The Netherlands—where it seems that everything (not just music) is not only available, but also legal and inexpensive"). CD bootlegs were basically legal in the Netherlands at the time, and crafty entrepreneurs in Italy, West Germany, and elsewhere found loopholes in laws designed to quash bootlegging. Once smuggled into the US, the discs were labeled as 'rare live imports' and sold for $25-$35 per disc at independent music stores.

Most striking is that the word "bootleg" was used so freely on Echoes in those days. Whereas now the purchase of bootleg recordings is vehemently discouraged, and bootleg sellers are hounded as traitors and swindlers, the culture at the time was much different. It was not uncommon to ask for recommendations about the best places to buy bootlegs... and there were no qualms about publicly posting the address and phone number of a local store that sold these 'imports'. The earliest version of the Echoes FAQ even had the question "Where is a good list of bootlegs?" (The answer read, in part, "Right now I am trying to compile a list based on postings to Echoes.")

The task of compiling this list—including detailed information on the dates, venues, tracklists, and sound quality—proved to be more than any one person could take on. In January 1992 Carl Ponder posted a list of some 60 bootleg titles, and offered to work on filling in the gaps using reviews from other Echoesians. Apparently, an unofficial committee was formed to work on developing this database, including Ponder, Piet de Bondt, Gerhard den Hollander, Tor Hulbakviken, and others.

And then, on February 11, 1992, Neff announced:

And with that, two grand Echoes traditions were established: the Pink Floyd RoIO Database, and the prohibition of the word "bootleg" in favor of "RoIO".

Within no time at all, Echoesians were chiming in to support the new term, while a few others were decrying it as paranoid and unnecessary. One member wondered in earnest if there had been some threat of legal action, or if they should start using pseudonyms to protect their identities. Dave Cowl noted almost immediately that the word "RoIO" had spread to an REM e-mail list, noting (unchallenged) that the word had been originated by Echoesians.

Exactly which Echoesian coined the term is unknown. Although the Echoes e-mails are all archived, the private discussions of the Database committee have likely been lost forever. Both Gerhard den Hollander and Piet de Bondt tried to credit Tor Hulbakviken with its creation, but he denied it: