Pink Floyd — The Wall: How to Identify a First Pressing

• Cover: The cover is extremely minimal, showing only a plain white brick wall with no text at all — the first Pink Floyd cover not designed by Hipgnosis since 'The Piper at the Gates of Dawn' (Waters and Storm Thorgerson were not on good terms at the time).
• Cover: The band-name and album-title typeface was designed by cartoonist Gerald Scarfe; depending on the pressing, this lettering either appears as a sticker on the outer shrink-wrap or is printed directly on the cover, in either black or red.
• Inner sleeve: Gerald Scarfe also created the inner-sleeve artwork and the label designs for both records, depicting the 'wall' at different stages of construction along with the characters from the story.

• As part of the 'Why Pink Floyd...?' campaign, a James Guthrie remaster called the Discovery Edition (with no bonus content) was released in 2011, followed by an Experience Edition and a seven-disc Immersion Edition in 2012 — all of which differ from the 1979 original vinyl in recording content and/or packaging specification.

• Sticker version vs. directly printed lettering: Within different batches that are all considered 'regular editions', the Gerald Scarfe-designed band-name/album-title lettering appears as a sticker on the outer shrink-wrap on some copies and is printed directly on the cover on others, in either black or red — an officially sanctioned variation rather than a clear-cut first-pressing/later-pressing distinction.

The sticker-versus-printed and black-versus-red lettering differences are clearly described verbatim on Wikipedia, but no further distinction as to which one corresponds to the 'true first pressing' could be found in accessible sources this time, so it is listed as unverified.

• Read the runout (the smooth area between the last groove and the label) with the disc tilted under a lamp: matrix numbers, stamper codes and mastering initials are the strongest evidence.
• Label details change between pressing plants and years: rim text, logo style, address, "Manufactured by" wording.
• Cover printing shows the plant and era: printer credit, catalog number position, barcode presence.
• Match all three. A first-press disc in a later cover, or the reverse, is common.

Shoot the label straight on in even light, then the runout with the disc tilted so the etched text catches the light (a phone torch from the side works). Add the front and back cover, the spine, and any inner sleeve or insert. The app reads the label and cover; the runout photo is what confirms the pressing.