I know it's a very long and convoluted story, going through many threads, but if you take the time to read them Tyke, you will see that Topic never went bust, the Topic album, Penguin Eggs is the only one issued during Nic's prforming period that is available. The recordings in question are the Trailer recordings.
The whole point of the issue is that Bulmer, having bought the rights to these recordings for, in many cases a pocket full of small change, will neither release, or sell the rights to the recordings, to the performers who made them.
A bastard is a bastard when he is living high on the hog and also when he has fallen on hard times, or maybe economic santions are finally paying off.

love, john