Musics I done

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Hey Record Labels, stop being idiots

So I had a bit of a splurge today and bought a couple of cds from various record labels.

I love buying music direct from the artist or the label; it gives me a sense of enormous well-being. It feels like fair-trade or something. I get stuff cheaper, they get more money. Everybody's happy, except rough trade who keep having to find new reasons to exist (cafe, bike racks, guitar strings, a one-day-a-week gourmet synthesiser shop; literally every time i go in, there's a new stupid, desperate thing in that shop).

But this particular shopping trip has given me a bad taste in my mouth.

I've recently got more into vinyl. I needed a good record player, so I bought one, so I thought I might as well make the change to 12" as my main listening avenue (other than mp3, obviously). So I've started looking for the vinyl option more.

But both Monotreme and Probe Plus records have thwarted me, by 'giving away' the cd with the vinyl. I don't want two copies of most albums (a couple i've bought in both formats... stupid, i know). I can buy the cd without the vinyl; I can't buy the vinyl without the cd.

Just give me the vinyl and the mp3s (or flacs). That covers all my bases - the lounge for the vinyl, everywhere else for the mp3s. What do I need the cd for as well? It sounds just the same as the soft copy, but takes up space. The vinyl copy sounds different and better (I actually think this now, after comparing analogue and digital versions of Cephalic Carnage's 'Anomalies'). How ever much I can save by not including the cd in the package, I'd like to save that money please. It must be an actual number, cds can't be so cheap as to be free.

So because of the lack of a pure vinyl (plus mp3) option, I've resorted to buying the cd version of two albums. It seems really wrong, but I just don't want two of every album. Vinyls are big enough as it is, without me having to store the cd as well.

Or am I looking a gift horse in the mouth? Is the cd version really really free?

3 comments:

Ed said...

Another way of looking at it is that you have an infinite number of copies, two of which are physical. You could always try lending the CD to people and asking them to buy it if they like it.

James Gorrie said...

You could just give the CD away for free as a double good deed. One for promoting the people you like and if the lucky person likes the band, voi la, the win.

Grilly said...

Advice taken. I decided that free cd copies make great presents, so I cancelled my monotreme order, so as to order the vinyl.

But then they put a £3 delivery charge on top of the vinyl order, compared to none on the cd version; meaning it was £7 more in total, which I could buy a whole nother album for. It was bad enough before, but the vinyl is not worth nearly twice the price.