The collector’s paradox
Only a week after David Byrne lamented the end of packaging — oh, and let us know that record packaging was all just record company artifice to begin with — The Residents released their plan to Take Back Your Shelf Space. Their new album will be sold as a presumably amazing-looking 2-CD set at the Museum Of Modern Art, among other exclusive venues. This is the part where it gets tricky: the CDs will be blank and the purchaser is supposed to burn them himself!
This brings up the classic collector quandary: will this set be worth more if you keep the CDs new & pristine or if you burn the limited-availability media to its proper medium? (The Residents intimate that the recorded material may disappear after December 2007) Back in the day of the Velvet Underground banana, the answer might have been obvious (save, of course, for all the confused/stoned people who peeled and lived on to regret it), but this opens up a whole new collector’s edition can of worms.
Speaking of which, the collector’s can sold for $11.7 million.
River of Crime poised for odd release plan
That’s our boys. Always looking for an innovative new way to weird things up.
I’m in the camp of preserving the article as much as possible. For instance, my Stereolab John Cage Bubblegum 45 contained a piece of authentic John Cage bubblegum inside the record sleeve. The record itself was a nice bubblegum colored piece of vinyl. Really nice packaging.
After thinking about it, I thought: is that just ordinary bubblegum? Lord knows what kind of trip you might end up on if it’s not. Also, isn’t it cool to have the gum in the original packaging? all nice and pristine next to its bubblegum colored vinyl brother.
It didn’t matter either way as my three year old daughter answered both questions for me by chewing the gum herself. Thankfully, it was just ordinary bubblegum. I hope it tasted good.
Kids.