Oblivions

Bought the “In the Weeds” variant. Sucker for the sharp contrast between that deep green/teal and the grey cover.

I’ve been doing flat rate shipping & free shipping over X amount since I started selling on Discogs and I print labels straight from PayPal after weighing them myself, so this doesn’t seem to affect me much.

Just now, MyEnemy said:

I definitely do feel you on that. I, personally, know what it’s like to run a record label and have to bump your prices, for LPs, from $14 to $18-$20.
 

But yeah, I don’t wanna really get into it either. I don’t, necessarily, care about paying what I do for records. Even if it’s a $20 four song EP. If it’s something I want, I shell out. Nothings going to change the fact that prices have and will go up. If you don’t want to pay that much, don’t. If you miss out, you miss out. Simple as...

I may be more curious than frustrated. I’d love it if there was an article or blog that broke down the economics of vinyl, production costs & retail prices, over the last few months.
Anecdotally, it feels like there has been a significant bump in prices, larger than I can remember over the last 6-7 years. I’ve seen more pre-orders go for $30+ and also more pre-orders that stagger prices to match the exclusivity of the variant. It feels like a combination of production costs going up and artists/labels being more savvy about acknowledging and combating the secondary market. But I obviously don’t know and there may not be an actual trend.

I’m also curious what happens if the USPS shuts down or gets privatized. I had a label owner tell me that if the USPS gets privatized and media mail goes away, indie labels are done. I don’t know if most musicians and label owners are prescient enough to bump their prices in anticipation of a huge roadblock like that happening. But these are the thoughts that swirl in my head when I see a $40 Juliana Theory and post a dumb comment about the price.

28 minutes ago, MyEnemy said:

Put it into 2020 record buying/reselling context: if you know it’ll be gone by tomorrow, or Friday(I’m guessing it will). By next week it’ll be going for $80+ and it probably won’t drop in price, unless you score one from someone pricing to sell(which could take months or years). If you want it and don’t want to “regret” not owning the record, or pay even more, there’s some sound logic to pull the trigger on almost any record. Or don’t and just bitch about a $40 2xLP of a 20 year old record that’s only been pressed once 🤷

I don’t have the energy or motivation to go full VC bro, so, sadly, the best I can do is make 1-2 posts in a row noting the significant bump in prices lately.

15 minutes ago, Alan P said:

Ha, yeah. All those prices are crazy, but have I wanted 'Emotion is Dead' on vinyl forever, so I went with the $40 version. I have always wanted the OG, but was never willing to pay the $80+ resale price on Discogs.

It makes sense, especially if factories are charging higher due to COVID-19. It’s just a bummer when it’s a release that you’d buy in a heartbeat for $20.

Why are they charging only $40? Why stop there?

A good detective knows where the delivery trucks park and what angles are absent from the security camera’s view.

Found a sealed copy of Idler Wheel sitting in a boutique audio equipment shop for $18 about 5 years ago, when it had been out of print for years and selling for $100+ on Discogs/eBay.

For what it’s worth, I saw the $5 shipping when I viewed this yesterday. Might be a random glitch?

Not indulging in $30 pre-orders anymore but BK is great and his backstory behind his long hiatus is sad/wild/interesting and worth googling.

75% of new/sealed records I buy have some kind of warp, often medium or above. It’s been that way for about the last 2 years. I live in Southern California so I imagine it’s a combination of maybe less quality control standards at plants, as the vinyl resurgence rages on, and the temperatures of mail rooms and vans here. A few years ago, I’d check with labels/shops on large warps but now I don’t bother unless there is an actual skip or the warp is a gnarly edge warp. Large bowled warps can still play through fine and I have a $100 stylus on a $300 player so I don’t have the qualms that some have with warps putting an extra burden on their setup. In the end though, the increase in warps is one of a handful of reasons why I’ve stopped buying as many records. It is what it is and I should be slowing down my purchases anyway so I haven’t done much Flat Records or Bust advocacy at all.

I like my slow Sufjan to be over sparse or lush acoustic guitars. I am tentatively waiting for more samples from this album before I let myself get excited.

The mark of a good pop-punk/nostalgia reissue label or shop is having the serenity to accept your terrible and annoying customers, the courage to help your good customers who have reasonable complaints and support needs, and the wisdom to know the difference. 

If every new indie shop/site undercuts the previous one by 97 cents, eventually we’ll be able to buy this baby for free.

I will listen to the record and pick up a no frills mass produced copy.
 

Semi-related, I feel like there’s been a quiet bump in prices recently, at a larger rate than the usual inflation. I don’t mind it if that’s what artists want to charge but it’s made me more selective about which albums/artists/labels I want to support with a $40 purchase.

I thought Slice died like 4 years ago when Amazon rewrote their refund policy!

I’ve been pumping the breaks on vinyl purchases so “it’s one long song” and no preview is exactly what I need to curb my inner desire to drop $35 blind on this.

Does the spindle in the center of the platter stay static while the platter spins? And the record center hole is “tight” and “clinging” on the spindle, making it “stuck” while the platter spins below it?
 

If so, the center hole might be cut too tight...and, with some discretion, you can fix that with an xacto blade by carefully and evenly shaving a very small amount of the vinyl from the center hole perimeter. 
 

If the spindle spins with the platter and the record is stuck some other way, I’d be curious how that works. Does the needle provide enough pressure/resistance to stop the record from spinning?

Is this yet to be fully confirmed for retail posting and a few shops are just breaking the line and getting their order page out first?

I had the Enjoy the Ride pressing but I ended up selling it. WDTRSH is the one I’ll always keep a vinyl copy of. Hit me perfect in 8th grade.

All the pros of selling limited vinyl (increased demand, higher price, greater urgency) without any of the cons (the quantity is limited). ☺️ 

1 hour ago, mmhmm said:

I see the sarcasm here but I've read this like three times and I'm still confused what you're trying to say by it lol.

Lol. Mostly that I’m thankful that, for the most part and through sheer luck, I don’t collect records from bands that have a rabid collector fan base, so I don’t get ensnared in situations similar to this (fighting for digital place in line for pre-orders, labels improvising their sale strategy on the fly in clumsy ways, high Discogs prices if you miss the pre-order, unprepared labels doing other silly stuff after they’ve got everyone’s money, etc etc) outside of the occasional dumb National/ R.E.M. RSD release. The latter half of my post was self-deprecation, since I do mostly buy boring music and I pay $24 for new records that sell for $9 on Discogs a week later. 🙂

All that said, I am a LTJ fan and I have bought a few of their vinyl releases but I def tip my cap to people who collect their stuff on vinyl! It’s not easy/cheap!

This is why I stream collectible 90s/2000s ska punk records and purchase boring unpopular sad indie rock records that depreciate in value by 70% as soon as you click “Buy”. 

I replied to my order confirmation email which sent me to [email protected].

2 hours ago, euphoria said:

Did anybody tried to cancel their order on the official store? I saw some comments about no cancellations allowed, but I haven't see that comment of their website

They replied to my first message about 2 weeks later and canceled my order. It seems they’ve selectively been telling people “no” but it’s not very hard to push back on that or file a PayPal claim to get your money back.