PO Now - Paramore Reissues (RIOT, All We Know Is Falling, Brand New Eyes)

[Bronchitis]

Just now, Derek™ said:

I don’t know if it’s just “the hobby” tapering out, or if other platforms like Chorus.fm and VMP have established some safe havens for similar discussions.  I know VC is probably the least newcomer-friendly of the bunch, but I’ve at least tried to tone it down on the new hazing over the years.  As cliché as it sounds - and without trying to sound like a VC veteran - I really do miss some of those older days.

 

I think there were a handful of us who harped on him pretty hard, haha.  It was a good read.

 

I miss those days a lot. I had a lot of problems in my personal life around then and it was always nice being able to escape to here to discover new music or discuss my passions with like-minded people. I’m getting all sappy (in a Paramore thread...), but it makes me really happy to see some familiar people still around after my hiatus. Long live the hobby. 

[DecayToDeath]

10 minutes ago, Derek™ said:

I don’t know if it’s just “the hobby” tapering out, or if other platforms like Chorus.fm and VMP have established some safe havens for similar discussions.  I know VC is probably the least newcomer-friendly of the bunch, but I’ve at least tried to tone it down on the new hazing over the years.  As cliché as it sounds - and without trying to sound like a VC veteran - I really do miss some of those older days.

It upsets me how much more active VMP is compared to VC nowadays. I've tried to get active in their community a few times but never found myself hanging around.

[Bronchitis]

Ewww, wait -  Vinyl Me Please have a forum too? 

[DecayToDeath]

18 minutes ago, Bronchitis said:

Ewww, wait -  Vinyl Me Please have a forum too? 

If you ever get really bored and wanna read up on some stuff you missed, Gatefoldgate was funny (from the VMP thread)

[Bronchitis]

3 minutes ago, DecayToDeath said:

If you ever get really bored and wanna read up on some stuff you missed, Gatefoldgate was funny (from the VMP thread)

You are speaking my language. I’m always bored and VC conflict is the best. Sorry for hijacking your thread, Paramore people. This stuff is important though. 

[Derek™]

37 minutes ago, DecayToDeath said:

It upsets me how much more active VMP is compared to VC nowadays. I've tried to get active in their community a few times but never found myself hanging around.

 

29 minutes ago, Bronchitis said:

Ewww, wait -  Vinyl Me Please have a forum too? 

Someone with more insight and exposure to the VMP community can correct me if I’m wrong, but VMP’s forums feel like bizarro world to me.  The little lurking I’ve done - on several occasions - suggested that there is a disgusting amount of bandwagon that occurs over there.  I’ve seen several posts in various threads where someone is either saying “damn that variant is SICK and I absolutely need it because of how limited it is and how cool it’ll look on my shelf.  Someone link me to these guys’ top 3 songs”.  Or even “ahh fuck it, you guys are hyped for this thing and I love the album art so I ordered.  Guess I gotta’ check it out on Spotify now.”  I don’t know, it’s just really abstract to me.  Lots of high-fiving and people who’ve never heard of X artist who is featured as ROTM, but are now instantly dropping $120 on their discography that VMP has restocked.  Anyone else feel like it’s just a nesting ground for bearded dudes in their 30s to talk about alcohol and provide one another with musical outlets to burn surplus income?  Because that’s the vibe I get and it’s just not for me.  Any sort of negative opinion seems to be met with little or no tolerance, too, which is pretty lame.  It all comes off as feeling way too hivemind-y from the bit of lurking I’ve done, personally.  I’d rather stay on the slower, barbaric board if it means avoiding that.  There is some established mob mentality here, and a bit of VC-core, but it beats trying to fit in by larping as one uniform middle aged hipster.

[DecayToDeath]

5 hours ago, Derek™ said:

 

Someone with more insight and exposure to the VMP community can correct me if I’m wrong, but VMP’s forums feel like bizarro world to me.  The little lurking I’ve done - on several occasions - suggested that there is a disgusting amount of bandwagon that occurs over there.  I’ve seen several posts in various threads where someone is either saying “damn that variant is SICK and I absolutely need it because of how limited it is and how cool it’ll look on my shelf.  Someone link me to these guys’ top 3 songs”.  Or even “ahh fuck it, you guys are hyped for this thing and I love the album art so I ordered.  Guess I gotta’ check it out on Spotify now.”  I don’t know, it’s just really abstract to me.  Lots of high-fiving and people who’ve never heard of X artist who is featured as ROTM, but are now instantly dropping $120 on their discography that VMP has restocked.  Anyone else feel like it’s just a nesting ground for bearded dudes in their 30s to talk about alcohol and provide one another with musical outlets to burn surplus income?  Because that’s the vibe I get and it’s just not for me.  Any sort of negative opinion seems to be met with little or no tolerance, too, which is pretty lame.  It all comes off as feeling way too hivemind-y from the bit of lurking I’ve done, personally.  I’d rather stay on the slower, barbaric board if it means avoiding that.  There is some established mob mentality here, and a bit of VC-core, but it beats trying to fit in by larping as one uniform middle aged hipster.

This is exactly why I could never hang around too long on VMP. The general attitude is really weird to me. People who seemingly had limitless disposable income would blind buy several records a day just because the variant was cool, and half of those people wouldn't even listen to the albums. During the whole Gatefoldgate thing I remember telling someone something to the effect of "the point of vinyl isn't the A E S T H E T I C" and people started getting on my case about it cuz they liked to frame their vynilses.

[Oblivions]

N/M

Edited May 20, 2019 by Oblivions

[Derek™]

7 minutes ago, swb said:

VMP is priced pretty high and marketed toward a certain class/income demographic that can afford to burn a pretty penny in the name of diving into something new and exciting.

 

I know I went through a phase where I was spending way too much money on way too many records and I’m sure we’ve all went nuts to some degree before we realized we don’t need to buy entire discographies just to say we own entire discographies or buy jazz and ‘important’ records that we aspire to one day like. The difference is we probably did that on our own and researched different labels and hunted down deals, etc, and some other people just log on to the VMP forums and buy whatever is linked or talked about there in one convenient location. I can’t knock them for being new or excited about stuff and being privileged enough to afford to spend hundreds of dollars on impulse buys.

Yeah, I'm not ragging on them because the general demographic seems to have more disposable income for off-the-cuff purchases.  Taking gambles like that can be fun – I've done it with great results, usually being nudged to hop on a limited pre-order with friends who know my tastes and know that I'd kick myself for skipping on a limited repress, etc.  But it's just taken to such an extreme over there that it feels like everyone just wants to be spoon-fed music and "relevant tastes".  And that's garbage.  It ends up boiling down to exactly what you just said; people who want to flex by way of their record shelves.  I've gone head over heels for artists that are new to my ears, so I get the desire to backtrack and explore their catalog.  I'm not knocking on that at all.  But to just throw down the cash because your forum bros are pledging to a full discography, and you don't want to be left out?  Whatever.  At least be less transparent about it.

 

7 minutes ago, swb said:

A small glitch or error would be spun into a catastrophic event that made them question everything they ever believed about the company. There were a handful of posters who were downright rude to employees and moderators and, because they had built an online friendship with other frequent posters, were never really called out or confronted about their outbursts. Many times their expectations of how fast their orders should arrive, what order they should arrive, how fast customer support should respond, how perfect a record sleeve should be, how much transparency there should be with the company’s finances and business decisions, and similar subjects was so high and unprecedented. I’ve never seen a company the size of VMP answer their customers questions on the forums 24/7, outside of business hours, and be so patient and as transparent as they can be and, somehow, every few days or weeks, there’d be a blow up where VMP was framed as being a soulless, lying company that didn’t care about their customers at all. And if anyone was like “Hey, let’s relax. This is a vinyl club that is already providing insane customer support and endless replacements”, that person would be accused of gaslighting and censoring and emotionally harming the people who were calling for VMP’s head. After a few years of being a forum poster, it started to give me some anxiety and trigger me a little bit (lol) because it seemed a lot like groupmind borderline personality disorder (“I LOVE YOU! I HATE YOU! I’M LEAVING! DON’T LEAVE ME!”) and I’ve dealt with that in my personal life and didn’t need to be reading that cycle every week.

This sounds fairly fucked.

[FlippingOut]

7 hours ago, Derek™ said:

 

Someone with more insight and exposure to the VMP community can correct me if I’m wrong, but VMP’s forums feel like bizarro world to me.  The little lurking I’ve done - on several occasions - suggested that there is a disgusting amount of bandwagon that occurs over there.  I’ve seen several posts in various threads where someone is either saying “damn that variant is SICK and I absolutely need it because of how limited it is and how cool it’ll look on my shelf.  Someone link me to these guys’ top 3 songs”.  Or even “ahh fuck it, you guys are hyped for this thing and I love the album art so I ordered.  Guess I gotta’ check it out on Spotify now.”  I don’t know, it’s just really abstract to me.  Lots of high-fiving and people who’ve never heard of X artist who is featured as ROTM, but are now instantly dropping $120 on their discography that VMP has restocked.  Anyone else feel like it’s just a nesting ground for bearded dudes in their 30s to talk about alcohol and provide one another with musical outlets to burn surplus income?  Because that’s the vibe I get and it’s just not for me.  Any sort of negative opinion seems to be met with little or no tolerance, too, which is pretty lame.  It all comes off as feeling way too hivemind-y from the bit of lurking I’ve done, personally.  I’d rather stay on the slower, barbaric board if it means avoiding that.  There is some established mob mentality here, and a bit of VC-core, but it beats trying to fit in by larping as one uniform middle aged hipster.

So you mean to tell me Vinyl Me Please is just a pool of hipsters? Color me surprised (not really)

[Derek™]

2 minutes ago, FlippingOut said:

So you mean to tell me Vinyl Me Please is just a pool of hipsters? Color me surprised (not really)

And I'm sure the argument could be made that VC's population is composed of a bunch of hipsters, too – sort of synonymous with the medium we're all here for, right?  It just feels so goddamn prevalent and even embraced on their side of the lawn, and it throws me for a loop.

[Shelby]

At least our forum owners actually do suck so we expect less than nothing from them with no reason to get mad.  That Snoop Dogg thread was a fucking disgustingly vile display of humanity.

[drewberinger]

14 hours ago, Derek™ said:

And I'm sure the argument could be made that VC's population is composed of a bunch of hipsters, too – sort of synonymous with the medium we're all here for, right?  It just feels so goddamn prevalent and even embraced on their side of the lawn, and it throws me for a loop.

makes me think of this comic every time