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In The RP2A Over The Sea - someone else who thinks they can improve upon NMH.


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To the OP - I definitely don't consider it an 'improvement' on the original album, nor is it (or any cover for that matter) supposed to be. Some cover albums/songs are better than the original (pretty much every other version of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah", especially Jeff Buckley's, imo) but most aren't. A cover isn't supposed to transcend the original but pay tribute. Maybe try listening to more than 3 seconds of the album before deciding it's an atrocity to the world? Hell, I put the whole damn thing up on YT so people could hear it before making a decision. It may not be your cup of tea, that's totally fine, but a lot of people are digging it and the campaign is 50% funded after 5 days, not to mention it was the feature project on the music homepage for a few days so if nothing else, the Director of Music at Kickstarter loved it.

 

But I'm not here to defend it or anything. It's all subjective so you can think and say whatever you want. I just wanted to throw in my bit for the peanut gallery!

 

On 3/3/2019 at 2:13 PM, itsgoodtobefree said:

Yeah $45 is a little much for an 8bit cover album. 

I get that. I had another guy mention this in a Reddit post and I responded to illustrate the costs that go into short run vinyl. I went into more detail in that post but the tl;dr is that the $45 level includes a digital download of the album, two previously released digital albums, extras that many standard vinyl don't include like poly bags and inserts - and shipping costs are included (I hate when KS campaigns add shipping after pledging so I didn't want to do that).

 

What it breaks down to, cost-wise, is $15-$20 for the vinyl itself, all other things considered, so I don't think that's unfair!

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1 hour ago, Doctor Octoroc said:

 

 

I get that. I had another guy mention this in a Reddit post and I responded to illustrate the costs that go into short run vinyl. I went into more detail in that post but the tl;dr is that the $45 level includes a digital download of the album, two previously released digital albums, extras that many standard vinyl don't include like poly bags and inserts - and shipping costs are included (I hate when KS campaigns add shipping after pledging so I didn't want to do that).

 

What it breaks down to, cost-wise, is $15-$20 for the vinyl itself, all other things considered, so I don't think that's unfair!

 

Polysleeves, inserts, and shipping dont add up to $25-30 extra. 

 

 

Just my .02

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I like it. It's well done and the creator probably had a lot of fun making it. Does it need to exist?  You could ask yourself the same thing about so much other complete garbage that gets pressed and posted about on VC. That $100 Garth Brooks set that everyone was nutting themselves over on here recently springs to mind. $45 is a bit steep, though. 

 

 

Edited by NorthwayNative
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7 minutes ago, NorthwayNative said:

I like it. It's well done and the creator probably had a lot of fun making it. Does it need to exist?  You could ask yourself the same thing about so much other complete garbage that gets pressed and posted about on VC. That $100 Garth Brooks set that everyone was nutting themselves over on here recently springs to mind. $45 is a bit steep, though. 

 

 

So... THREE box sets for $100. That's 5-7 records per set. So let's toss in the boxes. The individual numbering. 

 

So let's do the math, 15-21 records for $100 shipped... still wonder why people were all nuts over it? 

 

 

So get your 24 upvote ass outta here. 

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1 minute ago, Satan said:

So... THREE box sets for $100. That's 5-7 records per set. So let's toss in the boxes. The individual numbering. 

 

So let's do the math, 15-21 records for $100 shipped... still wonder why people were all nuts over it? 

 

 

So get your 24 upvote ass outta here. 

I don't care if it's 100 records for $100 it still has Garth Brooks' shitty music on them. 

 

How about you get your elitist vinyl message board dwelling ass out of here?

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Haha. Y’all are funny. This is a niche, non-essential thing. Price it for the people who are into it and according to what you need to earn back to be to be worth your while.

Beyond increasing your profit, a higher price point also weeds out a lot of headaches as a creator/producer/maker as it cuts down on people who are only interested because of the price. Those are the people who will take up residence in your inbox and count the pennies lost from their corner ding or get upset by the spec they didn’t read in your description because all they saw was the price. Having less customers total but more interested customers quality wise, especially if your goal isn’t to mass produce and make real money, can be preferable. If you’re married, your spouse will also thank you for not losing money and not wasting time by keeping your fun side projects as fun side projects.

All that said, this is VC so technically I’m the jerk trying to stop nature from rightfully happening. Sorry, buds. I couldn’t help myself! :) 

Edited by swb
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5 minutes ago, NorthwayNative said:

I don't care if it's 100 records for $100 it still has Garth Brooks' shitty music on them. 

 

How about you get your elitist vinyl message board dwelling ass out of here?

Well. Seems like you're one of THOSE people. Have fun here. You'll be welcomed with open arms. 

 

Kids these days. 

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9 minutes ago, NorthwayNative said:

I don't care if it's 100 records for $100 it still has Garth Brooks' shitty music on them. 

 

How about you get your elitist vinyl message board dwelling ass out of here?

One last thing. You do realize the amount of punks and hardcore metalheads were in that thread, and also start threads about country music here. 

 

Its called diversity.  So just go ahead and jam that thumb further up your ass. 

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14 minutes ago, Satan said:

Well. Seems like you're one of THOSE people. Have fun here. You'll be welcomed with open arms. 

 

Kids these days. 

I've been on here since 2015, sorry I haven't met your post count gatekeeping standards. I called you a douche but I edited it out so now I called you a douche but not really. Take care and "get gaped". 

Edited by NorthwayNative
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3 hours ago, Satan said:

 

Polysleeves, inserts, and shipping dont add up to $25-30 extra. 

 

 

Just my .02

Well, that $45 backer level also includes a download of the album plus digital downloads of two of my previous albums so it's not just the costs of a singular physical vinyl album's components plus shipping at play here. You may not care for the extra album downloads, which is fine, but for a lot of people who dig chiptunes, it's a great bundle. And honestly, this forum thread is the first time I've encountered anyone who's been so negative about the project - and that's totally fine. I don't expect everyone to like it but at least offer some constructive criticism to help me improve as an artist if you've been bothered to offer up any comment to begin with.

To break it down in more detail: shipping is around $10 on average (shipping supplies - vinyl mailer, stiffeners, label, label sleeve - plus shipping costs themselves, per album - averaged for anywhere in the USA since I'm covering a pretty wide range) plus the going (quite reasonable) rate for two digital albums (46 tracks total) for a combined $21 - which takes $31 from the $45 pledge total and leaves $14 for the vinyl album (including download of the album) which, at a small 200 units run, works out to about $9 each to produce per album. A $5 markup is well below retail standard (stores tend to mark up products to 200% of what they pay for them so if they pay $10 for an album, they'll sell it for $20). So even if you calculate things in the opposite direction and say that a vinyl that includes a digital download shouldn't cost more than $20 and then take the $10 shipping costs from that, the digital downloads work out to $15 which is less than what they cost on their own and more than acceptable for two full album downloads with 46 tracks between them.

Considering all of that I really don't think $45 is a lot to ask for a pledge for a vinyl album that includes the shipping and other extras on a Kickstarter project - the whole point of which is to fund an independent artist for a release on vinyl.

But look, if you don't dig chiptunes as a genre, I understand not being interested in the project. No hard feelings!

 

2 hours ago, NorthwayNative said:

I like it. It's well done and the creator probably had a lot of fun making it. Does it need to exist?  You could ask yourself the same thing about so much other complete garbage that gets pressed and posted about on VC. That $100 Garth Brooks set that everyone was nutting themselves over on here recently springs to mind. $45 is a bit steep, though. 

 

 

Thank you! I did have a lot of fun and I've been working on it since last summer.  And you bring up an interesting point in mentioning the Garth Brooks vinyl. I personally don't like him or the genre so I wouldn't pay even $10 for that box set, let alone $100. Point is,  it will always come down to personal subjective taste vs value. Clearly, many people think that I'm offering a great product at a good value while others (present company included) don't. And that's totally fine.

Fact is, anyone who loves chiptunes and Neutral Milk Hotel will likely be into it - aside from the OP, of course. But even they didn't bother to give it a chance before passing judgement. 3 seconds of any album is not enough to go on so how they perceived that to be a sufficient sample to judge the entire content before doing so is beyond me. Having said that, they're welcome to dislike it and offer constructive criticism. I'll never raise and issue with someone who's willing to take the time to tell me why they don't like what I've done.

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2 hours ago, swb said:

Haha. Y’all are funny. This is a niche, non-essential thing. Price it for the people who are into it and according to what you need to earn back to be to be worth your while.

Beyond increasing your profit, a higher price point also weeds out a lot of headaches as a creator/producer/maker as it cuts down on people who are only interested because of the price. Those are the people who will take up residence in your inbox and count the pennies lost from their corner ding or get upset by the spec they didn’t read in your description because all they saw was the price. Having less customers total but more interested customers quality wise, especially if your goal isn’t to mass produce and make real money, can be preferable. If you’re married, your spouse will also thank you for not losing money and not wasting time by keeping your fun side projects as fun side projects.

All that said, this is VC so technically I’m the jerk trying to stop nature from rightfully happening. Sorry, buds. I couldn’t help myself! :) 

^Someone who gets it! I'm not married but my girlfriend would certainly have some pointed questions for me if I lost a bunch of money to release an album on vinyl haha. As it stands, I break about even if I just hit the campaign goal, considering I'm throwing well over a grand at Merge Records just for the royalties on this thing. A lot of people don't think about that factor when it comes to cover albums done properly (legally).

I agree, I'd rather release a quality album for those who can truly appreciate it and gain little, monetarily, then make big bank catering to the masses. This is a passion project and I've put a lot of time and effort into it. Anyone is welcome to dislike it but this mentality of trying to present demonstrable proof of the failure of a subjective work to live up to its arbitrary purpose is futile and I can only chuckle at some of the responses here.

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Whoooo cares, dude? Do what you want, some people will like it, some won't. I don't, others do. You don't have to keep defending it (especially since you said you weren't here to do that).

 

You do you. It's not going to be everyone's cup of tea. I personally think chiptunes are fucking stupid, and I'm not into cover albums, but some people like both. I think a lot of people are just over other folks covering NMH too. Like...we get it, the album "changed your life" or whatever. Go out and make some new music about it.

Edited by MachoHommeRandallSauvage
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7 minutes ago, MachoHommeRandallSauvage said:

Whoooo cares, dude? Do what you want, some people will like it, some won't. I don't, others do. You don't have to keep defending it (especially since you said you weren't here to do that).

 

You do you. It's not going to be everyone's cup of tea. I personally think chiptunes are fucking stupid, and I'm not into cover albums, but some people like both. I think a lot of people are just over other folks covering NMH too. Like...we get it, the album "changed your life" or whatever. Go out and make some new music about it.

Haha, fair enough. Of course anything I say can be said to be a defense of the album, whether or not it is. Defending the album itself and defending my choice of pledge amounts for the campaign are two different things, in my mind. Not here to do the former but the latter is a matter of principle. When someone misrepresents me and/or my intentions (artistic integrity aside), I'll gladly engage them to learn more and either set the record (no pun intended) straight or hear them out and see where they're coming from.

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