June 9 : Sonic Youth’s ‘The Eternal’ with BEGN option

anybody who pre-ordered get to access the stream yet?

I pre-ordered thru insound.com, so far no code to access the stream of the album :-(

 

I'm still waiting on my code from www.insound.com too. I've found them to be very helpful so I'm not worried that they'll drop the ball. . . . I seem to remember when I pre-ordered Pavement BEGN from them, it took several days for them to get the access code to me. I'm guessing by the end of this week they should have a code to me. That's quickly enough for me.

Craig(VC).

 

just got this e-mail from insound, as a reply to my inquiry

Hey there Steve,

You will get a download link. At the end of every day before the release of 'The Eternal' I send everyone's email address who ordered that day to Matador so your MP3 can be distributed. You will receive your download soon!

If you need anything else let me know!

 

Listened to the BEGN stream this morning. Based on one listen this is a solid SY album. Can't wait to get my hands on the vinyl in June.

 

I was quite keen on Nurse, but agree on RR, which started strong but overall was too derivitave of previous work to really stand out. "Rats", for ex, was essentially a rewrite of "Disappearer".

Anyway, haven't heard any of the mp3's for the new LP yet, but have got my BEGN order in and hope to soon!

 

I just pre-ordered the vinyl edition from the Matador.com website. I go to the Buy Early, Get Now website like the e-mail tells me to and I can't get in with the information they gave me. I guess it must take some time for the site to "update"?

Update.... I told the site that I "forgot" my password that they originally sent me.. and then I get a different password that let me in to the site. Weird.

 

Cool. I just received my information to access the BEGN site, 2.5 days sooner than I'd expected it to take.

Craig(VC).

 

sound clips at amazon

http://www.amazon.com/Eternal-Sonic-Youth/dp/B0026BD2II/ref=pd_bxgy_m_img_b

 

awesome!! can't wait for this album. I think they're 00's stuff is equal the their 80's output (and certainly buries the 90's stuff). bring it on!

 

Hmmm...will have to wait and hear the whole thing before judging, but the immediate impression is that it sounds more like Dirty than anything in recent memory. Plus, a few of the songs immediately reminded me of certain other SY songs, which I didn't particularly like.

FTR, I love Murray Street and Sonic Nurse, but thought Rather Ripped was a slight disappointment. Outside that my fave SY records are EVOL, Sister, Daydream Nation and Washing Machine.

This is an obvious purchase at any rate. June is shaping up to be a pretty spectacular month; Neil Young Archives, 13th Floor Elevators box, new albums by Sonic Youth, Wilco and Motorpsycho...bring it on!

 

so far this BEGN doesn't compare to the Pavement deal, for Brighten the Corners you got a bonus live LP and 2 unique mp3's for a few bucks more than the cd itself would be in a store. The Eternal BEGN is double the price of what the cd alone will cost so you're really paying $12 for that bonus live lp, and so far the 1 download is a song that will be on the live lp anyway. A lot more hype than value so far.

I realize Pavement was a re-issue and that has to be marketed a little differently than new material, still I wish SY would throw me something for my $25

 

Well, I imagine Matador may have fronted SY quite a bit of money to sign them, compared to what they may have paid to keep Pavement, so no surprise.

But what's to complain about--a live LP for $12? Plus a free stream of the album? And some kind of poster? That's decent value, isn't it?

 

This is a very good album. Especially in FLAC

 

FYI the vinyl on this is $38 list.

Way to bend over those analog fans.

 

4 times 3 songs sounds ncie as a double lp!

 

http://www.matadorrecords.com/store/index.php?catalog_id=365

Double lp plus bonus $35. CD plus bonus $24.

Funny, I think I paid Insound $41 for BEGN, which was $45 less 10%. Did they drop the prices?

 

Not sure on the overall structure, but the MSRP on the vinyl version is $38...and that is the only LP version available.

Murray Street and Rather Ripped (both major label releases) were $12.98 list, while Sonic Nurse was $14.98. Even the four LP box sets of Daydream, Goo and Dirty are $36 with super packaging.

I'm not sure the "bonus" LP is worth an extra $20, but more so it bothers me that now shipping the whole thing to Europe is going to net out over $60...

 

I bought it over a week ago in my local store in Glasgow and got a download code until it arrives in June. it was £27 for the vinyl edition. The code wont work on the website at all. Grrrrr. Its only a stream anyway and i can't be bothered hooking my Mac up to my hi-fi so i will just wait. its only a week or so now.

 

What's the Euro label? Matador Europe or something else? Did you write to the site admin about the download?

 

free stream is worthless, I found a .rar file of the album on the web before the stream was available.

Pavement also included a stream and a poster.

It's not a terrible deal, but I felt I needed to point out that unlike The Pavement BEGN (where by paying early, you got much more than the same money would get you on release day), with this one you do get more but you pay more, and the 'exclusive' download being a song that will be on the live album instead of something truly exclusive, is lame. I paid April 28, it's now may 27, the album drops in what 11 days, I'm still waiting for the "bonus exclusive MP3 outtakes and live tracks"

BEGN started out by making you feel really appreciated as a customer who was willing to put up the $$ early, I don't feel that way yet with The Eternal


update, OK my bad on the exclusive download, I checked the site again and it now states

This track is a b-side (non-LP) track from the River To River Festival at Battery Park show that is the same concert we've culled for the bonus live LP that comes with Buy Early Get Now

I feel a little better

 

I agree; I'm underwhelmed (but not quite disappointed yet) by this BEGN, especially compared to how wonderful the Pavement Brighten The Corners BEGN was.

This one should have been around a $17.99 price point. I feel like I overpaid at $28.98 ($24.99 plus Insound's shipping charge of $3.99), considering what I'm getting.

Last October I paid Insound $20.99 ($17.99 + shipping) for Pavement's Brighten the Corners - Nicene Creedence Edition (Deluxe Edition) 2xCD+LP. That felt like genuine value, considering the relatively lavish packaging of the 2CD set alone. Though, if I remember correctly, I think that $17.99 price was an error, that's what I paid.

I'm going to be much more careful with deciding whether to participate in future BEGN offerings. In the era where free, legal downloads of live recordings are a dime a dozen at sites such as http://www.archive.org/ , the value of a bonus live LP (which isn't likely to offer much of a sonic upgrade beyond downloadable FLAC files) is not very high for me.

As seg763 suggested, a handful of downloadable outtakes or other exclusive tracks (in FLAC format) would help reduce the sting of this BEGN purchase. At this point, though, unless the live LP is one of the most jaw-dropping live performances I've ever heard, I'm thinking that I'd still be disappointed with anything less than about a full bonus CD worth of downloadable FLAC files of outtakes and other bonus tracks. I don't think that's gonna happen at this point.

Craig.

 

You guys should go over to the Matador board to lodge your complaints. Seriously. If no one says anything to them, they won't do anything about it. This SY BEGN has been a ripoff.

 

Look, if the complaint is about the retail price of the double vinyl, that's one thing. If it's about the extra $12-$15 for BEGN, I don't get it. For me I just got it because I'm an SY collector, and the only question for me is whether to get two. But if a limited live LP dropped for $15, would you complain? How about if it included a poster and some extras? What if you got first shot at tickets for their tour (you want a complaint, how about the $15 of service charges per ticket).

So, like, what's the problem here? If the live LP wasn't worth it for you, why did you buy? Or, is it the problem that Insound didn't misprice the BEGN offer this time?

And though I'm not morally opposed to downloading free, to say the stream is "worthless" because you can steal it, well, that's pretty weak from where I stand. If all you want is best value, why purchase anything at all? If you have a collector fetish, then this BEGN feeds that, at a price. Pick your poison.

 

I guess I expected some more buzz and surprises along the way. With Pavement, I got over 2 hours of (great) music, a fantastic booklet in a package with a slipcover, an early stream (which I listened to several times in advance of the ship date), at least one (or was it two?) exclusive song to download in advance, a live LP of a really good performance, along with several enthusiastic emails from Matador along the way, revealing more goodies each time.

Just seemed like they carried me along the BEGN process much more than they're doing this time with the Sonic Youth album (the live song download, which will also appear on the live LP, seemed more like an insult and less like a treat), the new CD will be a single disc (not unusual for a new studio album, but it is a difference nontheless), etc.

I did get interested in the pre-sale ticket deal at first, until I saw the prices (yeah, the service charges were insane, too). I decided it wasn't worth the price so I skipped it. (Instead I put my concert-going funds toward seeing Mike Watt at half the price.) So that perk was of no value to me, personally.

Yeah, I'm comparing the real price of the SY BEGN with a mispriced Pavement BEGN. But even comparing $24.99 to $24.99, the Pavement BEGN was a much better value. At $17.99 + shipping, it was a great bargain for me. Even if I'd paid $24.99 + shipping, I would not have complained about the Pavement BEGN (for all the reasons I listed above), because it would have been reasonably priced. With the SY BEGN, I feel like I'm getting less, but being charged the same. Just feels like the Matador folks might be slacking off on this BEGN program to see how little they can offer and still get people to buy into it.

I'm not swearing off the BEGN program. There's still a lot of great stuff on the Matador label that they could put out in a really compelling BEGN package. It's just that I'm going to be more selective next time. Allowing that the live LP might be super-awesome, I think I would've been just as happy saving $18 and just ordering the SY Eternal CD from DeepDiscount.com for $12.47, shipped.

Eh, maybe I can sell the SY live LP for $18 + shipping and recoup my losses. Doubt it, though.

Craig.

 

Ah, that's good to know. That's a bit better, I agree.