Music is My Radar

I’ve written before about my appreciation of the music writers over at the Onion A.V. Club.  Unlike much of what comes out of Pitchfork, the A.V. Club people actually seem to enjoy music and writing about it, and have a sense of humor to boot.  So it was with great pleasure that I read this article.

I’ll just add a few comments about some of the artists in the list.

1. Saying that U2 comes off as pretentious and self-aggrandizing is like saying that the Lucky Charms leprechaun comes off as a bad Irish stereotype.  It’s the currency of much of their discography.  I still enjoy U2 every now and then, particularly when they adopt some degree of irony, although I’ve often felt that their irony was too self-aware, like “Look at us, we’re being soooooo ironic!”  Yep.  You sure are.
2. If I had to answer as many stupid interview questions as did Bob Dylan in the 1960s, I’d turn into a press-hating misanthropist too.
3. Lars Ulrich is a bitch.  Anyone who can complain about his fans snagging a few of his band’s songs gratis while turning into an art collector deserves to be in a band with James Hetfield.  And be short.  Which he is.
4. Paul McCartney?  A control freak?  GET OUT.
5. I’ll be offended about Justice’s anthropological excursions into American culture when Americans stop being such fucktards.
6. Jefferson Airplane begat Jefferson Starship begat Starship, which shat this onto the airwaves.  Need I say more?
7. Radiohead is apparently suffering from the same affliction as did Bob Dylan in the 60s.  Blameless.
8. Is anyone really shocked that the heavy metal stars of the 1980s are dicks?  Doesn’t pretty much every song in the genre scream I am an asshole?!  I haven’t seen the documentary in question, but Paul Stanley acting like a ‘tard is not a news flash.

After watching Cee-Lo Green perform on Saturday Night Live the weekend before last, my wife and I were excited to buy his new CD, The Lady Killer.  (OOH!  Even the name is exciting!!  I wonder what ladies he’s going to kill, and in what ways!!) So I trotted over to my local record store to purchase a copy, and here is what I found.

FIVE VERSIONS OF THE SAME CD, EACH WITH TRACKS THAT DON’T APPEAR ON ANY OTHER VERSION.

Seriously Cee-Lo?  Five versions?  OK fine … three of the five are simply the U.S. version of the CD with bonus tracks. But to get all the songs recorded for the album, I have to buy the original CD, plus the full version from iTunes (they don’t sell the bonus tracks separate from the album), then drive to frickin’ Best Buy to buy THEIR version, then fly to FRICKIN’ JAPAN to buy their version!!  (Note: I realize I could buy the Japanese version via the interwebs, but why should I have to?!?!)  To say nothing of the “International Version.”  I mean, what’s so international about that version?  Different songs in a different order?  HUH?!

No one needs to explain why this happens.  One word: $$$$.  Cee-Lo (or, more accurately, his record company) can earn more profit by releasing different versions of the same album with exclusive bonus tracks.  Fine.  I get it.  And it’s not like I don’t like paying extra for more music.  In fact, I prefer buying the limited edition bonus version of most albums, with the extra tracks, or bonus DVD, or frickin’ coffee mug.  I really do.  I just don’t like feeling that I am being ass-raped for cash.

Yes, I could buy one of the singles from the album and pick up a few of the bonus tracks.  And who knows, maybe Cee-Lo will release a greatest hits album in a few years with a bonus CD of b-sides and remixes.  But still, this is ridiculous.

So what did I do?  I bought two nearly identical versions of the same damn album, the U.S. version and the (bullshit) international version.  I don’t remember how much I spent, but it was close to $30 total.  Also, I “acquired” a few of the bonus tracks from a “friend.”  So, problem solved … mostly.  But I’m still missing three of the bonus tracks.

To be fair, I’ve done this before.  That is, I’ve bought two nearly identical versions of the same album solely for the sake of a few damn bonus tracks.  (This is the “problem” I refer to in this post’s title.)  But aside from bitching about feeling ripped off (and yet continuing to do the same thing), this does raise an interesting question.

What is the “true” version of The Lady Killer?  The U.S. release?  The international version?  The one from the iTunes store with two extra tracks?  The frickin’ Best Buy version?!

Consider Tales from Turnpike House, a really lovely album by Saint Etienne.  I do freely admit to buying both the U.S. and U.K. releases (again, that problem I have), mostly so I could get the Up the Wooden Hills bonus CD, a collection of children’s songs.  (It’s also quite nice.)  But the two versions differ considerably.  Taking the U.K. release as a starting point, the U.S. version drops two songs (“Relocate” and “Bird Man of EC1″), adds three (“Dream Lover,” “Oh My,” and “I’m Falling”) and completely changes the order of the songs.  While they share ten songs, the albums are really quite different.  Further, the Japanese version keeps the original track listing as the U.K. version but adds two songs (“The Leyton Art Inferno” and “Got a Job”) smack in the middle of the album.  What?!?!

[sound that Scooby Doo makes when he is confused]

So what is the true version of Tales from Turnpike House?  For my money, I’d go with the U.K. version, simply because the band is British and presumably had more control over that release.  As a point of comparison, examine the U.K. track listing for the Beatles’ album Rubber Soul with the U.S. version’s track listing.  Rubber Soul was the band’s sixth album in the U.K. but it’s eleventh (!) album in the U.S.  The U.S. releases, in addition to having a different mix and different track listings, usually included singles and b-sides not included on the U.K. releases.  My presumption is that the band had more input/control over the U.K. version, and thus that version is the true version of the album.

(As another point of comparison, look at the track listing for the U.S.-only album Hey Jude.  Yep.  Pretty clearly a cash grab.)

My first Beatles’ album purchases were on vinyl and featured the U.K. track listing.  So for me, Rubber Soul will always begin with “Drive My Car.”  But to an American growing up in the 1960s, Rubber Soul will always begin with “I’ve Just Seen A Face.”  (WaitWHAT?  That was on Help!, not Rubber Soul!!)  It’s really interesting to think about what that album means to listeners on either side of the Atlantic Ocean, given that the different versions contained different songs, structures, and mixes.  One could imagine two entirely different perspectives of what, in name at least, is the same album.

Anyway, what all of this amounts to is:

• Record companies suck.
• Record companies suck.
• I now have five new reasons to say “Fuck You.”