Keith Jarrett, Me and My iPod: The Cheap Download Conundrum!‏ By Tom Kipp and Marc Marshall

Downloaded Keith Jarrett’s “The Survivors Suite” for $1.98. Life is good. The sound is fine. If I had the CD to A-B compare it to and thought the CD sounded better, I would say I don’t give a rat’s ass anymore and would still have lived a full life. I guess I am officially over being an audiophile. Having said that, I just bought some earbuds from Monster for $175 that sound pretty damned audiophile friendly 🙂 It is great to be able to lie down in my bed with my matchbook sized iPod w/ earbuds in comfort without having 15 feet of coiled headphone stretched out from my pillow to my cd player across the room, tugging at my ears.

It really is a good deal, sometimes anyway, and you can make your own cd complete with the artwork if you want. In this case I got sick of waiting for ECM to reissue all of their classic era 70’s stuff on cd.

I mean $1.98 and it downloaded easily and flawlessly from CD Universe onto my iTunes library which is provided by Apple for FREE! Call me a sell out LOL

– Marc Marshall

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I wouldn’t dream of it! LOL

Now where are my beloved/horrifying SUN BEAR CONCERTS"compositions"?!

– Tom Kipp

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Well, it only has those 13 “tracks”, after all!

Even if they do take up 10 LPs/6 cds/half one’s life! LOL

Thanks Marc,

– Tom Kipp

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Hmmm…you are a better detective than I. I missed that small detail. LOL

A further look shows that indeed, one must spend $54 to get the whole thing as a download; still a lot cheaper but no small drop in the bucket either.

– Marc Marshall

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Make no mistake, I missed that too, as I had naturally assumed you were correct about the 99 cents per track download cost, which is pretty standard, unless you’re The Freakin’ Beatles.

Lots of albums with long tracks DO, nevertheless, charge that very reasonable rate. I’m sure “In-a-Gadda-da-Vida” and “Sister Ray” go for that on mp3, for example, not to mention any number of tracks by Terry Riley, et al!

Those greedy bastards at ECM–how dare they act like K. Jarrett’s keyboardistical flutterings are worth over $4 a track!

In fact, they should be charging LESS because those tracks are so long, not more!

Tom

P.S. Here’s the “cheap” way t’git SUN BEAR, just like I did in Chicago about 7 or 8 years ago, when Timmy, Andy and I found it used in one of the “collector” stores thereabouts: http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B002NLWONU/ref=dp_olp_used?ie=UTF8&qid=1300744354&sr=1-4&condition=used

P.P.S. Sorry. At first I assumed the $12.00 “VG+” version was the complete box set, because that’s about what I’d paid for it, but then I noticed that one was $129.88. This is just the “promo excerpts” single LP, which I ALSO own, by the way! LOL

I’m a “SUN BEAR Completist”, Marc, except when it comes to actually listening to the thing! But what an Art Object.

As a Complete Electric Miles Glutton, I also own Ian Carr’s Keith Jarrett biography, though in the interest of my sanity I’ve limited myself to [very] selective skimming, i.e. the sections about his time with Miles!

http://www.amazon.com/Keith-Jarrett-Man-His-Music/dp/0246134348/ref=tmm_hrd_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1300744929&sr=1-1

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I didn’t know about the per song price. I am still a newbie LOL I didn’t know the price was pretty standard. So Survivors Suite is 2 songs, one per side. $1.98 Nice. Can I assume the artists are getting screwed with this deal? The longer and fewer songs they record, the less they can charge, or more correctly, the less the record company can charge? The Minuteman should be happy then.

And what about Joe Robertson’s favorite John Coltrane Live in Japan 4 cd box set with 6 songs across the whole set?

Okay I just looked up Survivors Suite on Amazon and those f–kers want 9.98 for it? WTF?

– Marc Marshall

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But I’m pretty sure there were some incredible steals during the early years of "legit"downloading, and maybe still, for those with Avant-Garde tastes. Too bad I already own(ed) it all! LOL

I now note that "Sister Ray" cannot be purchased separately from its album. http://www.amazon.com/White-Light-Heat-Velvet-Underground/dp/B000002G7E/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1300755184&sr=1-1

And I’m seeing a lot of long tracks listed as "Album Only", meaning that you must buy the entire work to own/hear it at all. [I noticed this tactic being used re: Terry Riley’s A RAINBOW IN CURVED AIR, for example, as well as The Stones’ AFTERMATH!]

I don’t think this used to be predominantly the case, but perhaps I’m mistaken, given that I paid relatively little attention to such matters for many years.

Coltrane’s LIVE IN JAPAN, like so many somewhat older cds [e.g. Deep Purple’s newly-remastered LIVE IN JAPAN], seems not to be available for downloading, though you’d think it would be a cinch to set that up.

From the way the media portrayed it last year, you’d have thought that The Beatles‘ music was the only catalog in the world that you couldn’t buy via download, which turns out to be complete horseshit!

I see in the case of the remastered version of THE DOORS (1967) that you cannot actually purchase individual tracks, but must buy all 14 for $10.49 to own it on mp3, while brand new copies of the cd start at $5.83! Will the biz NEVER stop shooting itself in the foot?! LOL http://www.amazon.com/Doors/dp/B000MCIBE8/ref=sr_1_3?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1300755391&sr=1-3

I notice that "Desolation Row", on the other hand, IS available for 99 cents!http://www.amazon.com/Highway-Revisited-Reis-Bob-Dylan/dp/B00026WU82/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1300755551&sr=1-1

"This much madness is too much sorrow….",

Tom

P.S. DOUBLE NICKELS ON THE DIME would cost $42.57 as individual downloads, but is a rather reasonable $8.99 instead, so perhaps Amazon isn’t quite the root of all evil. On the other hand, you’re getting a 20-yr-old non-remastered cd with shite fidelity in the first place! http://www.amazon.com/Double-Nickels-Dime-Minutemen/dp/B000000LZV/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1300756276&sr=1-2

And don’t get me started about the state of all those magnificent 1980s SST albums that now languish in unremastered, overpriced, badly annotated cd editions! Talk about a bloody cultural tragedy….Husker Du, Black Flag, Minutemen, Meat Puppets, Saccharine Trust, Bad Brains, Negativland, et too many effin’ al. At least the good Sonic Youth albums escaped their clutches.

Now that Human Switchboard’s long-lost 1981 album WHO’S LANDING IN MY HANGAR? is coming out this spring on Bar/None, I think the SST catalog will become My New CD Crusade! Along with my beloved Brains’ 1980-81 albums on Mercury, of course….

P.P.S. I think we can ALWAYS assume that the artists are getting screwed!

– Tom Kipp

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