As much as I love the new Radiohead release, I have to say I’m still disappointed by their decision to go with 160kbps. The muffled and muddied sound quality of the files feels like a bootleg copy, or something I downloaded illegally because I couldn’t wait for the full and final release…
Admittedly, I have done it before — I downloaded a bootleg copy of Hail to the Thief well before its official release, which is not something I normally do but I really wanted to hear it. I have to wonder if Radiohead didn’t realize that In Rainbows would be leaked soon and quickly p2p’d into the hands of anyone who wanted it. For free. Seen in that light, this is clearly a very shrewd move, and likely very lucrative even if most people pay very little for it. It’s quite likely that a high percentage of those who downloaded this version will buy the cd when it comes out next year.
Just the same, I expected better, and most importantly I paid for it too. Perhaps I’ve been ruined by bleep.com, where I buy almost all of my music these days. It’s DRM free, 320kbps, and reasonably priced. Strange to call that the bare minimum when it seems like the gold standard, but that’s how I rip mp3s from a cd, and have for many years. And since I refuse to buy cds anymore, except in special situations, that’s how I want my mp3s.
I’m a huge Radiohead fan, but this feels like a bit of a bait and switch. The buying experience was lousy, the quality of the files is poor, and there was no embedded artwork (perhaps the most glaring omission of all). Yes, it’s still a new Radiohead album — and I haven’t stopped listening to it since Wednesday morning — but the whole process feels rushed at best, or half-assed at worst. And I have to wonder why.
Am I just being contrarian? Does anyone else see it the same way?
Related posts
- I made a list of my favorite songs and sounds of 2007↓ Download all ten songs Just like last year, though admittedly much less ambitious, I want to mark the passing...
- A penguin and carnation, a lemon and dalmatian, though I look for inspiration, still my favourite combination……is Candylion. I love this song. So much that I had to download it illegally, just so I could take...
- I made a mix of my favorite songs from my favorite albums of 2006↓ Download all ten songs I started this project back in December, but work and life in general have conspired...
160kbps is more than enough for most people. considering the amount of downloads their servers had to endure i’d say a very small percentage would even benefit from 320kbps while way more bandwidth would have been used for little gain.
[…] I whined about the 160kbps thing, impugned their motives, and generally disparaged In Rainbows in the very beginning. But the more I […]
[…] the game with Radiohead, so much so that the first album I purchased was Hail to the Thief. Sure, I complained about the 160kbps thing when they first released In Rainbows, but paid for it anyway and then paid again when the cd […]