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July 14, 2005
Who's stealing Son Volt CDs anyway?
Argh...
I bought the new Son Volt CD, "Okemah and the Melody of Riot," at Best Buy last night. Seemed a good deal -- $11.99 for the DualDisc version with a bonus live DVD. The DVD side of the DualDisc has the album in 5.1 audio and a 30-minute documentary which I haven't listened to yet. Despite the ominous warning on the back of the label ("The audio side of this disc does not conform to CD specifications and therefore will not play on some CD and DVD players."), I wasn’t worried because Ben Folds' "Songs for Silverman" had a similar label and played fine.
Whatever they've done with this disc, it's a problem, and a bad one.
I tried to play it on my car's CD player this morning and it skipped. It usually won't even get recognized by the CD/DVD drive in my PC at work and when it does, it plays very stuttered. It seems to have played all right on my Mac, but I haven't listened to it through yet (I was almost hoping it wouldn't so I could say I have a defective disc).
From what I've read, it sounds like the ability to read it varies from drive to drive. I understand the desire for copy protection, but this is insanity. I could have listened to it streamed for free on the sonvolt.net site or for free on Yahoo Music, but I bought the disc and I'm treated like a criminal.
Other similar reports on the JayFarrar.net message boards. Here's one.
Caveat emptor, yo.
Posted by Lee Clontz at July 14, 2005 2:10 PM