smashing pumpkins have returned with a new album

so, the new smashing pumpkins album "zeitgeist" is out. instead of going to best buy, target, and itunes to purchase the album 3 times for 3 different bonus tracks, i bought the version with the 76 page book, which cost me $27 at my local independent music store, which i whole-heartedly support (the bonus tracks can be accumulated from other friend's purchases down the line, hopefully). the book is pretty sweet, but i am not sure it is $17 extra worth of sweet. the music is brilliant. when i listened to the first 2 tracks, i was swept back to my mid-to-late teens on a magic carpet that flies on the wings of totally wicked fuzzed-out distorted guitar and jimmy chamberlin's always magnificent drumming. i was thinking, "they are back!... well, 2 of them are back anyways. woo hoo!!!".

i find out the same day that the pumpkins are playing in atlanta on october 30th at the beautiful fox theatre. tickets were to go on sale thursday, the 12th of july. i think to myself, awesome! i will buy tickets on that day. then i go to ticketmaster’s website to see how much i will be soaked for a pair of tickets, but not caring. it is then that i find out that the itunes presale starts on the 12th and lasts until friday the 13th at 10:00pm (so basically 2 whole days). what that means, is that i had to prepurchase the music from itunes prior to the release date to get the itunes presale password so i can get tickets 2 days before they go on sale to the general public (because the general public is so much more unimportant than the itunes music purchaser, right?).

so because i bought the actual $27 deluxe edition instead of buying the tunes digitally, i was being punished, and i knew for a fact that i would get crappy seats to the show, because everyone else probably bought it from itunes (coincidentally, i ordered tickets on saturday, the 14th, and got great seats - at least i think i did; i will need to verify that when the tickets actually arrive in the mail - but that is not the point!). {back to my rant}---

and at that point, i couldn't even bite the bullet and buy it on itunes just to get the passcode either, because it had to be a preorder.

SON OF A…!!!!!!

so, basically, because i bought the deluxe edition that cost almost 3x what the others cost, i was getting screwed out of 3 bonus tracks and a passcode to buy tickets early.

what they should have done is this:

one edition that is a standard format - 12 songs
the second, deluxe edition, would have the 76 page booklet, three bonus tracks, and a slip of paper inside with a unique passcode for preordering the tickets for their 2007 tour.

that is worth the $27 price tag. why should people who preordered the album from a certain place (itunes) get the front-of-the-line privilege when there are people that spent a boatload of money for the deluxe edition? the consumer should be rewarded for supporting the band, not for supporting the store that the band’s CD was bought from. if i was the record company, i would have pushed more for people to buy the deluxe edition vs the standard edition, instead of trying to get people to buy the $10 edition from some big box retail store. complete bull$hit.

anywho, buy the album because it is good. see them in concert if you can. but man, these shenanigans make even the die-hard fan wonder what the hell they were thinking. urgh!