So we've found ourself in a album predicament...

[Cramboli]

As you can tell from the title yes it is...
We are currently working on a new album only problem is were down to 33 songs after the elimination ceremony even though it's still only 1:30:35 long and I don't know how to go about doing this for a release/cd... So again I figure ask the good, the bad, and the completely mundane...

also we were thinking about doing memsticks and cds the memsticks would be locked down for over writing honestly that would suck to sell a memstick just to have it reformatted for something else although it would boost sales because they would be cheaper than store bought...
Anywho any help would be appreciated... also it's like 78 mb overall not including copyright software on it...

[Seafroggys]

hmmm I'm not understand your question.

You want to sell a CD and a memory stick?

Several factors:

1: A Red Book compliant CD is 74 minutes long. They are NO 80 minute long red book compliant CDs, even though they make CD-Rs that are 80 minutes in length. If you want your CD to work on every player and meet spec, then it has to be Red book compliant. However, this does contradict two of my CD's, which are both in the 75-78 minute range. Look into this some more. Regardless, you will want a Red Book CD.
2: Since you are at 90 minutes in song length, you have three options: cut it down some more, release a double album, or be cheap and release two albums. A 45 minute album is not unheard of, that was the longest album length in the LP days. A double album would work best. Or just get rid of several more songs you may like, but may not be as great as the others.
3: If you go the memory stick route, what format will you save them as? If they're standard MP3's, you will lose quality. If they're FLAC, not many can play them. If they're WAV, you have the best quality, but takes the most space, and who knows if the end user will just make them MP3s.
4: Memory Sticks are far more expensive. Even if you go the MP3 route, you will want a 128 or 256 meg stick, which is still several bucks apiece. Replicated CDs cost a dollar if you order a high number like 1000, and that includes all the inserts and artwork and sleeves!

[Cramboli]

I've been looking at diskmakers.com I've done the double disk before but I found that turned people off to buying it the mem stick was more of a experimental idea and redbook cd?
fill me in a little if you may...

[Aaron]

You could also do the Standard Edition and Deluxe Edition thing, and have the extra tracks for download based on a code within the physical album's packaging?

[Cramboli]

That just seems a little more work than needed I guess... Although it's a good idea, the but I forgot to mention that they go along with an overall theme hence why we narrowed it down to 33 tracks it was 50 like 2 hours ago and the rest that didn't make it didn't cut it for the theme... I blame our HR

[Knifeboy]

i'm sure you can find 5 tracks that are less stellar than the rest.
And then just upload them to your website as b-sides

[Cramboli]

Chances are theres going to be a movie that goes with the who thing but were not there nor anywhere with that right now... I guess we'll sacrifice a song or to maybe give them to the less fortunate musicians who can't come up with there own stuff and have to steal others... (not directed to anyone on here) we let out a "leak" on myspace like a year and a half ago and I started getting emails of people bitching at me to take that song of the site saying they were going to sue me because I stole it from them so I followed to there band site to find my song uploaded to there site claiming it was there own, granted I won but it still irked me...

[Seafroggys]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Book_(audio_CD_standard)

[heylelshalem]

do it on vinyl! FTW!

[Cramboli]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Book_(audio_CD_standard)

but good sir if I can't source wikipedia in a paper I don't think I should trust these interwebs... No really I never thought to search it there I thought it was slang...

An vinyl? Seriously I'd do that if I knew more than 3 people out of 50 that have a phonograph...

Thanks for all the ideas guys... I think we may just say F-it and go with a full length feature film... And no album to go with it... or not I'm not really sure still...

[Cramboli]

Someone was telling me that Nero does a "generic" format like that so it plays on everything... Is this true? I've personally used this old cd burning software and did each cd one at a time and haven't run into a playback-format issue...

[Moseph]

Someone was telling me that Nero does a "generic" format like that so it plays on everything... Is this true? I've personally used this old cd burning software and did each cd one at a time and haven't run into a playback-format issue...

The Red Book spec is the "generic" spec. It is the original specification for audio compact disc. If you make a CD that conforms to the Red Book Audio standard, then it should play in any working CD player.

Regarding the track count and length, you're pretty much stuck. If you want to make it compatible with most playback devices you'll need to release it on 2 discs if you have 90 minutes of audio. If by "memory stick" you mean "USB Flash Drive," I agree that it's an interesting idea, but it's incredibly more expensive than a CD (or even a double album), and may not be affordable for you to put out in realistic numbers. If you meant Sony's Memory Stick proprietary format, I think it's a terrible idea, since nobody actually uses that format except a small select group of Sony hardware owners.

One thing that comes to mind is that you could release half the album on 1 disc about six months prior to the other half. That way you can use whatever money you make on the first half to help pay for the release of the second half. System of a Down did this with Mesmorize/Hypnotize and it didn't come off as a terrible idea. If you try that, just make sure the first half is good enough to warrant people buying the second half 6 months later.

[Seafroggys]

Yes, there are plenty of players out there that won't play non-Red Book CDs. My DVD player will not play any burned CD, and has trouble playing burned DVDs. It does, however, play copies of CDs and DVDs just fine, but anything created on a computer using 99% of consumer burning software will not work.

Very few programs can actually make a Red Book standard CD. The cheapest (and one of the best) is Sony CD Architect, but its a fairly hefty program...$100, but it does come with a lot of basic mastering tools and plug-ins as well. Too bad it uses DirectX plugs and not VST :p

[Cramboli]

Yeah... Not Sony format... I got a guy who can do some weird stuff with mem sticks (usb) so if it came to that I guess it'd work but at 274$ for 50 and only 34$ for 100 Verbatim blanks

100@ $259
# CD-Rs w/content & label print
# Full Color On-Disc Printing
# Jewel Case w/black tray
# 2 Panel Insert
# Traycard
# Poly Wrap
# Standard - 5 Day

[heylelshalem]

but good sir if I can't source wikipedia in a paper I don't think I should trust these interwebs... No really I never thought to search it there I thought it was slang...

An vinyl? Seriously I'd do that if I knew more than 3 people out of 50 that have a phonograph...

Thanks for all the ideas guys... I think we may just say F-it and go with a full length feature film... And no album to go with it... or not I'm not really sure still...

its getting bigger everyday now. i read somewhere that records outsell CDS right now.

[Seafroggys]

its getting bigger everyday now. i read somewhere that records outsell CDS right now.

That's so wrong its not even funny....its still only like 2% of CD sales.

[I Am a Hat]

double album just kidding how about not being obnoxious and just making it it like 50 minutes or better yet breaking the band up

[Cramboli]

because telling my self to F-off means I'd need to take crazy pills again... And those don't taste like flinstones chewable tablets... Nah guys I got it covered thanks for all the potential ideas... and for the records I'd half-*** it and go with the verbatim-phono style cd's... lol...

[Aus_rock_god]

As you can tell from the title yes it is...
We are currently working on a new album only problem is were down to 33 songs after the elimination ceremony even though it's still only 1:30:35 long and I don't know how to go about doing this for a release/cd... So again I figure ask the good, the bad, and the completely mundane...

also we were thinking about doing memsticks and cds the memsticks would be locked down for over writing honestly that would suck to sell a memstick just to have it reformatted for something else although it would boost sales because they would be cheaper than store bought...
Anywho any help would be appreciated... also it's like 78 mb overall not including copyright software on it...

Don't be afraid to kill your babies man.

You guys are gonna have to pick 12-20 songs that you think are the best, and save the rest for live play until your next CD.

If somthing isn't working, don't be afraid to take a samuri sword to it and chop sh!t out.

Not the same senario, but my band had one song that had a big long intro (which was how the song came about), that we couldn't make work in the studio. After spending ages on the f*cking thing we ended up de-capitating the song, and it ended up sounding better anyway.

Quality over quantity dude, just like Nintendo :thumb:.

[Cramboli]

Actually that sounds like a reasonable solution to get rid of the long intro(s) like the first song (ironically) called intro is like 10 minutes...

[Aaron]

You've got to put on it what people want to listen to, not neccesarily what you want them to listen to. If you're serious about your band becoming popular then you have to do that. Tried bouncing songs off a third-party for honest review?

[Aus_rock_god]

1: A Red Book compliant CD is 74 minutes long. They are NO 80 minute long red book compliant CDs, even though they make CD-Rs that are 80 minutes in length. If you want your CD to work on every player and meet spec, then it has to be Red book compliant. However, this does contradict two of my CD's, which are both in the 75-78 minute range. Look into this some more. Regardless, you will want a Red Book CD.


Note on Redbook compliant CDs:

They're made by first creating a glass copy of the CD (the master), and then sticking it in a machine that stamps the music onto the disk, along with the label, rather than burning (just like cutting a record, only with a cd).

This process is pretty expencive, and most places that do Redbook replication will only do it for orders of over 500 copies, which, at $2 a disk, plus setup and packaging fees, can cost over $1,000.

Consider that before you decide to go Redbook, because you can get 100 copies of the first run duplicated (ie: burnt) for $200ish in a lot of places, which works out to be $1000 if you sell the CD for $10, which you can use to get 500 Redbook versions for your second run of disks.

[Seafroggys]

Hmm, 100 CDs for $200? I've never heard of anything that cheap. Most of the time the good deals don't start happening until you get to the 1000 CD runs. Most places have them for about $1000 for a 1000, give or take a little (the duplication houses I am checking out range from $900 to $1299 for 1000). Most of the time, a run of 100 will cost you about $3-4 per CD.

[Aus_rock_god]

That's for printing onto CDR though.

$3-4 a disk is huge! That's more than quadruple what the materials cost!

[Seafroggys]

http://www.discmakers.com/ check it out yourself, this is one of the leading duplicators in the US

[Cramboli]

Actually Seafroggys thats where the quote on page one came from... I just never heard any 'real' feed back from anyone on it so I didn't know if it was legit or not... I'm weary of scams and things like that... Last cd I tried making I went through this company that a chain music store had suggested I asked for a qoute for everything for 50 cds I never heard from them I couldn't find there website there was 3 numbers to call and only one of them worked once... I even sent the master disc in and didn't get it back... So all I've heard from Discmakers though is what they tell you...

[EADGCF]

Why not do a double, or 2 cds? Maybe even release them 6 months or so apart?

Seriously though, a 74 minute CD is typically very obnoxious and too much for people to digest at once.

[Seafroggys]

Why not do a double, or 2 cds? Maybe even release them 6 months or so apart?

Seriously though, a 74 minute CD is typically very obnoxious and too much for people to digest at once.

Yeah, who the hell wants to listen to Beethoven's 9th in one sitting?

[Aus_rock_god]

How about The Wall? That runs for way longer than 74 minutes, and it doesn't sound any good unless you listen to it in one sitting.

[EADGCF]

Citing exceptions is typically not a very effective way to counter a point.

:-/

[Seafroggys]

The reason I used my particular example was because it was the reason CD's are as long as they are. An executive at Sony or Philips wanted the CD format to be able to hold Beethoven's 9th on one disc. They were originally gonna be shorter.

Its hard for me to otherwise promote filled albums, mainly because all but 3 of my CDs were originally LP releases, so they're less than 45 minutes in length (sans bonus tracks), aside from the several double albums that I have, which are either two CD or just short enough to fit on one disc (such as The Who's Tommy). But I think its a great idea if you have enough material for a decent chunk. 60 minutes seems to be a good length, which was about the length of the Black Album.

Besides, who the **** wants to watch a movie all the way through?

[Aus_rock_god]

*raises hand meekly*

[EADGCF]

The reason I used my particular example was because it was the reason CD's are as long as they are. An executive at Sony or Philips wanted the CD format to be able to hold Beethoven's 9th on one disc. They were originally gonna be shorter.


And I still stand by my point.


Its hard for me to otherwise promote filled albums, mainly because all but 3 of my CDs were originally LP releases, so they're less than 45 minutes in length (sans bonus tracks), aside from the several double albums that I have, which are either two CD or just short enough to fit on one disc (such as The Who's Tommy).


And still.


But I think its a great idea if you have enough material for a decent chunk. 60 minutes seems to be a good length, which was about the length of the Black Album.


I disagree. 45-ish works for me.

[Knifeboy]

I don't know many bands that can keep me interested for more than 50 minutes on album

[Cramboli]

What if you were like doing something for an hour and had the music on in the background? I mean that's all we really do is background music... I guess...

[Aus_rock_god]

It all depends on the drugs you take at the end of the day.

A pot-head, or someone on an acid trip, could easily sit though The Wall, or watch 2001 a Space Oddesy from start to finish and not bat an eyelid.

Get someone of speed however, and they won't be able to sit still and listen to two songs on an album, let alone the whole thing.

It's also worth noting that, statistically, people's attention spans are now much shorter than they were in the 50s and 60s.


Aus_rock_god; Giving you useless facts and statistics since 1986.

[Seafroggys]

Well I'm the type who likes 2001, so there you go :)

[Cramboli]

but I don't do speed and can't even sit through 2001...

[Aus_rock_god]

^^^ then you need to cut down of the red cordial my friend.

[Cramboli]

Once I start consuming them at all then I will...

[Aus_rock_god]

Nice comeback.

[Cramboli]

I get it now theres that point where you smoke so much pot you can't sit still and everything you try to pay attention to is boring as hell but everything else is amazing... And it's not my lack of alcoholism...

[heylelshalem]

http://reveries.com/%3Fp%3D509

so at least in britain the largest music store chain they have is saying that 70 percent of all the new releases are bought in vinyl format.

[Moseph]

http://reveries.com/%3Fp%3D509

so at least in britain the largest music store chain they have is saying that 70 percent of all the new releases are bought in vinyl format.


Not so sure you read that particular article very well...

Virgin Megastores U.K. hopes to "transform the way consumers perceive record stores" by giving "more space than ever ... to vinyl records," reports Tony Glover in The Business (5/14/06). Yes -- vinyl records (http://www.vinylrecords.co.uk/): "According to Rob Campkin, the head of Music at Virgin Megastores (http://www.virginmega.co.uk/) in the U.K., vinyl is now outselling CDs when it comes to the latest records." He comments: "Up to 70 percent of sales of new releases are vinyl." According to the British Phonographic Industry, "annual sales of vinyl singles in the U.K. rose sixfold to over 1m, accounting for 14.7 percent of all physical singles sales in 2005, up from 12.2 percent in 2004." Rob Campkin says "collectability" is one reason for vinyl's comeback.

Those numbers are nowhere near 50% and they're really the only hard numbers given in the article. Consider that:

(01) It's really an upper limit, not a minimum: 0% is considered "up to 70%."

(02) It could easily be interpretted to correspond to the total physical record sales of all singles, or for any individual single. It's a poorly worded phrase.

Here's some links that corroborate the idea that vinyl sales are up, but also provide hard numbers that clearly show that CD's are still far outselling vinyl records:

http://blog.wired.com/music/2008/04/riaa-admits-vin.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/31/fashion/31vinyl.html

[joshmay]

make it a 4 x 10" vinyl only release. i mean, it doesnt sound like it could get any more ridiculous anyway...

[Aaron]

8-track tape is an emerging medium.

[Moon Flavor]

Record the cd live via video camera and then sell it in VHS format tbh

[Cramboli]

if I was going to do that then I'd just break out the 8 mm and a cassete tape to go with it... Might as well sell the projector too...

[heylelshalem]

i dont know anyone personally who buys cds anymore. most everyone i know who still actually buys albums purchases it on vinyl.

[Cramboli]

I know alot of people who just do digital downloads The last time someone I knew bought a cd was like 2 years ago... Like tunecore.com You can sign up sell your music on thus letting you sell your music on Itunes
Rhapsody
Napster
eMusic
GroupieTunes
Amazon MP3
Lala
Shockhound
Amie Street

[horseypie]

release it on betamax

[Aaron]

Musicbox.