independent cd stores. i love what they do for the community, but sometimes i wonder.

i went in to get the new mt. zion disc. i haven't been buying a lot of cds lately, but i try and keep up with those guys. and i've been "saving" a lot of money from not smoking, so i've actually put aside a small amount for a monthly budget. i used to collect those little round discs before real life came around and started demanding i start paying into it. it gave me great enjoyment, so i'd like to get back to doing it. i'm going to be kind of working around my reviews to fill in holes in the collection.

so i thought i'd check to see if there's any belew. they had some of the ones i have and a bunch of the ones i don't really want, as well as one that i have a sort of high-end bootleg of. it was a gift from a friend of my father. my uncle used to do the same thing. so, i have a stack of this stuff - mostly prog-related. i've never really considered them as 'part of the collection'. rather, i've always thought of them more as try-before-you-buy type things, but i'm treating them as though they are for the review site. in actuality, a lot of them are out of print, so those boots are the closest i'm ever going to get. that's the case for this one.

so: $10 for an out of print disc i don't have - collectors jump on that shit. bring it up to the cash...

"geez, this is an old disc."
"yeah."
"i'll mark it down to $6."
"swell."

it's $184, new, on amazon. and i'd be surprised if the disc i got was ever actually played. the insert doesn't look like it's been unraveled before. crisp.

now, that says more about amazon taking advantage of dwindling supply than anything else. it's kind of an asshole price. but, still.

if you collect cds, you have stories like this - and you're glad the indie stores don't do these sorts of rigorous checks. there's not much chance somebody's going to walk into a cd store in windsor and hand over $200 for a decades old out of print adrian belew cd. sure. but, it could conceivably be auctioned for more than $6.

so, i'm happy about this, but i have to wonder....