Incredible, astonishing issue with the 3LP Exclusive White 180gr edition

[mannix]

Hi all,
I really don't know if to cry or laugh or both 

I bought the LP from Universal Music in Germany.

It's incredible, never happened to me in 40 years and I bought probably hundreds of vinyls...

The sides A, B, E are recorded at wrong speed!
It's like playing a 45rpm at 33rpm; at the beginning I thought something bad happened to the motor of my precious Technics.
Clearly it wasn't, the other sides are playing just fine (gosh!).

Quite fascinating but obviously I did expect a much much better quality control for a such classy release.

On top of that I like the design but c'mon, whoever designed the box never had vinyls in his life. It's a mess to fit the discs inside and it's a mess to fit the internal folder with the disc inside in the outside folder. Rookie mistakes.
Also the internal folders looks nice but the outside black paper is terribly cheap; it keeps leaving black debris on the disc every time I put it in and out, extremely annoying.

Is there someone else that bought it in Germany/Europe and got a copy without this issue?
I really hope it's limited to my copy/batch, I'm requesting customer support to replace it.

Thx

[ThePumisher]

Can anyone confirm this?

Sides A.B and E play at 45 RPM
Sides C,D and F are 33 1/3 RPM

bit strange

https://oncewasanote.com/2019/04/14/april-14-2019-the-chemical-brothers-no-geography/

[mannix]

Seriously? is it on purpose?

[Csar]

From reading some members' posts about it, yes it does appear that it was done intentionally (to perhaps justify a 3 LP release for such a short album?). It's a weird decision, though.

https://www.discogs.com/de/The-Chemical-Brothers-No-Geography/release/13482212

By the way, did you get a digital download card for the bonus/ instrumental tracks with your German release?

[mannix]

LoL, I wonder what they had in mind, too much dope probably 

It's going to be frustrating to go back and change the speed every time!
I'm never going to remember which side is at 45rpm and which at 33rpm.

I'm not an audiophile and I'm not an expert but I spent quite few hours calibrating the turntable.
It's a very bad idea to run a 12 inch disc at 45rpm (should have wondered why nobody does it), the skew changes a lot and the outer side of the first track will become degraded over time.
But yes, indeed it's very exclusive!

I did receive the leaflet, struggled a bit to find it because it was inside the inner folder of disc 1.
Just downloaded it in MP3 and WAV formats, full album plus the 3 bonus instrumental tracks.

Amazing album!

Cheers

[Csar]

Yeah, probably That's why they used to write "extra supa dope thanks". But in all honesty, I suspect this hasn't to do with Tom and Ed at all. It's more likely just one weird decision on the publisher's end. In any case, it certainly takes away from a good listening experience. Does it have at least some sort of reminder printed in the booklet?


Glad you had the download card shipped with the German release. Some folks from other regions struggled quite a bit with that, most notably with Astralwerks's handling of their issues.

[mannix]

Indeed, Tom and Ed probably weren't involved much if not at all.
Doesn't mean whoever thought this wasn't way too much on dope 

Now that I'm done with the boring online training I was in, I realize there's no impact on the skew.
Did a quick googling and indeed shouldn't cause any kind of technical issue.

It's just going to be very unpractical and annoying!
Would have been just much better to keep it all at 33rpm, doh.

I've read the other posts about the leaflet issues, I feel very lucky I've been spared the hassle!

[M_O_N_O]

Yeah it sucks. I already complained about it a while ago: https://forum.thechembase.com/index.php/topic,1626.msg19258.html#msg19258

In the end it means that the box will stay in my shelf without ever being listened to again. A 3LP box without any bonus tracks is already a bit pointless but this 33/45 rpm mix is just unbelievably stupid. It just makes no sense at all.

[Ford]

The label on each side will tell you what speed to play it at in very very small writing.