#CD Single Promo

[k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9]

Rage Against the Machine - Killing in the Name

[white-cat-of-doom]

Another thing to check off my list of items I have been scouring the internet for.

This is the cast recording for the Italian Tour that ran between October 2009 and September 2011, which goes together nicely with the programme/brochure I also own for the production. It is a highlights soundtrack, but features most of the songs from the musical.

These songs were recorded during the first week of the production, during the previews in Fermo and Udine that took place on 10-11 October and 14-18 October 2009, respectively.

The booklet features many of the same photos and information found in the programme, with the addition of the Italian lyrics of the featured songs.

I have always been very fond of this cast recording and I am so happy to finally own a copy!

I honestly figured I would never actually own this, but luck was on my side for both finding the listing and convincing the seller to ship it to me in Canada. Who knows if another chance will ever come up!

[yyoon5]

ENOi bloom promotional single (limited edition) ⭐️

[swiftracer13]

Today I show you another item of my big Taylor collection. This is the UK Teardrops On My Guitar promo. It comes in a cardboard sleeve (I love cardboard sleeves) and with two contact email addresses on a sticker on the backside. I censored the email addresses, because I don't want to get trouble for posting them for everyone to see.

[lesbianlenas]

tswift rereleasing speak now just unlocked a memory in me that for christmas of 2010 my parents had gotten my aunt & uncle the speak now cd as a gift i think perhaps w another cd or two but anyway i was 10 at the time & i just remember that i kept like staring at the cd from where my mom was keeping it bc i thought she looked so pretty on the cover 😭 like i would pick up the cd and look at it like hm this is so interesting…….cannot imagine how my 10 yr old self would have reacted to the new cover i prob would’ve been like “mom can girls like other girls?” 😭😭

[rainbowsky]

On GG's album, and hints of what was to come

As everyone here likely already knows, I'm completely losing it over the news of a full album from GG. There's a lot more to all of this that I haven't yet discussed, so let's dig into it. I have thoughts...

Disclaimer: Most of what's discussed here is rumor and interpretation, and could be inaccurate. We'll find out what's really happening soon enough!

I never dared dream that GG would put out an album. I have been begging for crumbs of a song for years now, it would have seemed completely outrageous to dare to dream of an entire album!!!

But now that it's on its way, and I've heard more info/rumors about the release (more on that in a bit), I can look back over the past year and see some signs that have been there all along, of what's to come.

More on the release

Promo has already begun, and we now know more about the release schedule based on what's posted on the streaming platforms.

The songs will be released in 3 waves, with the first wave happening on the 12th, the next one on the 19th and the final one on the 26th.

The physical album is going to be coming in December, and there are some tantalizing rumors about what that will include:

The album cover was drawn by GG.

A Xiao Zhan Studio red gift box containing various items including postcards, t-shirts etc.

There will be a CD version and a limited edition vinyl version.

A music video is also rumored to have been completed. This has been confirmed, and will be premiering on the 12th.

Clues we've had all along

What's interesting to me is that for months I've been posting updates about changes to XZ Studio's business license, that have been clues to what GG might be up to.

In January a license was obtained to establish a domestic performance agency.

In March that license was expanded to include services for film production and live performances.

In June there were some legal trademark applications made, pertaining to office supplies, calendars and paper gift wrapping.

And now we know that he's releasing an album, at least some editions which will likely be sold with bonus gifts, paper products and packaging (I think this is a very credible rumor because if he's going the physical album route, it's likely designer GG will want to do special editions like this).

Licenses recently purchased protect the studio's exclusive rights to produce and sell such items.

We also know GG and his studio love to produce stunning high quality videos. Was there ever any doubt that he'd make a music video? Maybe even more than one.

Licenses purchased earlier this year give the studio the right to produce such commercial videos.

And there's another license that is associated with live concert performances! I think it's highly likely we'll see a concert from him in the coming year or two.

Generous GG

As Fat Shrimp mentioned, the songs will be free on streaming. This has made a big impression on some fans, and there has been a lot of discussion about it, and about how much this album will have cost to produce, for GG to give it away for free (here's a compilation of some of the comments via Nili, and another from Estefanita).

People have expressed so many thoughts about this. Everyone agrees that it's almost unheard of to give an entire album for free. One or two songs, maybe, but just as a teaser for the full album - which must be paid for.

A lot of people have talked about the 'old days' (ack, I feel old!) when people would buy physical albums, often after having heard only one or two singles on the radio (although where I'm from people could go into a record store and listen to the full album before buying).

They say that he's opening himself up to that evaluation before people are expected to commit to paying for it, and that it's very generous and honorable, but that it will also open him up to being heard more by passersby who wouldn't otherwise be willing to pay for the music - therefore expanding his possible audience.

I personally think there are a few possible factors contributing to why he chose to share his album for free:

To me, this feels almost like GG's bigger 'debut' as an independent solo singer. He's finally releasing music entirely on his own terms. He wants to share and celebrate that with the world, as a gift to the world and to the fans. "I'm here. Please enjoy."

He's inviting people to listen to his music and judge for themselves whether it's worthy of their investment. It goes along with his personality as someone who wouldn't want people to associate any sort of 'buyer's remorse' with something he's sold them. He's always saying, "people are free to like or to hate," and this is his way of giving people that choice without judgment. "Listen and if you like it, buy it. If you don't, that's fine too." By doing this he's likely to build a bigger audience than by doing a traditional release, because everyone has a chance to hear and evaluate him without any up-front investment.

He wants to avoid any possibility of a repeat of what happened with Spotlight, where he was criticized because fans were buying dozens of copies as a means of boosting sales, and then bragging that their idol was the biggest seller of all time. He doesn't want fans to spend all their money on his songs or on boosting his 'sales', nor does he want any perception that the success of his album was bought by fans.

He could be bargaining on making more overall sales via charging for only the physical copies than by selling both, due to the expanded interest a free release is likely to generate.

He has confidence in what he's created, and is happy to share it openly.

He's doing this out of the joy of it more than anything else, and money isn't a central factor for him.

To me this approach, along with the stated plans for rolling all of this out, feels like a marketing plan, and we all know GG has a professional background in that kind of thing.

Yes, all those other elements of artistry, generosity and magnanimity come into it as well, of course. Marketing is treated as a dirty word, but we must remember that every marketing plan is based deeply in the values and intent of the individual/organization doing the marketing, and is focused on their goals.

I feel that his plan will have considered the factors I mentioned, and will be aligned with his values, intentions and goals.

This is just my take on it, of course. Only GG and his studio really know for sure what his plans and goals are.

Can't wait!!!

Whatever his feelings or plans are, I can't wait to hear this album, I can't wait to buy it, and I can't wait to see what kind if interest and critique it generates!!

I also hope that this is just the beginning - that he will be releasing more music, and hopefully doing concerts in the future.

[lcdsoundsystem]

Cocteau Twins’ “Iceblink Luck” CD single promo (1990)

[k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9]

Rage Against the Machine - Know Your Enemy

[thisisrealy2kok]

Tlc Dear Lie UK Promo 5" Cd Single

[damonalbarn]

Stylorouge:

Preparatory work for the single sleeve design for This Is A Low. 1995.

Unimpressive (and frankly rubbish quality) Polaroids were taken very quickly at the end of a meeting with the band against the windows of what was then our spanking new mews studio in Paddington. You can actually see our previous ground floor studio behind Graham’s head. These snaps were used as reference for in-house drawings to be made to emulate the silhouette profile of HM QE2 on the fake stamps that were stuck onto each promo CD wallet before being rubber stamped with the typography

[X]

[swiftracer13]

Todays piece of my collection is this original US promo single of Our Song. It just features the song three times. But it again has a really nice cover, back cover and has the lyrics written inside.

[fromtenthousandfeet]

What a difference a year+ makes

So, last year when Bit Hit released Set Me Free Part 2, they built up hype prior to the release with a poster and a teaser video. This time around with Smeraldo Garden Marching Band (what a name), we have no:

Pre-orders or pre-saves

CD singles

Social media promotion

Posters, images, or teaser videos

BTS fans (and especially Jimin's fans, IMHO) are great at creating promotional material with just a little bit of material from the company. But what happens when you have nothing?!? Content creators literally have no SGMB material to work with. I'm sure this was yet another intentional move on BH's part to prevent fans from making their own promotions.

I've got to hand it to the company. Not only do they know how to promo the hell out of a song (SEVEN), they also know how to sabotage a song in every possible way. BH will obviously do anything to prevent this song from charting.

Today, SGMB co-producer, Tommy Brown, shared a fan-made promo for the song on Instagram. I'm sorry, but that's just pathetic. BigHit is so lame.

At the end of the day, who cares if Ray Kurzeka and Geffen apologize to Jimin if HYBE/Geffen don't life a finger to support SGMB? It's already too late for CD singles.

PLEASE FOCUS ON HYBE MORE THAN GEFFEN!!! We all know the bullshit starts there. Geffen could care less about BTS or K-pop. They just do as they’re told by HYBE labels and collect a paycheck. The fandom is way too obsessed with Geffen and not nearly concerned enough about BH/BSH/Scooter.

[alphadog]

''I Don't Care'' Promo CD Single (2008)

[sizzlingpatrolfox]

Don't you think pjms theories are too much of a reach? I don't think the company is sabotaging Jimin or that Bang/Scooter hate Jimin. There's not enough evidence to affirm those things to me. The company is just inefficient, stupid and money hungry. They are in a position to give better support to Bts solo songs that are not tied to western producers, they just don't want to spend money because a bts solo has some degree of success guaranteed anyway.

I have stanned idols who sued their company, who shaded their company until they left. And Jimin doesn't do those things. He complained about the MVs, but that's about it. He looks happy, he jokes around with staff. To me he is not being mistreated, it just looks like it because they company is incompent.

No, I don't think everything is a reach. I don't think they particularly hate Jimin, it's not personal. It's just that Jimin wasn't who they were planning on investing in, and they had other things to prove and he unfortunately stepped in their way. I even think they would've done the same to any other member, of course not everyone has the star quality Jimin has.

They're not incompetent. You don't build a multi billion dollar company if you're incompetent, for god's sake. You're naive and everyone thinking the same is naive or playing dumb. A lot of what they did for Jungkook's promo they already did it for BTS as a group before; they actually did more for Jungkook than they even did for BTS. They've always known what to do, they just didn't do it for anyone else. And even if some things slipped out of their hands, fans have been tagging them and asking them to fix it and they never did. Even though they fixed everything people complained about regarding seven.

What do you mean to say, that from April to July they learned everything didn't learn in 10 years? Because that's the time between like crazy and seven; 3 months. How does that make sense? Even more, the moment Jungkook was in that studio booth, they were already planning everything for seven. So, did they learn everything between March 24th and April 7th?

All solo releases had a settled and agreed on budget by the company. I doubt the members get involved with numbers; it's the company who decides on the budget. But even knowing and understanding that, some things are hard to understand still.

Jimin didn't get 6 videos because it was "irrational" but rookie group new jeans got 6 videos. Jungkook is going to get at least 2 more when he releases his album, and I don't even have to talk about predictions but present day is enough: there's like 10 visualizers (I think it's more than that now because I keep getting the notifications) for this one single and those videos cost money too.

I get that the physical CDs that the fans have been asking for cost money, but here's the thing.. they were sold out in the first or second week. So they never planned on restocking anyways, they manufactured a certain amount that got sold out in the first week and they never restocked because they were never planning on manufacturing more. Now, Jungkook has a month worth of CDs stock, I heard that the they stocked 38k CDs a couple of days ago and I believe the first stock was 10k, and since then they've restocked like 4 times so I'm sure they're already around the 100k CDs sold. I would even bet you that if they run out of their initial stock, they will manufacture more CDs if necessary for this single.

The same is happening to other BTS releases, by the way. They've been sold out for months and they're only restocking for Jungkook. It wasn't an exaggeration when I said all the money the 7 have earned is solely going into Jungkook's career. I will keep saying that because it's a fact.

By not restocking those CDs, they're limiting their support for their own artists. But they're also limiting the support fans can give them, because how can they buy if the product is not available. And that is sabotage, no matter the reason behind.

You say "They are in a position to give better support to Bts solo songs that are not tied to western producers, they just don't want to" well exactly, and that is not incompetence. They just don't want to.

"Demand, impact" bla bla bla. If they were to restock 50k CDs of like crazy, they will sell all. And they know that. It's not that they're scared they'll manufacture and ship CDs and make no revenue; they know there's demand, they just don't want to do it.

Budget and money aside, there's still important things they could've done, important things they could still do that they don't need money for.

There's no need to for budget to combine a song's streams or let people know about change in a chart rules. The English and Korean versions were released combined, it gained streams the following two days simply because it's a good song, and it hit #1 on global. The day after it was #1, the numbers were split and thus affecting its chart position. It's almost like for three days it didn't matter but it mattered the moment it was #1, because that was the debut they had planned for a different member. Seven, of course, combined from the begining and still no problems.

Spotify customer service said the label was in charge of combining songs, that they could do it if the label asked. I wasn't sure if I believed them at first, because sometimes databases get messed up and also Spotify customer service is kinda bad. But for several reasons, one being that issue with Post Malone's song, and the other being scooter's attempt at changing the number of streams for seven after its debut, I believe them now and I'm sure that if hybe wanted to, they could.

They didn't need budget to let people know about the change in the chart rules. They didn't care to, they didn't want to announce it until Yoongi had a song out. I don't know if you remember, but this is how things played out:

-> like crazy predicted between #4 - #6 for the second week

-> announcement that 100k+ sales were deducted from the total sold that week

-> a couple of hours later: instagram posts about Jungkook "making history" with bangpd and scooter

-> bangpd on the cover of billboard magazine the next week

If you think all of that was a coincidence, you do you.

And they didn't need budget to let people know what happened to those 100k sales. They still haven't given any explanation on that.

Did they need budget to put like crazy on this is BTS playlist? Did they need to hear Jimin say he wants to be a giant popstar?

None of that has anything to do with personal aspirations the members might have and it has everything to do with management. And no, I don't believe they're incompetent.

I said this earlier this year and I still stand by it:

There is no doubt it was Jimin who decided for who long he'd promote and what activitites. Of course, I'm not ignoring that Yoongi's release was stepping on Jimin's tail, so I also think Jimin could've been somewhat obliged to cram everything into a few days because he knew Yoongi was next.

I know Jimin decided on the shows and performances he went to; Jimin always been tied emotionally to their Korean fans, and he's always respected and honored them; during the pandemic and for festa 2022 he mentioned several times wanting to do music shows. He's had a good relationship with Jimmy Fallon for years, he chose to go to his show because he likes him. I never expected Jimin to go to live lounge as well as I don't expect Jungkook to ever do a stage like set me free pt2 or even like crazy.

I could consider -I have considered- the option that everything was just bad luck or something and that after knowing it was possible to have such a debut like Jimin, hybe he wanted a piece of the cake and to seriously take credit for success like that, so they decided to go all out for JK (this is where personal aspirations come into play), making sure that everyone knew who were the people involved. Because everyone knows who's behind seven. Even Jungkook won't miss any opportunity to talk about receiving the song and being granted this chance. He literally said his life changed because they gave him this song.

I mean...

But there are two things that won't let me really commit to the possibility that all happened by chance; one being all the mediaplay around JK since early 2022. Two, and the most relevant to me it's that Jungkook seemingly never worked on his album. He said that he wasn't doing anything, that he had no plans, told people to not wait for him. I'm sure you know everything. It's not like they suddenly decided to give him a song and then a full english album, no. They've been planning this for a while, and he probably knew about the plans and that's why he wasn't really working on anything.

Maybe you're new to the fandom, but one of the years BTS went to the Grammys, I think it was 2020, a CEO went with them and he placed himself in every photo next to them. In one photo, he even moved Jungkook out of the center so he could be the center of the photo in the freaking red carpet.

That same man, along with BangPd would give interview after interview talking about how they know how to create the next BTS, because they allegedly have some kind of formula. Formula was the word they always used. Armys always got so mad about those statements, saying BTS can't be imitated and that BTS is what it is because of the members and not because of the company. Most armys who remember that, who read those interviews aren't in the fandom anymore. The people in the fandom now don't know, and don't care.

This whole thing, for more than a year, has reeked of the same ideology.

You know that they are fame and money hungry, yet don't consider the possibility that they might do everything they can to get exactly that.

[lcdsoundsystem]

Mariah Carey “Heartbreaker” Japanese Promo CD Single, 1999

[k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9]

Rage Against the Machine - Freedom