If only they had, you know, planned for a lot of people to visit their website at once. I tried ordering yesterday and gave up after an hour.

So far I like it (2 listens, neither of them terribly close). They've been getting more glitchy and stuff which is fun. I like the populist approach; nobody gets it early, no early reviews. This very blog post is itself an early commentary on the album (though I bet there were a lot of people on the other side of the pond tasked with listening to the thing all day and writing a full-on review for immediate publication). It seems, though, from things written on pitchfork and lyrics pages on greenplastic, e.g., that true fans are never completely surprised -- how many of these songs were previewed in live shows?

Did you shell out the 40 quid for the box?

Nope.

Time from beginning of trendy NPR-affiliate morning show to broadcast of song from In Rainbows: Seven minutes.

I thought it was the very first song, wasn't it?

Upon a third most-of-the-way listen on my commute I retract my description of the album as "glitchy". It's only really the first song and maybe sort of the second that has anything like that. In fact I'd call it rather conventional for radiohead; nothing terribly new or innovative. However the songs are solid and I'll listen to the album a lot, I think. For a non-radiohead band this would be a great album; that's what happens when you set your bar too high. I give them a mulligan, though, because, as you no doubt know, they've rolled the dice with their distribution channels, which is enough innovation, I think.

Second song, plus they played another one later.

I am extremely interested in this band's ability to bypass the corporate distribution system. I hope it's not a one-off.

Well, I would say they've already failed to some extent by not preparing for the hordes of people trying to download their album, but these sort of problems happen with major labels as well. Still, I'm glad I pre-ordered it days ago.

ah, radiohead. "big show, no results."

i didnt bother to preorder it and managed to download it in a couple minutes this morning. each page took a little longer than normal to load, but i didnt have to wait for an email with a download code - they just provided a link after the registration process. for what reasons do you consider it somewhat of a failure, cm?

Oh, I've heard several people say that they have not been able to access the album at all. There's the first comment from A above, and kottke at kottke.org was having problems as well. So it seems like that even though you were able to get through this morning, not everyone is having your luck.

and we're sure it's not a failure because radiohead, say, sucks?

ive neither read nor heard anything about people having problems downloading the album itself - only delays during the preorder process. the fact that i was able to download it with no issues the day of release, just as if it had been made available via the itunes music store (though in rainbows downloaded quicker than any purchase ive made there), makes me think they did a pretty decent job with it.

and now that i think about it, why the f would you need to preorder a downloadable album? i understand preordering the big box thing - is this where people are having problems?

you know more about this internet business than i do, but is there a reasonable/cost-effective way to avoid the site delays that im sure were anticipated, say, on the day the album was announced or the day before it was released?

now thats its been done on this scale, do you see any ways to improve the process?

The pre-ordering was sort of a trick, because they announced that the quality of the mp3s was relatively low (160 kbps) only after a few days of pre-ordering came in. (I might have paid less if I had known that the quality was 160 kbps.)

As for avoiding site delays, that's sort out of my scope, but that's what paying for bandwidth/redundancy is for. It's like when Lieberman's web site went down on Election Day because they had a shitty hosting situation.

Jbg, I think we got it that you think Radiohead sucks. I must ask you, do you really think they suck? I can understand (sort of) not being into them, or disliking them because they are so loved, but they suck? Really? They are really talented, even if you don't their music. I don't like the Rolling Stones at all. Not a whit. Not even their old stuff. But do they suck? Nah, that is too strong of a word. In fact, I am tired of that word. When I am at Yankees or Red Sox games there is always that stupid chant of "[insert-team-here] sucks" when in fact, no, neither team sucks, you jsut dislike them. I tried chanting "I dislike the Yankees" but it just didn't take. And if you don't like Radiohead, who do you like?

Can of worms = opened.

nah, i was just trolling. i own pablo honey, and liked the bends. i've heard ok computer. i don't really think they suck.

i do, however, consider them to be the all-purpose "go-to-band" for shitty people who want to seem like they know stuff about music. even radiohead devotees have to admit that.

sample dialogue:

retarded frat-hole at a party: uh, yeah, like music today is so, uh, mainstream.
drunk chick with VD: you're so right!
rf-h: yeah, i'm into, like, more "experimental" stuff.
dcwVD: oh! like who?
rf-h: radiohead.

BTW, your sox/yankees analogy is way off, of course, because the yankees do suck.

Two things.

A#1: Don't badmouth drunk chick with VD, she's a friend of mine.

B#2: The next time I need a username I'm going to use dcwVD.

it's nice that you consider your mom a friend.

No you didn't!

re: improving the process- use their clout and their gobs and gobs of money to enable other bands that don't have the same position to also bypass the labels and make some money on their records.

You mean become a pro-bono record label?

i don't know if a bono-only record label would work. he doesn't have much of a solo ouevre, does he?

He does have a funny name!

Hmmmmm. CM, now that you put it that way, I'm not so sure I like the idea.