Fountains of Wayne's "Traffic and Weather" and CD prices

I got the Sunday Sun all full of hope only to have it dashed away when I opened up both the Best Buy and Circuit City weekly ads to see absolutely no touting of the sale price for the new Fountains of Wayne CD, out today.

I'd not "preordered" (what a stupid word that is) it because I figured I'd get a much better deal waiting for opening day.

Wrong!

The CD lists for $15.98. Bestbuy.com is selling it for $14.99. Wow. Now that's what I call a bargain! I didn't even bother checking Circuit City's site. Websites are mostly selling it for $12+, so with shipping and handling, I'm much better off buying it in person somewhere.

I figured I would be able to pick up a copy for $9.99 or thereabouts somewhere. The cheapest I've been able to find it for is $12.99 at a store around here. Of course, I drove right by it earlier today and didn't bother to stop in to see what their price was. Oops.

Usually, record stores try to "move those units" by pricing a new release way low. Makes sense. Now, I don't know if Richard Branson (forgive me if I offend by leaving off the "Sir", sir) is trying to pay to fix global warming all by his lonesome, but if so, he's off to a good start. Virgin Records, am I doing my share to help the environment by paying out the ass for this CD?

I did research many years ago on the price of a CD, and where the money actually goes. Actually, it was for vinyl, but the same thing, really. Most of the money from a CD goes straight into the pockets of the record execs. Not the bands. The bands/artists make most of their money from touring. Even artists with a really, really good contract aren't going to make a killing off of CD sales, unless they sell a skidillion copies or something close to it.

So, why the high price? If record labels kept their damn CD prices reasonable, fewer people would be turning to the Internet to download the record illegally, like that kid did that I met at the FoW showcase a couple of weeks ago. I didn't approve of what he'd done, but now, I'm beginning to understand why.

Music is still your best entertainment value, at least if you like the damn CD. If it sucks a big one, then you're screwed. I know I'm going to play the living hell out of this baby when I get it (I wonder if I can say the same about the new Nine Inch Nails CD when that comes out in two weeks, as I've not liked the two songs I've heard online), so it's not like it won't be worth the money, but still, you'd think that record company execs would have at least one-sixth of a brain and get the damn CD prices as low as makes sense so that people like me would go out and buy the thing instead of wondering if I should wait to see if the price comes down any or if I should just try to find that kid at the FoW showcase and make friends with him to get my copy.