Putting Out A CD: Your Thoughts

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

OK, convoluted question here but im sure there's some decent folks in the crowd willing to offer suggestions.

to celebrate plain parade's third anniversary, we're having a bunch of bands who have played our shows contribute a track to a compilation cd. everyone is covering another philly artist [past or present].

ive thought about just burning a ton of cd's and going the handmade packaging route, but that just feels... time consuming. most cd manufacturing places seem to do runs of no less than 500 and i know we're not going to sell that many.

do you think that digital distribution [ie, itunes] would be a better route for this project? should i burn a bunch of them [i have many computers at my disposal to make this happen] and then sell the rest online?

im just curious about what options i have and if anyone has some creative solutions.

― maria tessa sciarrino (theoreticalgirl), Friday, 9 September 2005 15:37 (twenty years ago)

fyi, here's the track listing for anyone interested:

01 Sympathizers - Late Night Television or O'Jays
02 National Eye - Like Moving Insects or Capitol Years
03 Andrew Chalfen - Joey Sweeney "Blue But Not Really"
04 This Radiant Boy - Capitol Years
05 Golden Ball - Espers "Voices" or Kandywhales "Sex Box"
06 Method + Result - patternismovement or Buried Beds
07 Motherfucking Clash - Dead Milkmen "Take Me Apart"
08 Walker Lundee - The Intruders
09 Rifle Nice - The Teeth
10 Hail Social - Mazarin
11 The A-Sides - Soul Survivors "Expressway to Your Heart"
12 Evil Janet - Cynthia G Mason
13 Yah Mos Def - Philly songs mashup
14 Lee, Jae-Won - Bob Hazard "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun"
15 Dragon City - Todd Rundgren "I Saw the Light"
16 Bitter, Bitter Weeks - She-Haw "Never Enough"
17 Cordalene - Bitter, Bitter Weeks
18 The Jane Anchor - TBA
19 Canine10 - TBA

― maria tessa sciarrino (theoreticalgirl), Friday, 9 September 2005 15:39 (twenty years ago)

I've pressed up a couple of CD albums of my own music, runs of 500 in both cases. IIRC one of the pressing plants would do a run of 300, but it was only just a tiny little bit cheaper than pressing 500. Apparently there are places who will press up shorter runs of CD-rs for you, with properly printed sleeves etc, it might be worth looking into that.

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Friday, 9 September 2005 16:09 (twenty years ago)

Why don't you get someone to burn the CD-Rs for you. You can those done with inked on-disc labels for pretty cheap. I did this, but I forget what the company was called. We did 200 for like $200 or something.

― mcd (mcd), Friday, 9 September 2005 16:13 (twenty years ago)

Oh and I think you're better off with physical CDs, as opposed to iTunes, so bands can sell 'em at shows and give 'em to the bands, etc.

― mcd (mcd), Friday, 9 September 2005 16:23 (twenty years ago)

yeah, i like the idea of CDs not burned by itunes better, so if you have any specific vendors who can do this for reasonable prices, please make suggestions here.

― maria tessa sciarrino (theoreticalgirl), Friday, 9 September 2005 16:25 (twenty years ago)

check the back of your local alternative paper, before the sex ads, there's usually a bunch of ads, you can get CD-rs at any amount, but obv if you're doing enough, proper duplication is way better. As far as printing on the CD...those places will probably do 4-color printing off a printer which doesn't always look so nice. Try to keep the image simple, I'd say.

― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Friday, 9 September 2005 16:59 (twenty years ago)

Actually, I had good luck with Discmakers. They do short runs--I made 50 of a solo project, for about $3 each. That was with a jewel case, full-color inserts, and black printing on the disc. Two days.

― The Mad Puffin (The Mad Puffin), Friday, 9 September 2005 17:10 (twenty years ago)

THANKS DUDES! whoa, i meant to do that in lower case, but well, whatever.

from discmakers:

http://duplication.discmakers.com/action/ProductPricingView?pricing=true

― maria tessa sciarrino (theoreticalgirl), Friday, 9 September 2005 18:36 (twenty years ago)

100 CDs for $178 is a good deal.

― The Mad Puffin (The Mad Puffin), Friday, 9 September 2005 19:23 (twenty years ago)

If you're looking to get those CDs in stores, we can sell you a list of stores that take titles on consignment...$1 per store with a $150 minimum....might help you recoup the cost of the pressing, production and packaging. www.almightyretail.com

― craig r, Friday, 9 September 2005 19:45 (twenty years ago)

how is spending 150$ going to earn me money? the way i look at it, 150 + 178 = 328 more in debt than i need to be. i sit and do accounting all day, you cant fool me with this shit.

the only places where this is going to retail are local stores -- there isnt enough outside [ie non-philadelphia] interest, aside from like, 10 people.

― maria tessa sciarrino (theoreticalgirl), Friday, 9 September 2005 19:53 (twenty years ago)

I'm not trying to fool anyone...Just offering a service if you're interested. We're a reputable company with more than 130 clients using our service. Check the client list http://www.almightyretail.com/indexlinks.php.

― craig r, Friday, 9 September 2005 20:02 (twenty years ago)

we can sell you a list of stores that take titles on consignment

This is one of the most ridiculous offers I ever heard.

― joseph cotten (joseph cotten), Friday, 9 September 2005 20:07 (twenty years ago)

Again...it's a service that we offer mostly to record companies to help them market their titles more effectively at retail. We also offer unsigned artists lists of stores that take CDs on consignment with the contact information for the individual stores. Ridiculous to Joseph Cotton might be valuable to someone else who is seriously trying to launch a career by building a story at retail.

― craig r, Friday, 9 September 2005 20:27 (twenty years ago)

craig, thats great. now get off my thread.

― maria tessa sciarrino (theoreticalgirl), Saturday, 10 September 2005 14:13 (twenty years ago)

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.