In 1993, the major record companies got the bizarre idea that used CD stores were killing the music industry. This, of course, was after home taping killed the music industry but before Napster killed the music industry. Anyway, EMI Records led the anti-used CD charge by threatening to withhold copies of then-superstar Garth Brooks' latest album from any store that sold used CDs. The assumption seemed to be that the stores would immediately cave in and meekly remove their used CD sections, when the reality was that the mom ...
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In 1993, the major record companies got the bizarre idea that used CD stores were killing the music industry. This, of course, was after home taping killed the music industry but before Napster killed the music industry. Anyway, EMI Records led the anti-used CD charge by threatening to withhold copies of then-superstar Garth Brooks' latest album from any store that sold used CDs. The assumption seemed to be that the stores would immediately cave in and meekly remove their used CD sections, when the reality was that the mom and pop independents and small regional chains whose profit margins depended on the far more lucrative used CD trade basically told EMI and the other majors to get bent. The majors went home to sulk and look for something new that might possibly kill the music industry.Pretty much the only lasting artifact to come out of this whole rather pointless affair was Buy This Used Compact Disc, a sampler of songs on labels controlled by what was at the time the largest independent record distributor in the US, Dutch East India Trading. Because DEIT's main customers were just the sort of independent retailers targeted by the major labels' misguided wrath, the distributor put together this 22-song sampler, to be sold at the same price as a used CD, and offered it to their customers as a show of support, complete with ranting liner notes by DEIT president Jack Sheehy.In retrospect, Buy This Used CD is most useful as a snapshot of the state of indie rock circa 1993. In that post-Nevermind era, "alternative" rock was long gone, simply a fond memory and an increasingly dull sub-section in Sam Goody's record bins. In a world where the tired hard rock boredom of Pearl Jam or Alice In Chains was being marketed as "alternative," the real alternative scene was trying to decide what it was going to do. Several options are offered here, with lo-fi (New Radiant Storm King's classic "The Opposing Engineer Sleeps Alone," Sebadoh's anthem "Gimme Indie Rock"), alt-country (Uncle Tupelo's sweet "Sauget Wind," Chuck Prophet's "Balinese Dancer"), mopey emo (Sister Double Happiness' "San Diego") and semi-naïve indie pop (Erik Voek's "Symmetry" and a bracingly ironic version of Argent's "God Gave Rock and Roll To Us" courtesy of Unrest) winning out as the best available choices. Some of the artists represented remained non-entities, usually for good reason, but Buy This Used CD also contains rare gems like Japanese girl group the 5.6.7.8's covering the Flamin Groovies classic "Teenage Head." ~ Stewart Mason, Rovi
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