07 March 2007

Why Bother: Neon Bible [Special Edition]


Welcome to Why Bother: {subject matter here}, a new feature of then no sound, which we've named after that one Weezer song that goes, why bother, 'ts gonna hurt me, 'ts gonna kill when you desert me... The title should should explain what it's all about.


Not feeling very capable today, we can't figure out how to make that photo above be at work done here. (That is, we're not feeling very capable, etc--dangling participles be damned.) But d'you see all that stuff up there? That's a box with a moving 3-D hologram-type thing; a sleek, plastic sleeve for the CD; a lyrics book; a matchbook-sized flipbook, which presents the same image that you see on the cover of the aforementioned box; and a larger flipbook that seems to depict a meteorological-eyed view (viz., high above satellite image) that turns into people. Right.

Yesterday, we paid $21.50 (incl. NM sales tax) for the Arcade Fire's Neon Bible [Special Edition], straight cash, yesterday because the LP is mysteriously unavailable, and we got the leak, like, back in January: so we thought we should, you know, support the band; and whatnot.

So it's not about the money or anything. We ask only: why bother making a 3-D holographic box, a matchbook-sized flipbook depicting what's already on the box; and a larger flipbook that depicts some inscrutable subject matter. This is the kind of shit that we only lose, and even if we didn't lose it--what, are we supposed to listen to the music and flip the flipbooks, or gaze at the box? We just don't understand why so much glossy paper, so many staples, and all those 3-D holographic plastic sheets were used to produce what amounts to exterior and interior packaging for a CD that, on its own, is very good and needs only, maybe, the lyric sheet and some candles or, well, fire of some sort, to accompany it. Why couldn't they have spent their time ensuring the LP release coincided with the CD release--rather than designing all that stupid shit?