Hello Jasper!

Thanks for opening up this section! I don't know if you are the right person for this question (maybe it InsideOut's thing, i dont know), but i have this question in mind for some years now. I'm speaking from my perspective as a die-hard fan of Devin's music, first day buyer of all of his stuff. So maybe my opinion is very much biased by that, and i admit i don't know anything about markting.

Why can't there be an option to get an immidiate digital download (of Epicloud for example) the day the pre-order gets up?
I would buy my favourite package (download mp3 only; download lossless + cd; download + cd + t-shirt etc.), get the download directly and the rest of the package at the release-date. There could be a preview page with samples and one or two complete songs for streaming and a button for easy buying (pretty much like Bandcamp).

Advantages:
- Quick, spontaneous buying decisions are possible (i bought some digital albums because i was overwhelmed by the first impression of it - wouldn't have done it for all of them if i had heard them some more times).
- No drama with worldwide shipping problems.
- Different bundles for different buyers, cheap downloads (but with much less cost for the label because no CD-production etc.). Maybe more sales overall?
- Die-hard fans would be thankful, because they don't have to wait longer then necessary. They would get the impression that they are more important than some journalists who get preview versions and write shitty reviews.
- No drama for die-hard-fans because of the dilemma of illegal downloads before relase date.
- No problem with leaked copies appearing before the release date, because no one gets it before the pre-order plus download-option gets up.

Disadvantages:
- Maybe magazines are pissed because they don't have some time ahead for writing reviews. But i think online-reviews are much more important now and with a digital relase, every webzine, blogger and customer could review it at the same time.
- Maybe resellers are pissed, because some of the sales would not need them. But i guess they are a dead horse, too(?)
- ?

Sorry, it got quite long, but i'm very interested in this.

Thanks very much!

[JasperNMC]

There's a few reasons why this won't happen. The first being chart positions. Most releases, especially in rock/metal, have their peak sales on release date which makes up for the national chart positions. Most fans wouldnt give a rat's ass about chart postitions but unfortunately magazines, concert promoters, publishing companies and most other companies that are needed to generate income for an artist do find it important and a good chart position will definitely raise the awareness with these people. At this point digital sales make up about 10 to 15% of album sales and in some countries this is starting to increase (Norway, for example, nowadays sees 90% of album income from digital, mainly from WIMP which is pretty much the same as Spotify) and since pre-orders start roughly 4 to 6 weeks prior to release no record label will want to give out advance digital full albums as it'll spread out the sales over a much longer period and thus will mess up the charts.

Also keep in mind that pre-orders are mainly done so the record label can get a feel of how much stock they need to manufacture. Keeping a lot of stock in a warehouse is expensive so they try to make a quantity that just about covers enough for first few weeks sale and then remaufacture as needed along the way. Punters have gotten so used to pre-orders now that they kinda see the pre-order date as the release date but thats really not the case. Release date is release date and thats when the full album will get released.

Lastly, record labels want to sell CD's, not digital. Century Media is a good example of a label that started their own e-commerce store for physical product (CMDistro) which bypasses the regular CD store in your local town and thus making more profit. With the record labels selling less and less each year they are on a desperate search to generate more income (this is actually a whole different and much more complicated story) and the margins on physical product are simply much higher than on digital. A full album on iTunes costs about 9,99 but the label only sees about 50 or 60% of that. The rest is for Apple. Selling a CD for 12,99 on CM distro is a 100% for for the record label. Of course the overhead costs for creating, storing and selling physical product is much higher but still the profit margins are bigger than with digital.

I hope this explains things a bit. I havent discussed pre-release full album leaks here which does have to do with it all but that as well is part of a much bigger discussion.

Thank you very much for explaining! (I didn't want to start the illegal downloading discussion, too.)

I guess it will be interesting to see how Relapse's deal with Bandcamp will work out for them. I bought 4 albums from their catalogue since they started the Bandcamp-thing which i wouldn't have bought without it, but i don't know if enough other customers do it, too.

Something similar to the original question, would it be possible to get a digital copy on the day if release? I pre ordered Epicloud but find it still takes a week to two weeks to get delivered

Buy the Pre-order. Then buy on iTunes the day it comes out. Then buy a shirt from the u.k. Then go to his show. But another physical copy and 5 shirts. If you all did this, he would be much better off. Don't eat for a week of that's what it takes. Quit being cheap.