Bruce Springsteen fans had ‘High Hopes” when The Boss announced recordings of his upcoming shows would be able to purchase. Now Springsteen is copping flack over the high price and low quality of the recordings.
What should have been a low-price purchase for a high volume sale exercise is the opposite.
Springsteen is charging $40 for each show, only making them available in mid-quality format MP3 instead of best quality FLAC format and selling the shows on obsolete technology, a 2 GB wristband USB.
Many of Bruce Springsteen’s Australian fans will want to own all 11 recordings of his shows. They will have to purchase 11 USB wristbands @$40 each to do so.
Springsteen is even being criticised for the decision to sell USB wristbands in such poor quality and high price by his own fan site Backstreets.com.
Pearl Jam pioneered the sales of recorded shows but they have a very different model to the proposed Springsteen product. Backstreets.com points out that Pearl Jam offer their shows for $9.99 for MP3 (the format Springsteen is using) but they also offer fans better quality recording at $14.99 for FLAC and $19.99 for 24-96 high quality FLAC.
Springsteen’s model is similar to the recent offering by Matchbox Twenty but, as Backstreets.com points out, Matchbox Twenty’s setlist rarely varied so fans only needed to buy one show. Springsteen does a completely different show every night, often placing songs in his setlist that had not been played for years. A lot of his fans will want every show and that will be costly for the fan.
The other complaint is the USB itself. When you purchase the wristband you are given one code for a single download. To purchase all 11 Australian shows you will have to buy 11 USB wristbands to obtain the 11 different codes needed for the shows. A 2 GB USB is already obsolete technology. You can buy an 8 GB USB at Officeworks for $4.97. That alone values the blank Springsteen disc at $1.25 retail making the mark-up excessive for what becomes a useless drive if you buy all shows and then combine them into one of your hard-drives.
The blank USB wristbands will be available at the merch stand at the Springsteen shows.
Live recordings of Bruce Springsteen’s Australian shows will be available within two days after the show from brucespringsteen.com
Springsteen resumes his tour in Cape Town, South Africa this Sunday, January 26, 2014.
Bruce Springsteen 2014 Australian dates
February 5, 7, 8, Perth, Perth Arena
February 11, 12, Adelaide, Entertainment Centre
February 15, 16, Melbourne, AAMI Park
February 19, Sydney, Allphones Arena
February 22, 23, Hunter Valley, Hope Estate
February 26, Brisbane, Entertainment Centre
Bruce Springsteen is touring Australia for Frontier Touring.
Bruce Springsteen, Rod Laver Arena, 2013, Photo By Ros O’Gorman
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