bump for skyrefuge
It's funny that Empyrium's 'Weiland' was featured in this thread. When that came out, I bought it blind from The End as soon as it appeared. I knew it was three discs and that it was their final statement, but just thought "whoa, they know how to go out with a bang, a three album set!" Then I get it and found out that it's just a pain-in-the-ass 50 minutes, broken down into three annoying pieces.
The upshot was that I hardly listened to it, because it was too much work. And since I hardly listened to it, I was pretty sure it wasn't any good. So for something like two years, those artfags from Empyrium lost out on the privilege and honor of caressing my ears with their music. Congratulations, assholes! Then when I eventually went all electronic and ripped it, I was able to listen to it in a normal fashion for the first time, which of course allowed me to finally recognize it as the brilliant piece of art that it is.
Maybe you could say they *wanted* it to be a lot of work to listen to their album, to make sure that only the worthy and tr00 listened to it, and listened to it carefully, while erecting a little fort around themselves out of all the packaging. But 'Weiland' has provided one of the most mind-blowing (and terror-inducing) listening experiences of my entire life. It happened on a black, moonless night in the deep woods of Tennessee, where I was completely alone, except for the phantoms of nature who watched me with malice from behind the unseen trees. Brrr....it still chills me to think about it. That would have never been possible had I not sterilized that bitch into package-less 1s and 0s, transforming into something that I could carry on my bike.
The funny thing is, the packaging actually isn't all that hot anyway. It's kinda cheap, with the three folders not really filling the slip-cases, and they're bent a bit wrong. Basically, I think what I'm saying is that it's my horrible experience with Weiland's packaging that drove me to this insanity, turning me from a peaceful, lol-ing music-lover into a crusading imbecile that antagonizes your forum for no useful reason at all. It's really all their fault. So what do you think of them now, huh? huh? They're not so great after all, right? I thought so!
Neil