Hard to find CDs

[Pro Abortion]

Where do you guys go on-line for some of the harder-to-find material on CD?  I found a place out of Ohio called Hells Headbangers and they're pretty great, but they don't have everything.  I know a lot of this shit is out of print anyway, but are there any small online distros that you guys know about?  (Besides evilmusic.com.)  Where would a guy find the Kvist album, for instance?  Or Ildjarn's "Det Frysende Nordariket?"  Or Nox Intempesta, Frozen Shadows, etc?  I don't necessarily need to know where I can find these specific albums, but I'm looking for a place that carries CDs along these lines.

[F.O.A.D.]

Miscreant,

Too be honest, i'm can't think of an website off the top of my head. I would check out amazon.com, half.com and ebay. Amazon is a good place to find used albums.

If not those, I recommend the various metal forums on the web. Thats how I got my copy of October Tides "Rain Without End." What surprised me was that I made a trade with an Malaysian trader and didn't get ripped off. And the album was in perfect condition. When I did that trade, I think i was on the Ultimate Metal forum. This was years ago though.

I hope this helps some.

[wEEman33]

Don't forget to try a Google search.

The only issue there is that you have to research the places that come up in the listings to make sure they are credible sellers.

[ray ban]

I haven't bought CDs in ages, I actually sold my entire collection on this forum and on ebay a couple years ago. I've since kept high quality rips of everything on two different hard drives and an AIDSpod and downloaded everything new that I want, which I actually highly recommend over owning hundreds of CDs.

As far as the stuff that you mentioned though, you're not going to find Det Frysende Nordariket at any online distro. This goes for a lot of black metal and death metal and I would imagine for a lot more releases now than when I was buying this kind of stuff. Your best bet for releases like this is ebay (although I bought Det Frysende Nordariket on CD for aprox. $50 and sold it later for aprox. $100) and if you really want this rare shit that bad without paying out the ass you can find lots of bootlegs for the normal CD or cassette price on ebay or miscellaneous distros. But if you're going to get a bootleg why not just download the album?

Moving on, my next recommendation would be to just keep google searching for more online distros because you really never know what you're going to find, especially with distros based in other countries. However, at the same time you could run into some assholes that will never ship your purchases or ship it like two months later, so you may want to ask them how they ship and details like that. As an example though, I was looking for In The Autumn Shade and No Longer Silent by Ceremonium for ages, and I finally found them in stock at this weird online distro I'd never seen before, go figure.

Finally, your best bet is to find out the band's label (or occasionally even contact the band directly) and check out the label's online merchandise section. When I used to look for stuff online the place that would have it 80% of the time was the band's label. Some labels and distros I remember off the top of my head are Moribund, ISO666, Ajna Offensive, No Colours, Unique Leader (bleh...) etc. you can figure it out. Also you will find some weird used shit on amazon.com, and you might want to just check out your local used record stores, even better if you've got one with a metal section (but those can be pretty ugly)! But anyway, good luck and if you really want something super hard to find I'd email the band or try and trade with someone too.

[Dave]

Obviously releases like that Ildjarn album will only turn up on eBay, but if you want some quality distros, I'd recommend Ars Magna and God is Myth. They have an interesting selection and most CDs are only $9 including shipping. I've found stuff on there that I'd consider "rare" even though it's still in print. But if you're looking for something specific, a Google search is probably the best way to go.

[death metal black metal]

Crucial distinction here:

"In-print" -- labels and bands print runs of a thousand or more CDs, generally. Then they store these and distros can buy them.

"Out of print" -- when they run out, the CD becomes OOP, and your only option to buy it is "overstock" (too many at an existing retailer) or used.

[MasterEnslaver]

If you're looking for out-of-print stuff in mp3 format, www.thrashmageddon.com is a great aid, as well as soulseek and dc++ (if you know where to go/who to talk to).

[NecronomiconMortis]

in my experience the best place to get rarities/oop CDs is EbaY if you are a diehard collector with a "Visa Gold", the alternative place is Amazon a bit expensive but efficient.


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[pagan980938127]

When I'm finding something rare online, this is the process I use:

1. Google Shopping.  Pretty straightforward, you search various online websites including eBay all at once.  If you see a few results here, it's probably not a rare item after all   The problem is most distros are not included, and even eBay or Amazon are hit-and-miss.

2. Standard google search.  Actually this gets complicated, but you're searching almost every imaginable website.  Crafting your search properly is of the essence.  These days there are a lot of worthless lyrics and MP3 websites, and you probably want to avoid these.  Make sure to use quotes (") to find exact phrases and dashes (-) to exclude certain words.  The site keyword lets you search within certain domains or websites.  For example to find results of Det Frysende Nordariket which are not lyrics or MP3/download and which are from German websites, this is a possible search:

Code: [Select]

"Det Frysende Nordariket" -lyrics -review -mp3 -download site:deAnd you can do a lot more with the advanced search option.

3.  Try websites with affiliate programs.  Metal Archives and RateYourMusic, for example, have integrated searches for the likes of Amazon, eBay, Gemm, OmegaOrder, and others onto their release pages.  The rarest items will probably not be found this way, but it's worth a shot.

4. Search websites specializing in rare music: Gemm, Musicstack, CDAndLP are a few that come to mind.

5. Look for similar, more common items.  Sometimes you'll find that Google doesn't reach everywhere, but if you find one Ildjarn CD on some website, why not investigate for the exact one you want?

6. Try again later.  Don't assume that because you can't find the item today, you will not find it tomorrow.  In the past I was searching for years to find a few certain CDs, and finally I did find them by periodically searching.

7. Otherwise, as others noted, you may have to settle for a digital copy.  Occasionally even that is not easy, so you may want to search Google for decent DC hubs, but be prepared to offer a bit of your own collection, "leechers" are not tolerated as a rule.  Often you may need to formally request access and register to use the hub.