that's a lot of music.....

[kk]

http://www.sternsmusic.com/disk_info.php?id=3218462

[Neil Foxlee]

£50 for 18 CDs = £2.78 per CD; @ £80, it's £4.44 each. Better get in there quick if you want it!

As someone who's only occasionally dipped their toe (so to speak) into the vast ocean of African music, I do...

NB: I changed the postage from "OTHER" to UK, which reduced the postage cost from over £7 (which seems high) to £1.70 (which seems too low). No doubt Sterns will let me know if it's a mistake...

O the excitement of impulse buying.... (effective marketing on Sterns part)

O the doubts about how often I'll play an 18CD box set...

O the anticipation...

[Adam Blake]

It's a lot of music, yes. I hope a lot of libraries pick up copies. It's great that this stuff is gathered all in one place.

[jackdaw version]

O help!

[jackdaw version]

Nobody helped me. I read a bit of the bumpf about it. I thought to myself, "I don't need that. I'm sure I have about 2/3 of the tracks already." I read the bumpf some more. I observed that

Many of these songs are known and loved worldwide: Pata Pata, Soul Makossa, Yeke Yeke, Sweet Mother, Mario, Shakara, Jive Soweto. Others will be revelations to even the most dedicated record collectors.

Ouch! The hook was in the mouth! And then the barb caught me and I was reeled in*:

The deluxe longbox set includes a 60-page book of photographs, record-cover reproductions, specially-commissioned artwork and essays by experts on each of Africa s popular styles. Pieces by Mark Hudson (Daily Telegraph), Véronique Mortaigne (Le Monde), Patrick Labesse (Le Monde), Francis Dordor (Les Inrockuptibles) Bouziane Daoudi (La Libération), Daniel Brown, Daniel Lieuze and Leonardo da Silva (RFI, French Radio). Anyone with serious interest in African music will recognize this set s extraordinary value. It will be the essential collection of African popular music for the next 50 years.

I pulled out the credit card and the rest is a blur.

But I know I'm waiting for something to arrive in the post.

* Please note that I am not actually a fisherman and so, if my angling terminology is incorrect, that explains the problem.

[jackdaw version]

I forgot to say "thank you" to kk for bringing this extravagance to my attention! Thank you, kk — a good temptation is only worth resisting for so long!

[Des]

It's gone up to £65 already - how come?

[Dominic]

It's gone up to £65 already - how come?

The £50 offer was for the first 50 orders. As far as I understand more than 50 had been ordered by yesterday (Tuesday) - all of those will be fulfilled at the offer price. Not sure why it hasn't gone to eighty quid!

[Neil Foxlee]

Like I said, "Better get in there quick if you want it!" - ie at the cheaper price. The standard price. however, is cheaper than advertised (£65 rather than £80). Looks as though they've got a market for it out there.

[jackdaw version]

I swear, well almost, that I am never buying a retrospective African music compilation again! This one really is supersized.

[kk]

Not sure why it hasn't gone to eighty quid!

i am feeling cheated now... i wanted to save GBP30, not just GBP15..... ([smiley emoticon !])

[Neil Foxlee]

It's 55 euros from Amazon France (plus what I reckon to be 5.82 euros postage to the UK), which comes in at around £50, not allowing for credit-card currency charges. Mind you, it's temporarily out of stock ("en rupture de stock", as our Gallic chums put it).

The label it's on is not Sterns, but Discograph, a French outfit (though Sterns are also credited).

My copy has just arrived, but I can't play it for a while. Sigh...

[Neil Foxlee]

Some reactions already from the Vibes d'Afrique website, purely based on the Congolese tracklist by the look of it. You can't please all of the people all of the time...

http://vibesdafrique.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=1&action=display&thread=3494&page=1

[Des]

They're even more pissy on that forum than we are on this one!

There's a rogue apostrophe on the cover of the collection. That should by rights reduce the price.

[Dominic]

The label it's on is not Sterns, but Discograph, a French outfit (though Sterns are also credited).

Robert (Stern's boss) did a lot of work on it but isn't properly credited (if at all). Nor did he get a chance to proofread it - he might have missed the rogue apostrophe, but would have made sure all the artists' names were spelt correctly!