Paul McCartney - Egypt Station - Traveller’s Edition / Explorer's Edition*

No I’ve been a photo agent for 33 years. I rep commercial photographers and I work with ad agencies , designers , book publishers , food packagers and have worked on a bunch of printing promo pieces for my artists. I know about photo and illustrations licensing fees and used to know design fees and some printing costs.

 

There has been parallel music related merchandise for decades. Ever looked through a Beatlefest catalogue ? Fun stuff along with a ton of crap. But there’s a huge audience for licensing art type objects which has only grown bigger since the decline of physical music sales

 

How about that! I have the same puzzle. But all of the pieces are missing EXCEPT for 1 piece. And guess which one? I'll mail that piece to you ...

 

A fool and his money...

 

Mojo has been doing this for a while. Last year, they released a similar publication for The Beatles. Earlier this year, they did the same for Bowie.

 

The response i’d expect from you ​

 

Likewise

 

If that's the case then that's the case, I don't know any better.

Side by side against the BBB though there's so little actual unique printed material. By unique I mean the format - size, paper type, colour use. There's also no-where near as much printed material in general. BBB looks, to me, to contain hundreds of pages of printed material as well as 10 times the audio content. I can't imagine that the production costs of this item get anywhere near that for the BBB despite being priced the same. The only thing I can think of that would cost any real figure to produce would be the suitcase itself.

It looks badly priced when compared the BBB and really poorly priced in comparison to WOA which must have cost a fortune to put together. It's perceived value is a lot lower than BBB.

The worry I have is that this is just going to set a precedent for overpriced underwhelming sets and it selling out sends the message that fans are happy to support this sort of shenanigans. And it is shenanigans in this case.

 

Take away the price of the two box sets at retail value — that the actual cost of Wings Over Europe and the sleeve.
Considering that there were at most 3,500 copies and the same Archive sets had to be pulled for those, with distribution world-wide, you end up with a costly amount of labour for a small amount of product.
Especially when there's a distributor cost (so the people shipping make a profit) and label cost (because they are hosting the sales, paying the artist royalties, promoting, etc.) before MPL — and MPL has to pay the designers, the restoration team, etc.

 

I had a look now at the Beatlefest catalogue and I must admit that you are right. I agree that it is shockingly bad. I somehow see the sale of music content different to the sale of memorabilia which is licensed (or illegally produced). In my mind the two were separate markets but obviously this is not the case.

 

I can’t wait to find out what the hidden stuff is.

 

Probably a false bottom in the suitcase with a dvd or usb. Play it and get you get a jokey (Dana Carvey-like) Paul McCartney intro saying something like “Good job, travelers! You’ve found the hidden compartment! And we’ve got something special for you! It’s the Team Henrik version of “Come On To Me” (dance video) which is previously unreleased! Now you can vote for a new favorite in the #COTMChallenge!”

 

I'm frightened at how plausible that is.

 

Boy that would be terrible but honestly I can totally see it

 

Don't expect anything great like a full concert and hour long interview. Those are the sort of things they promote in a press release. Usually it's the puzzle that is the hidden surprise. The fact that they lead with the puzzle and poster "worthy of framing" scares me to imagine what the surprise could be.

 

Seriously, what the hell is anyone going to do with this "over blown" additional cash grab....and considering that "Egypt Station" is a far cry from being a good LP...maybe two songs where his voice is decent...the rest..well????

 

Perhaps a half pound of marijuana is secreted in the false bottom of the suitcase.

 

Nope, according to Japanese officials, he leaves it at the top.

 

It's an Egypt Station toupee cleaning kit for the seasoned traveller.

 

Paul likes it on top ...

 

The Toppermost of the Poppermost!!

 

Yes, and well-established artists with considerably long careers often get into other art-forms in addition to their music or whatever else it may be in the entertainment industry. It serves to keep boredom at bay, among other things, instead of just doing another album on a treadmill. Of course, McCartney got interested in painting and graphics in recent years, and is likely proud of this release, which has an art concept and combines a couple of his ongoing life interests.

 

Or just sand.