Almost one year ago to this day I posted on the auspicious news regarding the return of the early noughts Shelley-Devoto “Buzzkunst” album in its new guise as “Special Sauce” by the now re-branded Buzzkunst. The album had not been on LP prior during the Great Vinyl Drought™ so this normally would get only the slightest rise out of me since I greatly prefer CD to LP. However, they rejiggered the contents so that there were two new songs on it [with three removed]. That alone would not be enough for even Devoto-collecting me to buy a co$tly LP from the UK mail order these days.

So they salted the notion with Monk-bait® that was unmissable; a second album of Devoto solo efforts concurrent with the period of recording for the album called “Designoid” and credited to Devoto alone. There were 1000 LPs pressed up for £25/each plus shipping, and it was an exclusive from Cargo Records in the UK. I bought one and paid [with postage] £45.00 when all was said and done for the privilege. And I was happy to do it as I got hot fistfuls of Devoto music I could get no other way.

That the 2xLP has sat, unspun in my Record Cell for a full year, was down to a complete and utter lack of the half a day, minimum, of free time to digitize the new music to hard drive, denoise it, and cobble together sleeve art to accompany the gold archival CD I planned to burn of that puppy. That’s nothing unusual. I bought 6-7 LP only releases last year and all of them have sat unheard since their arrival in my home. It’s just the way it goes with me and records! It’s the primary [but not only] reason why I prefer the CD format…if I can buy it.

So it was with great annoyance that I received the email last week from Wire-Sound, the font of all things Devoto online, trumpeting that the website now was selling an exclusive repressing of the “Special Sauce” 2xLP in an edition of 300…with a CD of both LPs on a single disc in a card slipcase tucked in like an afterthought! Cost is now £30.00 for the package, but there’s a CD in it!!

The big question for me is…how much do I want to spend to get the CD I should have had the chance to buy in the first place!!?? I’m already in over $60.oo American for the first album. The new edition will now set me back $67.00 to have it chucked across the great divide. Thanks largely to the lobotomy scar playing with the US economy as if it were his own private toy right now. I will have the music on CD and can listen to it repeatedly, and immediately. Which is worth a lot in my lifestyle. But is it worth over $120.00? Even for Howard Devoto?

As I type these words there are roughly half of the 300 piece edition still available for sale. I have time to chew on this conundrum. Just not a lot of it. But I don’t immediately feel that this is a good use of my limited resources. I could possibly go to my grave not hearing that music but I would be dead and thus it wouldn’t bother me. Not even on my deathbed. So there’s a part of me; the larger part, it must be said, that wants to say “That’s it. Game over. I’ve bled enough for this cause.”

While there’s a smaller chunk of me that thinks, “Well, if I can sell off the unplayed “Special Sauce” 2xLP I already have for enough to cover its cost and maybe a part of the shipping fees, perhaps I can still re-order this CD enhanced version?” But from my aging music fan perspective, this doesn’t look too likely to happen. I think I’ve put enough skin into this game already and will just get on with my life as if I hadn’t heard of this highly annoying second pressing with the CD I wanted all along.

But if you’re a Devoto fan who maybe missed out on the whole shebang; the CD of “Buzzkunst” by Shelley-Devoto in the distant realm of 2002. Or even the 2024 issue of “Special Sauce,” by Buzzkunst with “Designoid” by Howard Devoto added as bait…then I’d urge anyone reading this to make like a DJ and hit that button!

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