The Swarm

October 10, 2007

Oink snorts at Radiohead's In Rainbows

TDS Editors

Update 10/23/07: Oink shut down…1 arrested…servers seized…

As expected, the audio snobs at uber-file sharing site/private torrent club Oink have banned Radiohead’s In Rainbows from the service do to the DRM-free files’ lower-than-CD-quality bit rate. And in the forums, Oink members aren’t quite as enthusiastic about the album as the rest of the downloading masses, and not just because its not up to their 192kbs standards. Here’s a sampling (users shall remain anonymous, natch):

- I would be pretty pissed of if I payed for the digital download, being its 160 kbps.

- The 160kbps download is a bit of a bummer but i was skeptical of this, hence the reason why i only paid 1p for the download! :p

- Does anyone know what the best email address to send constructive complains? I think they need to know that some of us are annoyed at having paid CD price and only getting 160kbps and no album art. Though generally they aren’t telling us much at all

- Normally I would agree with you. Normally I don’t really hear much difference in mastering between albums. I couldn’t really tell a difference between the Icky Thump CD vs. Vinyl, but for some reason on this one its incredibly noticeable to me, especially on a good set of headphones. It takes away from the music. And this is one of the best (worst?) examples of bad mastering I have ever heard. It is so noticeable to me. Awful.

- It is pretty bad. Just think of it as a preview/early leak, with the real release on December 3. These copies are certainly better than nothing!

- I find the Oink position on this album to be a little odd really. There’s so many different rips to suit tastes for big albums anyway, where’s the real harm in an early crap officially released one?

- Actually, here’s the thing, the big issue of sound quality on In Rainbows is not the MP3 at all. It’s the really really bad studio recording quality. They did it themselves and it shows. I thought it was a deliberate lo-fi thing at first, and I still think it partially is, but it’s still amateurish. The stereo imagery has all the subtlety of a supercharged bulldozer. Virtually EVERY track clips master recording levels when bass fires up or overlayed guitars and keyboards come together.

It’s a wonderful album. However it sounds pretty bad. I suspect a lot of people here will put it down to the MP3 which really is a very very distant issue.

UPDATE: Radiohead manager agrees:

“You can’t listen to a Radiohead record on MP3 [the digital music file standard] and hear the detail; it’s impossible,” Mr Edge said. “We can’t understand why record companies don’t go on the offensive and say what a great piece of kit CDs are. CDs are undervalued and sold too cheaply.”


Post a comment

Previous comments include

#1 Needs more FLAC says:

Come on douchebags. Who ripped the album? Your little brother?

#2 tical says:

Is it really wise to publicize Oink on this site? The content of this editorial is pretty meaningless and all you are doing is increasing the chance that the wrong people will hear about Oink. Keep it underground, dude, use your head.

#3 3 says:

like ppl dont already know about Oink.

#4 #4 says:

"due to"

#5 Wilbur tastes good. says:

"Keep it underground, dude, use your head."
"The content of this editorial is pretty meaningless"

You must live in a cave if you think that Oink exists in a cave.
Oink is well known, one only needs to look at the recent Media Defender leak to see that it's been on, not under, every music cops radar. The only reason it's still around is A)They are in a country where it's perfectly legal or B)The music police are planning something big.
As for the content, ahem, this is a music site with heavy emphasis on new formats and delivery (hence the word 'Swarm' in their name).
If yer so worried about the first rule of Oink Club, i suggest you go cry your pink little tears over at Slyck, Zeropaid and all the million other sites that talk about them too.

BTW Bravo Swarm for covering this site, MORE needs to be written about them.

#6 keepin' it Kosher says:

YES TDS PLEASE WRITE MORE ABOUT OINK, ESPECIALLY ABOUT WHAT A BUNCH OF DIOUCHEBAGS THEIR ADMINS ARE.

#7 tical says:

Right, as if "reporting" on the comments of a couple audio snobs on the oink message boards is soo newsworthy. Give me a break. The last thing we need are all the noobs who come here to read about Bobby Brown's heart attack to have oink on their radar. It's just socially irresponsible and reeks of "look at how hip and underground we are!!"

#8 Pig Sty says:

"The last thing we need are all the noobs who come here to read about Bobby Brown's heart attack to have oink on their radar."

Well judging by 'this little piggy's' comments sounds like yer the nOOB around that trough (PS good luck with that ratio).
Besides wtf are you so worried about noobs and Oink for in the firt place? The place is an invite-only system, and if they're such 'nooBs' they won't be able to find a way in anyhow.
Besides who died and made you the mediawatchdog, especially for Oink of places, where you will soon find out, my little piggy, they don't give a shit about you. All subjects are fair game in journalism, that's the bummer of a free press (digital or otherwise). Don't like it? Move to Tehran.

#9 Jonas says:

If you let 'professionals' rip a CD properly, you can get quite a bit of detail into the mp3 format.

Then of course there are the digital lossless formats like FLAC and Apple Lossless that are identical to the CD and take up half the space; perfect for those 160 GB iPods.

But the manager is right, CDs are great, and we will be missing out until the actual Radiohead CDs are here.

#10 Headfirst says:

Is it me or does anyone else think this is a (genius) marketing ploy to give people people a taste of the new album, only to have them release this properly as a CD, high quality MP3 etc etc, later on down the road?

#11 tical says:

I think "this little piggy" was being facetious. I don't use the name 'tical' on oink. I'm actually a power user with a decent positive ratio and about 8 uploaded torrents. But that is neither here nor there.

Why do I care about the noobs? because after reading this, they go and spam other forums with "someone pleeze give me an oink invite!!111" thus alterting their nooblet bretheren about the site. next thing you now, oink gets oversaturated and goes the way of (the old) napster. in this case, any publicity is bad publicity.

I'm not trying to be a watchdog for anything. I'm just someone who really appreciates Oink and I don't want to see it die an early death. Your "free press" comments are absolutely asinine. Of course, people can post what they please. But I am disappointed that the proprietors of this site lack the common sense to keep certain information out of the public forum. Perhaps if there was something really newsworthy happening with oink, it would be different. But this editorial has no real substance and it almost seems like The Daily Swarm is looking to take Oink down.

#12 This little piggy. says:

Cool down Tical, you've only been there a month.
PS you better to get your ratio up too, or you'll be in here next week screaming like a banshee about Demonoid.

#13 The other white meat. says:

Ditto.
Cool down tical, TDS ain't trying to take Oink down (I know for a fact that more than a couple of them are Oink members) and I doubt that a small blurb about them on TDS is going to upset an applecart thats weathered changes for, what, like 5 years now? Oink apparently aint Napster.
As far as it's getting over-saturated, at 100k plus members, from noob to RIAA, I think the word is well out there.
Where, noobs at the gate are concerned, there will ALWAYS be people wanting in, that's the nature of a private club. If it bothers you so much, then stop reading the 'Invites Here' thread on p2p forums. As an Oink member myself of over 3 years, I actually WELCOME noobs, it prevents the site from becoming too stale, bringing in new music versus people just re-uploading the same shit. The measures that are in place right now at Oink to kick the half-steppers to the curb work far better than someone whining real loud on a forum about how, after they joined, all these amateurs are trying to get in now. That sounds exactly like the definition of an audio-snob to me.

#14 tical says:

My main concern is not really noobs. People posting for invites in a p2p forum is one thing, but for a seemingly mainstream site like the Daily Swarm -- which I assume is popular with industry folks as well -- to post some huge front page headline centered on Oink, all this does is alert the wrong people to the site and it's magnitude. I just hope that the people who run this site -- which I think is great -- realize that with great power comes great responsibility.

#15 piggy says:

down with oink. its killing artists. its pure piracy and totally undefendable.

#16 J Beaumont says:

I don't know what noobs are and I don't care about how long Oink continues to exist, but i would say that a) these mp3s don't sound TERRIBLE--even if they aren't "pristine", they are by no means 128kpbs squelchy crap--it seems more clear that as one person points out, this was a band-produced album and they gave less of a shit about pristine Nigel Godrich-isms; b) regardless, i am not assuming the mp3s sound "perfect" and I am kinda annoyed that I paid 6 pounds for this record without being made aware that the mp3s would only be 160kpbs--sorta dick cause now i'm like, yeah, maybe i do need to get the cd afterall. Guess it's my own fault cause they didn't advertise falsely, but it does seem a little crass or at least frustrating... in any event, just dampens the joyous glow of "new business models" a little bit.

#17 Noob says:

Yo tical. can i get an invite please? i have:

band of horses - cease to exist
radiohead - in rainbows
arcade fire - neon bible
pj harvey - white chalk

thanks.

#18 Sleazy says:

If anyone belives Oink to be 'under the radar' or 'underground', they are truly kidding themselves. Even mainstream magazines have published stories on Oink and it's brethren. It's about as secret as Allofmp3.

#19 djelamerguez says:

you guys are really nothing else to do!! this is the most creative band of the last 10 years, and you just complains about the sound where actually the whole point is to show that the biggest band out there just doesn't care about the music industry business crap. The 160 kbps thing or lofi recording doesn't take anything out of the beauty of the album and out of what Radiohead really is: a f***** awesome band.
I'm a mastering engineer, and yes, maybe, on my £8000 sound system I can hear the lofi of some of the recording, but shit man, this is Radiohead, and they're giving us a good kick in the arse again!!!!

Chill out and enjoy ther music!

J

#20 tical says:

sleazy, do you mind supplying a link to one of these supposed mainstream publications about oink?

i say that if you think oink is on the level of allofmp3 you've got your head planted firmly inside your anus.

#21 Phrend says:

http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/...

They even link to OiNK! Nice.

#22 animal phat says:

YAAAAAAAAAAAY THE PIG IS COOKED LETS ALL HAVE A HAM SANDWICH!!


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