Blogcritics: Comments on The Mars Volta: Frances the Mute

Comment by Tom Johnson

Mon, 14 Mar 2005 15:54:23 EST

Thanks Tim, that at least clears up that mystery. Now if only Universal would fix the problem . . .

Comment by Tim Hall

Mon, 14 Mar 2005 12:38:13 EST

I'm describing it as having five tracks because "Miranda" and "Cassandra" are each continuous pieces of music. Perhaps I should have used the word "Song" rather than "Track", but song is hardly the word to use for 20+ minutes of anything on the album. On my CD, "Miranda" is one long track, while "Cassandra" is split into eight sections , even though the liner notes only list five parts. I have an EU-made CD, and there's no sign of any static on track 9; this supports your belief that it's a (US) pressing problem.

Comment by Tom Johnson

Sun, 13 Mar 2005 22:37:13 EST

You must have the Itunes version of the album - the CD is split into 12 separate tracks ("Miranda" and "Cassandra" are broken up by their subsections.) If you do have the Itunes version, can you check something? On the CD, it's track 9, from around 3:40 on - unfortunately I can't tell you where in the single-track version that is, but listen for static that sounds unnatural, like a bad disc. The forum at The Comatorium lit up the week it came out with dozens of complaints about this problem. My disc suffers from it too, and I even exchanged it for another - same problem persists, but in slightly different places and volumes. I'm curious to know if the Itunes version has these errors, too. It is, without a doubt, unintentional. I've heard my share of bad pressings and this is certainly one. I have a feeling, however, that at an average price of about $6.99 consumers are going to have a hard time getting the label to take this seriously and offer replacements. Is it copy-protection gone awry? No one seems to know, but it is on Universal, who are apparently putting out discs with copy-protection, even in the US where our fair-use rights should make this cumbersome attempt at preventing copies basically illegal.