'Cause Cheap Is How I Feel

It's not very often you'll see me shilling for company on here, but I'll make an exception this time because it's a great deal for music lovers.

A few months ago I got an email about a new music service called Your Music. The basic selling point is that it sells CDs for $5.99, with free shipping. It works two ways. First, you can buy CDs anytime you want for six bucks a pop. The other way is a subscription service. You set up a queue, kind of like Netflix, with whatever albums you want. Every month on whatever your subscription date is, they send you the next album in your queue. I've got my queue loaded up albums that I've always meant to pick up, but that always get bumped down on the list of priorities when I'm CD shopping. It's kind of cool going to the mail box once a month and have somewhat unexpected new tunes to listen to.

If you're like I am, at this point you're thinking "There's got to be a catch." There is, but its a small one. If you don't have an album in your queue on your ship date, and your account is still active, you get charged six bucks for that month and you don't get anything. But thats only a problem if you don't have anything in your queue. And you can cancel your account at anytime with no minimum purchase to buy, so really you could sign up, order a bunch of CDs, and cancel your account a week later.

It's run by the same people who run BMG Music Service, so it has some of the same issues that subscription services have always had. The selection is good, but certainly not great. I've been surprised by some of the albums they did have though, and if you have a wide range of tastes, you'll have no problem finding things you want. I've even seen a few CDs on their website that have been long out of print through normal retail outlets. The other issue is that standard shipping takes about two weeks. So if you're doing last minute Christmas shopping, you'll have to spring extra for express shipping.

Cowboy Junkies - "Cause Cheap Is How I Feel" (mp3) from The Caution Horses