Oh, Columbia House and BMG. How I screwed you when I was a teenager. I must have cashed that little deal in twice with each new Address we moved to. It was mail order Napster for me.
You see, I am blessed with many names John, Mike, Michael, John Michael and more, all used to fill my cart with wares from Mail Order Clubs offering free (to me) music.
For those who don't remember this amazing deal, it was promoted in every newspaper and magazine in the country. You send them a penny, they send you 12 Cassettes or 8 CD's, and you commit to buying a few tapes for full price later. Best part, they billed you for the shipping.
Sound too good to be true? It was. They call it negative option billing and it's kind of dirty, unless you stuck it to them like I did. Karma is a bitch, Columbia House.
Downside was that they had a limited selection of music, but to me, free was free. I would just have to suffer through Van Halen's 5150 (which I actually really love) if they didn't have VH-II. At very least, it was another tape for the case.
Even better yet, they sent you a catalog each month, and if you did not send the order card back with a "no thank you, not this month" box checked , they sent you "their pick" automatically at some premium rate. I think I ended up with a Krokus tape because of not returning the card (ironically titled "Change of Address"). Just another freebie to me....
The little thief Nago's music snatching was not exclusive to mail order clubs. One afternoon, K-Mart begged me to steal a Cinderella tape, how could I resist? However, the easiest pickings were at Murphys in the mall. Unfortunately, you had to steal from the "Bargain Bin". Hence, in 1986, I had a Nazareth tape.
I must admit that my catholic guilt was in full swing when it came time to steal from retail, and I really didn't like doing it. At some point I gave it up for mail order thievery exclusively.
I am not saying I feel good about any of this and I am definately am not proud of it. I only hope that some executive from Columbia House is not reading this and selling my name to a collection agency... However, if footage exists of a pre-teen Nago stealing tapes from the mall, I WOULD PAY TO SEE IT!!!!
I am sitting here trying to remember the Tapes I got on my first go around. There was some complete crap there, I'm sure. In my defense, I was 12 years old.
I think maybe the list included:
- Van Halen - 5150
- Heart - Heart
- Bryan Adams - Reckless
- Ratt - Dancing Undercover
- Foreigner - Agent Provocateur?
- Less than Zero Soundtrack?
- Something by Petra?
- Grim Reaper - See you in Hell?
OK, I am positive on the VH, Ratt, Bryan Adams and Heart. The rest were definitely in my tape case, but I don't remember if they came from Columbia House or not.
Conclusion: There is no point to this blog what-so-ever other than puking out random memories. The real story is in the link below thanks to the professionals at Mental Floss. I wasted your time, and you're welcome...
For the dirty details on Negative Option Billing and Columbia House, check out the article in the link:
http://mentalfloss.com/article/28036/its-steal-how-columbia-house-made-money-giving-away-music
Around the world, or around the block. Everywhere I go, the nerds wanna rock.
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