While I have not yet seen any convincing argument that the leak is a decoy, I also have not heard any good reason as to why this leak occured in the first place, if not intentional by the band. My understanding is that no outlets have recieved copies of the album yet, and that even reviewers have not actually been given a physical copy of the album. Like I said, I do not think what we have is a decoy, but, in trying to be open minded to both sides of the story, I'd like to know what others think about this. I'm guessing that I'm just wrong in assuming that nobody anywhere has obtained a copy of the album, but I'd like to see some reasoning beyond that... in other words, who would have been able to get their hands on this album? Feel free to speculate, but if you choose to do so, please make it clear - and at the same time, please source any "facts" or evidence. Please try to keep this thread clear of "this album is too great to be a decoy" or "this album sucks too much to not be a decoy" or "blair said x in y newsletter" etc... I'd just like to know more about who could have possibly gotten and leaked this album.

Maybe someone that works at the cd printing factory? I don't pretend to know how airtight the whole travel from studio to store is... my guess it that it involves a lot of people.

Yeah, I had thought about this, I don't really know if they do inventory checks to make sure the number of copies there were supposed to be made are actually all accounted for at the end of the day or anything like that.

If I've understood right the pattern is from record company -> distributors -> stores? I'm not sure how it works worldwide but here retailers get this particular cd/dv-a/whatever only few hours before store is opened (previous night or something).
Doesnt matter how much its been debated here already but it still keeps me wondering why such secrecy when the album's leaked...
.....May 2nd....

m4a format = itunes

I wonder when they actually start making the CDs. From what I've seen from the web services, you can place orders for a CD duplication, churning out 100,000 CDs in about a week. (Even less time if you pay extra).

Honestly, I am very surprised the CD press company got a copy of 10,000 Days that early. I figured to minimize the time until the leak, the CDs wouldn't be pressed that far in advance, more like a week before.

Given the right price, it's possible to do the CD pressing and shipments to the distrocenters the week of the release.

The only thing (I think) that would take time is the actual packaging, which is suprising that there haven't been good leaks/scans of it.

I used to work a CD store. Depending on the title and how "hot" it was, we usually got the album the day before it was released on monday. Every now and then we would get something two days early. (I know this is a bad example) One of the "hot" titles was some new back-door boys CD. We got that the day before at around 5:30. From talking to vendors, an average album starts pressing about two weeks before release. They start shipping usually the friday before release. But, this new Tool ablum is anything but typical.

Well a scene rip just surfaced, so say goodbye to any theories about the band leaking it. It's out, and it's one disc.

The leak originated on a private torrent site, the person who upped said they did not have an actual copy of the CD, but wouldn't tell me anymore than that. This led to a lot of speculation that the leak we have was a copy of a copy.

Also strange that we still have yet to see any other rip of the album surface. I see lots of transcodes, but why don't we have another rip yet? Strange.

link? (to proof, not the rip)

Has anyone compared the radio version of Vicarious, mix wise, to the leaked version? Discrepancies besides the usual radio vs. cd quality?

Yep. That ends just about everything. Start counting down until the 16th...

Discernable difference in quality or no?

Yes, it sounds much better. I havn't heard enough to comment on the mastering, but the rip is phenominal. Not lossless, but good.

Well, now all debate can end. As most had said, what we heard is the real deal.

*sigh*

Why would this be the goodbye to the/a decoy theory?

Let me be clear here: I think there is some pretty clever playing going on here, and releasing / leaking some more rips, preferably more towards the release date of higher bitrates and less lossy compression, ( and around the world for that matter) would only make the impact of the real deal more deeper.

I expect several "new rips""and ISO's to appear.

Cheers,

z

It's a scene release. That's why.

Occam's Razor.

except this is from one of the biggest mp3 groups out there and i doubt tool handed this over to them just to con us all.

edit: yeah what ethos said. =P

I'm not familiar with that stuff, does that mean it *definitely* has to be the retail version that's appearing in stores next week? Why wasn't the artwork included in the torrent file?

Not "Definitely" but more than likely, yes. I don't know how often artwork is included.

What's a scene release? (sorry, English is not my native language)

Z

It means it was released by a warez group. And this is a big, respected group.

I thinks it a decoy. some of the tunes are real and other ar not.. botril would never put out anything as shoddy as that as the final master. if you listen to what has been running round the net and you know anything about producing you will hear that most of the tunes are shody.. his vocals give it way..

Just my opinion is all.

Is there any difference in quality? I'm curious to know if we can say for sure it is a different "rip" than the one that we have all heard.

While I respect your opinion, I would like to request we keep this thread related to the topic of the leak itself... there are countless other threads where your post is more on-topic.

The Scene release would include a .nfo file. the first release didnt. all thats being thrown out there right now are recompressed files of the original .m4a files.

compare what u have to another tool album .. rip a tune to mp3 and listen to the diff... levels in what i have heard arnt right.

soz im new here . will do

but i think the leak was intentional

So this applies to the most recent release that you guys are talking about?

00-tool-10000_days-2006.nfo

ok, thanks for the education ;-)

Now that I know what a scene rip is, I have the following question: Why is the fact that a respectable warez group releases this, proof that this is the real deal?

IF you wanted to pull this off (I'm using a bigger IF than I did 15 minutes ago, admittedly) you would want to have such groups do some releasing for you, wouldnt you?

Thanks,

z

As far as I know, it signifies that these set of songs exist as a retail CD which will be released next week.

You are grasping at straws. A known warez group would want nothing to do with any record co.

What this means is that there is a physical CD out there in the form of 10,000 days. Whether this is the CD that will be released on May 2nd, or more importantly, the album that they worked the past 5 years on, is besides the point.

You mean the past 2 and a half years, roughly.

maybe. i thought maynard said that this album took 9-12 months to make?

I understand that fully.

But, how difficult would it be for tool/reccompany to get a bogus set out to such a group? (not hardware, but just the digital form, ISO or high-res rip). I dont think it would be very difficult, if you know some guys in the digital underground.

but, I admit, I just want this to be not the real deal, I was not so impressed with the stuff I listened to as I was when Lateralus came out. That blew my mind, this didn't.

Z

Just stop. That's not likely at all.