Help needed with Direct Music on-line store.

[Paulo Elias]

Folks,

Last year I was seeking for an on-line store that could sell me a copy of the 5.1 SACD edition of Mike Oldfield's Tubullar Bells, and I found Music Direct.

I opened an account and placed an order to that effect on December 13th 2008. They back ordered the disc, time passed and nothing happened.

Then things started to become weird: I wrote them an e-mail. No answer, I waited for all the end-of-year festivities to end and wrote them another e-mail. No answer. So I wrote another e-mail asking them to cancel my order and close my account. No answer!

As you may have realized I don't live in the US, and I usually contact US on-line dealers by e-mail. It is the first time ever that I get no answer, except for the usual "auto" acknowledment that a message was received.

I would be pleased if anyone in this forum could tell me what is going on with Music Direct, if they are in trouble or something or if they always have this habit of acknowledging messages and not answering them.

By the way: my order still stands, and the disc is still on "backorder". As far as I know, the SACD Japanese version of this recording was discontinued, and the Virgin edition is difficult to get.

Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[Johnny Vinyl]

I had the same problem with AcousticSounds this year. I had ordered David Gilmour's ON AN ISLAND (vinyl) and some record sleeves and it took nearly 6 months before they sent it. I had tried to cancel the order when they gave me that option in an email, but it was disregarded and they sent the products anyway.

As far as I know, both of these companies are very reputable, but their ordering system needs to be improved upon. And that's saying nothing about their shipping prices, which are ridiculously high in my opinion.

I've looked at various other sites to see if I could find your requested SACD, but have had no luck so far.

John

[Halcro 1]

Is that Music Direct .... Chicago USA ??? Direct music is a drum shop and the Music Direct site is working fine

[Clark Kent]

My guess is that even though the item was listed on the website, they did not have it in stock at all with little chance of acquiring any stock in the future. It is one of the hazards of ordering rare SACDs over the Internet. I have that Tubular Bells SACD and it is real nice with the original quad mix as the surround option. I would not expect to get it from Music Direct but maybe an email to them might help. I do not know.

Here is a link to Amazon marketplace with that SACD in stock for the low price of $110 plus shipping:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B000057NVH/ref=sr_1_olp_2?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1233010980&sr=8-2

I would probably search Ebay and the like before resorting to buying it off Amazon. Here is another link that might be more helpful finding a better deal on it. Amazon.fr looks to have a copy available for 20 Euros.
http://www.sa-cd.net/showtitle/578

I see a Virgin listing for a Japanese import SACD edition at Elusivedisc, but it has not come out yet as it looks to be a pre-order:
http://www.elusivedisc.com/prodinfo....er=VIRSAMI3185

[sandman6662]

sorry for you mishap, But as for Music Direct , they are a great company, My wife ordered my Marantz DV-7001 for playing SACD,after XMAS, and it was Dlvd. like in 4 days by UPS. , I even called them twice and very plesents to talk to , ,I will trust them anytime , myself that is.

[Paulo Elias]

Music Direct is indeed located in Chicago:

318 North Laflin Street
Chicago, IL 60607
312.433.0200 / (800)449.8333
312-433-0011 fax

I assumed that since the forum had a link to the company, they should have sustained a reasonable reputation as a dealer, and in fact I have had a very positive consumer relationship with US-based dealers so far, and therefore no reasons to be suspicious of anything.

Had I been living in the US I would surely have placed them a phone call, but that not being the case I have to rely on e-mail messagem, which, BTW, never let me down with other dealers.

What is particularly annoying is that they don't say anything, not even in response to my last request to close my account. I have no problems and perfectly understand when problems arise when products are no longer in stock, but in this case they should have advise me about that and give me the option to cancel the order.

With this particular SACD things are considerably more complicated, because HMV Japan already informed me that the Japanese version (SACD 4.0) has been discontinued. The Virgin, UK, edition (SACD 5.1) is still for sale, although not at the reach of most consumers.

I am a customer of Amazon's but buying it for the price range third parties request is simply unthinkable. I also found one Virgin edition on E-bay but it was not dispatched to my country. At the moment, I think I'll have more chances on E-bay than any place else, but it is a matter of being patient.

There is also the XRCD of the same recording, which I might order, if I don't succeed with the SACD purchase.

Thanks to all of you trying to find me a copy of this disc. The Elusive option seems to be a new pressing. If only I got cancel my order with Music Direct or have it filled, that would be fine for me.

Best regards,
Paulo Roberto Elias.

[Paulo Elias]

HI, again!

Since Music Direct did not bother to answer all of my messages, including my wish to cancel my order and close my account, I decided to make a move somewhere else: I bought an used SACD disc of Tubular Bells from a seller inside Amazon's web site and with Amazon's assistance. I have used this system before and works fine.

Most sellers there will offer this SACD for more than 100 US dollars. It so happens that a new offer turned up with a significant lower price. They said the disc was sealed and there was only one for sale. If everything goes well I am getting it at the end of February.

As for Music Direct lack of courtesy, I will continue to try to close down my account, and I deeply regret that they wanted my business to be dealt elsewhere, without even telling me!

[Paulo Elias]

Folks,

Earlier this morning I saw my order with Music Direct cancelled, and needless to say I was quite relieved. I don't know what this is due. I had asked them to close down my account but they did not close it. Neither did they write to at least tell me that my order was cancelled.

I have a friend in the US and had already asked him to phone them and try to sort things out. I thought that MD cancelled the order due to his call, but I got an-email from him just now saying that he hadn't done it yet. So, I assume that either one of my messages got through, or anyone of the MD's staff was reading this thread.

What follows next is my opinion and my opinion only. Please read it with caution:

I have been a customer of US-based web retailers since the days when the Internet was driven by text-only applications. In those days I had to "telnet" the dealer to order anything, and believe me, never had a single problem with them!

Like many others here I saw small, excellent companies closing down due to competition and other problems. But, mind you, ethics was never an issue!

I am perfectly all right with small businesses having trouble answering all of the customers' e-mails, but not to the point that they would not consider writing you a small message to explain specific order situations, like this one for example.

I search my e-mail provider spam filter on a daily basis, so as to recover legitimate messages amidst ordinary spam messages. In this case, Music Direct, to the best of my knowledge, never sent an e-mail message to my account, in regard to my inquiries. They did, however, sent me auto acknowledgements of their on-line e-mail form, which proves conclusively that they could have sent me any messages that would not be filtered or lost.

I don't know, and in fact it is not my concern to get to know, what is going on over there or how MD do business with consumers. And I for one who would not take advantage of this incident to incite people to not order from them again or to disrupt their reputation with the forum.

What happens now is that I am, nevertheless, and hopefully quite understandably, reluctant to ever place an order with Music Direct again, regardless of the reputation they might have with other forum members of this site. I only wish that they close this unpleasant incident by closing my account for good.