Pirate habit

The new Girl Talk album just dropped online, and I feel like a saint for actually shelling out $5 for it. They followed the Radiohead route, aka the Honor System, and you can pay whatever you want. You actually get access to the download links before you even pay, so it's like a double honor system. I decided five bucks was a reasonable price, though I feel strange about this behavior.

For a few reasons, I suppose:

• Sure, I threw down Night Ripper a few times, but I wouldn't say I'm a huge Girl Talk fan.
  
• By point number 1 (though this is a bulleted list, and the above bullet should really just say #1), I feel like I'm supporting the/an artist by doing this.
  
• However, I paid a whopping zero dollars for In Rainbows when that hit. Granted, I was very, very broke when that came out, and I am simply less broke now, but even at any level of broke-ness, five bucks is, well, not that much. (In about two weeks, I'll probably be able to say that the price I paid for the Girl Talk album is the same price as a gallon of gas.)

I am also on a very slow connection, and my download of said album hasn't even finished. And I could very well hate the album. I don't exactly frequent the types of late-night ragers that would accommodate and/or appreciate the latest Girl Talk album. They probably would just say, "Oh, shit, did he just throw 'Bittersweet Symphony' in there? That song fucking rules!"

That's the kind of Girl Talk fan I am, actually.

I guess this is what being an adult is all about. Paying for stuff because it's for a good cause, e.g. a record label isn't snarfing up most of the profits. This, however, comes from a guy whose iPod contains 98% worth of music outright stolen over the course of about a decade. Today felt strange, really, if only because it goes against my usual music-acquiring habit. Which is by, you know, not paying for any of it.