Blue or Gold?

Just a bit of a rant…

Does this record look blue to you?

This is the "blue" vinyl pressing of Madonna's True Blue I mentioned a while back that finally arrived.

Disappointed does not begin to describe it.

I immediately contacted the buyer who agreed to a return:

"If you wish. I did not manufacture the record so I am not sure what you expected."

Excuse me? Then, in an attempt to make me the bad guy in this transaction, sent several followup emails, including one from someone not even involved in the transaction, dated September 2016!:

"Does anyone know why there were such variations in the colour of the Vinyl in the Aust edition? I have one that when not held against the light almost looks black and has a marble effect, and another that is perfect blue. Happy to post a pic if someone could help."

The seller followed that up with, "Did you look at the photos?"

You mean the one you just sent with that two-and-a-half year old email?

And the final email received:

"A buyer asked me to send photos so I did. If you ask for photos of the item I can sedn them. Please remember that I DID NOT MANUFACTURE THE ALBUM"

If that weren't enough, the vinyl grade of VG+ he assigned to the record itself was more than a bit overstated. The surface noise was horrific.

Even though he agreed to cover the cost of the disk itself, I was out on shipping. Considering it cost me an additional $25 to send the record back to Australia, honey, that ain't happening. I lodged a complaint with Paypal, so I'm hoping to get the initial shipping fee refunded as well.

In the meantime, I discovered that True Blue had been reissued in 2016 by Sainsbury's in the UK:

As you can see, the vinyl is truly blue.

It was a couple dollars more than I paid for the 1986 pressing, but this one is brand new and unplayed. Fingers crossed. It's somewhere over the Atlantic as we speak…