For those about to rock…please wait at least three weeks. (Updated)

Update: Today, June 13th, I received confirmation that my order finally shipped! Nick, however, still has not received a shipping notice. -B

Original post:

So, a few weeks back on the show I aired some grievances with a few pre-order packages I was waiting on and I forgot to give y’all an update on those during the last episode.

The first package I was waiting for was my Alice In Chains “The Devil Put Dinosaurs Here” shirt and CD bundle. The album shipped prior to its May 28th release date, but UPS estimated 11 days to bring it from North Carolina to Massachusetts (a trip that I noted could be made on foot in only 8.5 days.) Well, I’m happy to report that it only took about 9 days to deliver and it showed up last week Saturday (only 4 days late) leaving us plenty of time to listen to it and review it for this weeks show. All is well.

The TesseracT pre-order, however, is a very different story. I ordered the digipak and hoodie package as well as a few other shirts from Merchconnection.com. At the time of placing the order, the website said for shipping info “This bundle will begin shipping shortly before May 28th, 2013.” As we all know, both Brian and I did not receive our orders in time for the review on Episode 87. I was understanding at the time that since Monday the 27th was a holiday that it added a degree of difficulty to coordinating deliveries to arrive on or before the albums release date, so I waited until the end of the day on the 28th to write a quick note to Merchconnection and inquire about the status of the order since I had still not heard anything on shipping confirmation. Here is their response:

“Hi We are still waiting for the shipment containing your CD digipak to come in from our suppliers. It should be coming in at any time. As soon as it does we will let you know and update you on your order immediately. Thanks!”

I forwarded that email along to Brian so he could share in my joy that we’d soon be receiving our orders and that there was a reason for the delay. Now, if they’d followed through on that, all would be well. However, the following Tuesday (June 4th) they sent this email to, supposedly, all customers that pre-ordered the TesseracT album:

“Hello, we wanted to send an update to all buyers regarding the purchase of the preorder bundles for the new Tesseract album. To put it briefly, distribution was unable to supply us with enough units to ship all packages for delivery by street date. This is incredibly unfortunate, but also something that we can not control as we are essentially left to wait on these units. Distribution has now sent us the remaining units needed to fulfill the rest of our preorders. Any remaining orders that have not yet been fulfilled will be shipped this week. We thank you kindly for your patience and understanding. If you are still waiting on a shipping confirmation email on your Tesseract preorder, please expect it this week.

Thanks”

And I did expect it. It never came though. I checked with Brian, who not only didn’t get a confirmation, but also didn’t get the courtesy email that I’d gotten. I sent them a follow up letter on Monday, June 10th (a day short of two weeks after the release date) and got this for a response:

“Hi These preorders are still being filled and shipped out. If you have not received tracking look for it this week. Thanks”

Look familiar? That was Monday. Still no news on shipping confirmation. Still no merch at my door.

As a side note, I did send a note to Century Media (TesseracT’s label) last week about the disappointing dealings with Merchconnection and they took the time to shoot me an email back right away, forward my message onto their promo and distribution teams about future dealings with Merchconnection, and also offered to send me a TesseracT shirt on top of that. Top notch dealings with a top notch company.

Let this be a lesson people: order from the label or band directly.

-n

P.S. To further Nick’s commentary, I emailed Merch Connection yesterday (June 11), a full two weeks after Altered State‘s release, since I had yet to receive any updates directly from them.  I got the same email Nick received on June 4th.  As of this posting, I have not received any further word from Merch Connection.  In the meantime, I received today, a day after it’s release, my pre-ordered Black Dahlia Murder – Everblack (Metal Blade) box set, which was ordered through Indie Merch.  I also received my pre-ordered Scale the Summit – The Migration (Prosthetic) vinyl & t-shirt yesterday, release day, which was also through Indie Merch. – B