OK, so check this out. It’s priceless…

CMJ holds a yearly Music Marathon and Festival in New York City that bands submit packages for in order to be considered to play one of their showcases, just like SXSW. It’s my understanding, according to a source I spoke to that you were to pay $45 for a Sonicbids EPK (electronic press kit) that was submitted to the CMJ panel for review and selection. Sounds fairly routine, yeah? Well it turns out that a lot of bands submitted packages to CMJ and after tracking their EPK stats, discovered that their songs were never even listened to. So, you pay nearly $50 and in some cases not a soul even listens to your music. Some of the greatest artists of the past 50 years weren’t handsome, so that’s really no guideline for selection. What’s the real reason?

But, it gets worse. A few hundred artists were told a few weeks ago that they were on CMJ’s “Stand-by” list and would hear shortly whether or not they were accepted to perform. So, the time came to let those unfortunate “stand-by” bands down with the news that they weren’t selected for CMJ 2007. Only problem is that they CC’d 670+ people in that email and basically opened everyone up to spam, unsolicited emails and any number of headaches. Now, I don’t know the whole story – I’m only reporting on what I saw in an email from CMJ routed through a few other bands and record labels and ending up in my inbox, but I think it’s pretty funny. Some people are requesting refunds, apologies and explanations.

One person at Shiny Little Record said this, “There were NO plays of any of our music by anyone (CMJ was the only ap we submitted). $45 should at the very least mean that they get an intern to click play on your song once. How sloppy. ”

Now, I’m no gossip blog, reporting slanderous material (Meg White sex tape anyone?) and buying into it, but this much is true – CMJ did CC everyone and it’s possible that people’s music didn’t even get heard despite paying the submission price. The upside is that CMJ is offering those bands a discounted badge rate of $175. That’s quite a bit cheaper than the $495 that badges are going to cost tomorrow. Though, in all fairness, CMJ did make over $30k from the bands referenced here.

There’s always next year, right?