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E! Online has this interesting tidbit about why Analog Heart was pulled from Amazon in April:

At the behest of Idol producers, Cook says he pulled the album pulled from Amazon’s MP3 downloads section last month shortly after topping the site’s charts, due to “fairness issues.”

Fairness issues? A-HA. I knew it was only because he was selling more than the other contestants who had albums out. Though it only sold about 1200 copies in its last two weeks on Amazon, this was apparently significant enough to cause the producers alarm, even though the voting was in the tens of millions every week.

If the producers were really interested in being “fair,” they should have blocked sales of any existing records by any contestant, but of course they couldn’t do that, because the vast majority of those had legal ties to other recording companies. Cook got screwed there because AH was solely his and the producers could lean on him.

Semi-good news, Cook fans! Amazon again has a page up for Analog Heart, though it is not available at this time—you can sign up to have them email you once it becomes available. I’m assuming that, now Cook’s won Idol, he’ll be free to release it for sale again, unless, of course, his contract with 19 Entertainment somehow forbids him to do so.

I am in the throes of a full-blown obsession with David Cook’s 2006 album, Analog Heart (no longer available, sadly, for purchase anywhere I’ve looked), an obsession the likes of which I haven’t experienced since I got Spitz’s single collection albums last year (and they’re my favorite band). In the two-odd weeks since I got it, I’ve listened to Analog Heart in its entirety at least once a day. No kidding. In fact, I’m listening to it right now—I like it that much.

So I blogged recently about getting Idol contestant David Cook’s 2006 self-produced album, Analog Heart, and how, as of this morning, it was the top selling MP3 album on Amazon.

But now, I’ve noticed a couple of things:

• There were some reports of it being pulled from Amazon briefly, and
• If you look at the album download page now, all sales rank information has been hidden as if it never was.

What do you want to bet that the Idol production team is somehow behind this? I’m sure a wide public perception that Cook is the front-runner—that, indeed, his victory is inevitable—could adversely affect voting patterns.

Update 2008-04-22 06:53—What?! As of now, you can’t buy (or sample!) the album at all, though the item page is still there. The buy and sample buttons have been removed from each individual track and the whole album, too. This I don’t get at all. I can understand removing the sales statistics, but not preventing it from being sold altogether.

First, if anything, that’s like closing the barn door after the horse has escaped, and second, this clandestine behavior smacks of under-the-table dealing, which, historically speaking, will only come back and bite the masterminds in the ass.

Mark my words: this is a PR nightmare in the making.

Update 2008-04-22 07:39—There are mutterings about this on Usenet, some wondering if Cook released Analog Heart for digital distribution after the AI season started.

Like others on the forum, though, I’m inclined to believe that the album was available before the season started, as are the albums made by other contestants (Carly Smithson, Kristy Lee Cook and Brooke White among them^*), but since DC has pulled ahead of the pack in recent weeks, there has been an upsurge of public interest in any available previous work, and the resultant sales spike took the AI production team by surprise.

^* Whose albums, by the way, are still available for purchase, making the removal of Analog Heart seem kind of unfair, if it was done just because it’s the only one of them that’s gotten enough public interest to become a phenomenon in its own right. Like I said: P. R. Nightmare.

Update 2008-04-22 10:39—More at MJ’s Big Blog.

Update 2008-04-22 14:47—Charming. Now Analog Heart no longer comes up in a search on Amazon, and if you try to follow the link I provided above, you get a 404 error.

Update 2008-04-22 14:56—If you intended to buy the album legitimately but missed the opportunity before it was pulled, you can still buy it from Fuzz. I’d recommend getting it before the same thing happens there.

Update 2008-04-26 16:25—And, quelle surprise, it is no longer available from Fuzz, either. Hope you got the chance to buy it before it disappeared.

on American Idol that, more than anyone else on the show, David Cook (whom, I’ll admit, I have formed a bit of an obsession for) was ready to make an album, and I said that I couldn’t wait to buy his music.

Turns out that (a) I didn’t have to wait so long, after all, and (b) there’s a reason DC seems to be more ready for the big time than the rest (in the words of my sister, he’s the only contestant that has never sounded like an amateur this season): he produced and released a solo album in 2006 called Analog Heart, which I sampled and bought this morning.

After listening to it, its assured polish makes me feel almost bad for the other contestants; Cook shows he’s an accomplished musician and songwriter, and we already know about his formidable singing talents. It seems evident now that he’s just biding his time before he hits it big. But back to the album: Analog Heart, though not as slickly produced as Daughtry’s larger-budget debut, shows a depth and a confidence you don’t normally see in a debut effort, and has enough rough edges to make me anticipate Cook’s future work. Very nice.

My favorite songs on the album include Don’t Say a Word (hands down), Searchlights, Fall Back into Me and Makeover.

Oh, and a bit of trivia: Cook put his degree in graphic design (of all things) to use by designing the cover art for Analog Heart. Neat-o.

Update 2008-04-21 11:41—Apparently Analog Heart is currently the top selling MP3 album on Amazon, outselling the new Mariah Carey CD and the Juno soundtrack, among others. Wow.