Heartland

MONTREAL — A disappointed Warren Hill says he's going to try again to sell his fabled acetate of the Velvet Underground's famous first recording, despite being thwarted by a prankster EBay bidder.

Hill, a soft-spoken 30-year-old who started his own tiny vintage record store six months ago, sounded downcast about the results of the Internet auction that concluded Friday with the highest of 253 bids clicking in at C$178,431.51.

The bid was too good to be true.

"It seems like the highest bidder was faked," Hill said in a telephone interview Monday.

But asked if he would try and sell it again, Hill replied: ``Yep."

He's not sure if he's going the Internet auction route again and was cautious about speculating on his plans.

"I don't know exactly how," he said. "But I feel like the amount of media coverage doesn't necessarily help because of people screwing around with it."

Asked whether he believes the media brought out rogue buyers and pranksters, he replied "it's possible."

Hill, a Vancouver native who settled in Montreal five years ago, found the rare copy of "The Velvet Underground and Nico" along with two other albums while browsing through a street sale bin during a trip to New York in 2002. He bought all three records for 75 cents.

He didn't think much about it until about a year later when he did some research and found out the cultural importance of the fragile acetate pressing of the Velvet Undergound's 1967 debut.

Although it sold only about 50,000 copies in its first release, ``Rolling Stone" magazine has since named it the 13th greatest rock album of all time.

The acetate is believed to be the only one of its kind in existence and several of the songs on the album are different mixes than on the final release of the album, which had many songs written by band member Lou Reed.

Among the differences from the final release are different tempos, guitar parts and lyrical phrasings in some sections.

Hill, who prefers gospel and blues to the works of the experimental rock band mentored by Andy Warhol, decided to auction it off because he didn't really need it or want it.

It went on EBay on Nov. 28 and the bids shot up to around $100,000 on Dec. 3 before going above $178,000 in the final hours with a bid by a man from Oakland, Calif.

Hill confirmed Monday the bid was a bad prank.

Oakland-based Saturn Records, which oversaw the EBay sale, also reportedly received an apologetic e-mail from the man believed to be the successful bidder, saying the bid was submitted without his knowledge by a prankster friend using his computer and EBay account.

Amid his obvious disappointment, Hill remained philosophical about the result of the auction.

"That's the way things go," he said.

markfiend wrote:Piratebay has it: Clicky