Radiohead is calling its new record, The King Of Limbs, “the world’s first Newspaper Album” (adding “perhaps” as a footnote).

Wouldn’t the first be Jethro Tull’s Thick As a Brick?

Here’s what the fans who pony up $48.00 and $53.00, respectively, for the MP3 and .wav versions of the record will also get this in the deluxe package:

Two clear 10” vinyl records in a purpose-built record sleeve.
A compact disc.
Many large sheets of artwork, 625 tiny pieces of artwork and a full-colour piece of oxo-degradeable plastic to hold it all together.

The Newspaper Album will be ship on 9th May 9th, 2011 but you can download it as of Saturday February 19th.

If you just want the digital download, it’ll cost you $9 for the MP3 version and $14 for the higher quality .wav file. It strikes me as somewhat absurd that there is a $5 buck difference in the price break between the lower quality MP3 version and the lossless wav files which will sound as good as a CD. Does transferring the wavs cost them $5 more dollars per buyer? Um, I doubt it. It’s like Radiohead are actively encouraging their fans here to go for the lower quality way to hear their music. That seems really counter-intuitive to me.