Radiohead sticks it to the man…
So, you are one of the most critically acclaimed bands in modern music and your contract with your label is up. What would you do? Cash in that acclaim for a big, fat, multi-year, multi-record deal, right? Not so fast.
Radiohead (AKA the best band in the world), went against most recording industry convention by signaling their new record, In Rainbows (due out on October 10th), would be self published and “available for download from their website”:http://www.inrainbows.com/Store/index3.html . And fans can pay what ever they like for the record. Literally.
No cut to the publisher or record label or anyone but themselves. Take the middle man right out of the picture. How frickin’ cool is that?
“Thom Yorke told TIME recently”:http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1666973,00.html, “I like the people at our record company, but the time is at hand when you have to ask why anyone needs one. And, yes, it probably would give us some perverse pleasure to say ‘Fuck you’ to this decaying business model.”
More choice quotes from the TIME article:
Several record executives admitted that, despite the rumors, they were stunned. “This feels like yet another death knell,” emailed an A&R executive at a major European label. “If the best band in the world doesn’t want a part of us, I’m not sure what’s left for this business.”
“That’s the interesting part of all this,” says a producer who works primarily with American rap artists. “Radiohead is the best band in the world; if you can pay whatever you want for music by the best band in the world, why would you pay $13 dollars or $.99 cents for music by somebody less talented? Once you open that door and start giving music away legally, I’m not sure there’s any going back.”
In addition to the digital download, Radiohead will be offering a collector’s package for around $80, which includes an extended CD, vinyl records, a book and more – available in December.
This high profile move from Radiohead, always the pioneers, will start a new movement in the music industry and I’m sure we’ll see artists like Wilco and Weezer (who have hinted at things like this in the past) bypass the record executives to deliver their own music to their fans. Think about it: say Radiohead sell 200,000 downloads of the album for an average of $1 a pop (from what I’ve read, other experiments like this, on a smaller scale, have trended toward $5 for an album download) – that more than covers their recording expenses. Add on to that the sold out shows and merchandise, they continue to make a very nice living without having to give away any of it to the greedy, slow-to-adjust, music/media behemoths. Sounds like a win/win situation for Radiohead.
