So the hip thing to do these days is releasing your album for free online and operate on a “pay if you like it” business model. But what if you’re not a big, established artist (Radiohead, Trent Reznor, etc.) with the moneyhats to pay for bandwidth and other digital distribution costs?
You pirate your own music.
At least, that’s what Benn Jordan (aka The Flashbulb) has done with his newest album, Soundtrack to a Vacant Life. Jordan’s taken the liberty of uploading his own album to a couple of torrent trackers, including renowned oink “replacement”, what.cd.
Why did he do this? According to his blog:
Well, they’ll be there in 24 hours anyway, and this way I can:
1. Be sure that people aren’t getting fakes.
2. Be sure that people aren’t getting bad rips (soooo many people have asked me about the “static track” on M³)
3. Be sure that people know where they can buy the album, or, “donate” to the artist by including an html file with a personal message.
Benn’s reasons certainly make sense from a practical standpoint. Any new album is going to find its way onto these torrent trackers soon after release, it’s just inevitable. And having information on how to buy the album from sanctioned sources is certainly better than having no information at all when your music is pirated. But is this a good business move for his fledgling record label?
Probably not, and he admits this:
I don’t think donation is the long-term answer, but it is hell of a lot better than pretending 85% of your audience doesn’t exist.
I’m impressed with Mr. Jordan’s honesty and grasp of the current climate of music consumption. He’s being upfront and honest with the public and that’s really much more than any label or artist can say for the past decade. His candor has apparently won over many file-traders as well. The admins at what.cd have posted Jordan’s entire missive on the front page of the site and designated the album as “freeleech.” This is huge among the torrenting community, because contrary to popular belief, even pirated music is not “free.” Oftentimes these torrent trackers require you to upload a certain amount of data relative to what you have downloaded, lest you risk losing your account privileges. Essentially, these sites are based on an economy with a currency of bandwidth instead of dollar amounts. By making Jordan’s album freeleech, many more people are downloading the music than if it were simply just another album.
Is this tactic working? In a later post, Jordan writes:
So after a 5 hour nap, I awake to see that the viral effect of “infringing my own label’s copyrights” has probably surpassed that of a $20,000 promotion budget.
Looking at the what.cd site itself, it appears as if almost 4,300 people have downloaded the album since he uploaded it 4 days ago, with more every minute. In fact, the album is the single most actively traded album on the site, totally eclipsing any other album available (there’s over 100,000 albums, to put that in perspective). In fact, the comments on the album page are filled with people pledging to donate/buy the record. And this is just from one site. Granted, the novelty and freshness of Jordan’s actions have probably contributed a lot to the number of eyes on this particular release. However, I see this as an opportunity for other developing artists who don’t have the ability to finance a Trent Reznor-like digital giveaway of their music. Get your fans to help distribute the album with their own bandwidth. It’s a step forward in repairing the mistrust the RIAA has engendered amongst music fans in recent years.
Is Benn’s solution perfect? No. It doesn’t guarantee monetary compensation, and I very much doubt he’ll make much money off it, if any. He’s also charging quite a bit for his album if you choose to “buy” it. ($9.99 for mp3s, $10.99 for lossless FLAC, and $14.99 for a CD) I know the record label is small and his costs are probably higher than a major distributor, but really, those prices are exorbitant in this day and age, especially for someone who professes how “broken” the current music distribution system is.
But at the end of the day, Benn Jordan is the type of artist we music fans want to hear from. We don’t like being patronized, criminalized, or ignored. Benn’s actions are refreshing in that he acknowledges the brokenness of the current system, and that it’s ultimately futile to prevent consumers from getting what they want by how they want to.
Oh, and by the way, the album is pretty good. It’s a compilation of very well arranged post-rock songs with varied instrumentation that are perfect for working, driving, or just daydreaming.
I’d really like you to explain to me how the download and physical CD prices are a lot. I buy a lot of cds and usually have to hunt around to get a price less than double that amount.
Maybe it’s because of where we are geographically, but please, tell me how much you pay for albums you physically buy or download.
William
In the US, at least, CD prices are routinely $9.99 nowadays. Recently, AAA releases such as Radiohead’s In Rainbows have dipped to $7.99. My sympathies if you live in a country where you have to pay upwards of $30 USD for a CD.