No Really, It's Up To You
Thanks, Radiohead, for making this a memorable week: our earbuds were treated, our thoughts provoked, and we collectively had the biggest group premature evaluation known to man. As expected, and apparently as intended, Radiohead's grand tip jar experiment has been a conversation starter these past few days. Jonny Greenwood told Gothamist:
It was kind of an experiment as well ... It’s just interesting to make people pause for even a few seconds and think about what music is worth now. I thought it was an interesting thing to ask people to do and compare it to whatever else in their lives they value or don’t value.Agreed, the "it's up to you" fun has initiated a compelling dialogue. But we'd be remiss not to remind ourselves that Radiohead isn't exactly the first band to do this. Remember Jane Siberry? Okay, then what about Juliana Hatfield?
OK, so a band with Radiohead's popularity is a whole other level. But before we leave this week, let's take a moment for posterity to remember the bygone pioneers in this experiment in pay-what-you-feel album sales. Add 'em if you got 'em -- and we'll give 'em tag.
You're it.
Posted at 6:51 PM
Tags: Jane Siberry | Juliana Hatfield | Radiohead
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Harvey Danger released their album, Little By Little, the same way back in 2005.
http://www.harveydanger.com/press/why.php
It's a great album, too. You should grab it if you haven't heard it yet.
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jane Siberry put on some of the greatest shows i've ever seen...on The Walking tour in 1988. truly stupendous. in a way i'm glad she's changed her name...the thrill is gone.
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http://lifesbathroom.blogspot.com/
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In 1979 Keith Green, a popular and still influential American Gospel artist, self-released "So You Want To Go Back to Egypt" after negotiating his way out of his record label contract. The album (which featured Bob Dylan playing harmonica) was shipped out from Green's ranch via mail order. He would send them to people for free, and in return, they would send back whatever they thought it was worth, or could afford. According to Wikipedia, he shipped out 200,000 records this way, and essentially gave away 61,000.
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one line drawing (jonah from the band far) always sold his records and merch on a sliding scale. not FREE, but a similar idea...and didn't prince give away his latest album this year? how come people aren't talking about that?
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The Smashing Pumpkins gave Machina II away to their fans too. As the lore goes, they took it to Virgin with the idea of releasing it, but it was (supposedly) rejected. The band gave away vinyl copies to fans and told them to put it on the 'net.
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is thom yorke trying to justify radioheads most recent most accessible album with this robert wyatt qoute,posted on dead air space
"I love pop music to death..... Most great composers rely on folk music. I rely on pop music.
I'm not saying I'm a great composer or that pop music is folk music. There's a whole endless thing going on out there.
You make your little pond but if your pond isn't connected to the river, which isn't connected to an ocean,
it's just going to dry up. It's just a little piss pool. I've lived too long to be happy in a pond."
DID ROBERT WYATT HAVE THE INTERNET?
everyone is connected to the ocean,people have no problem finding music they like these days,
and even if they dont find it now, they find it later and mine it for all its worth,like nick drake
would we have kid a or amnesiac if he had used this logic ? someone help me understand
this is one of the most important musicains of our time,STEREOGUM why are you not talking about this? why is no one talking about the real story here-RADIOHEAD TURNS BACK ON HARDCORE FANS WITH NEW WORST ALBUM SINCE PABLO HONEY, PACKED WITH LAME 'protoolsy' RECORDINGS OF GREAT SONGS.... apart from 15 step and faust arp
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Radiohead's true genius move here was cashing in on the leak.
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Few pointed out that the idea that you can pay "nothing" for their tracks makes sense, as anyone with a minimum of computer knowledge could find the tracks (and any other track) for free on bittorrent or similar download sites. All the people who paid £0.00 could just as well got the album for free somewhere else, and that's what the Head highlighted!
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while it isn't all music, npr (and pbs) has essentially the same plan with their fund raising every few months. people basically pay what they believe the content is worth to them.
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This more or less happened with Wilco's A Ghost Is Born. It leaked early, a paypal account was set up by fans and they paid what they felt they owed to the band. The difference is that Wilco felt they couldn't (legally?) accept the money, so it went to charity. Anyways, Wilco has been doing things in this nature since 2001.
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Yes, Harvey Danger was probably the last and most prominent to do this (outside of Radiohead), as the first post pointed out. Radiohead practically mirrored their whole process, but for different reasons (They had on label; Radiohead didn't want one/Wanted to get the record out this year).
I fully support this distribution method. God bless other people falling off the label bandwagon. I'm looking at you, Trent.
It's a great idea, especially if the album is a great as In Rainbows.
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Justin Kelly smells of elderberries
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Brian Jonestown Massacre have had all of their albums on their website to download for free for quite some time. Also they just gave out a rough mix of the newest album for free.
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trent reznor leaked the dvd version of "closure" because the label refused to re-release it
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i'm just quite pleased to see someone remembered keith green and i got to read about it here!
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It is within anyone's right to say they don't like In Rainbows and, within that context, they can either feel justified or burned by the amount of money they paid for their download. Most of them wanted duplications of a sound they heard with the songs played live: rockier.
I never have heard them live. I don't know what Videotape's live arrangement was. Maybe that's to my benefit because I think this is a great album, better than Kid A and Amnesiac, certainly better than Hail To The Thief. I'm glad I plunked down for the discbox. I don't feel beaten in the slightest.
I am troubled by the continual assertions that "maybe I'd have liked it better if I downloaded it for free off BitTorrent". The album was virtually given for those who weren't persuaded to go whole hog; still there's the statement of "I'd have preferred to take it". I'm not being priggish about the evils of downloading so much as I'm confused by the psychology. People got this for free as something of a gift. Some of those people still wish they could have robbed it.
Am I wrong or am I winning something?
DwD
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Didn't Tim Fite give away his last album for free?
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Radiohead? Sell by The Bends.
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I agree with d completely.
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also Wilco had that justafan website for people to donate money to charity if they had downloaded their leaked album.
and, the Stars also released their album to the internet soon after completing it (though at a set price). And don't forget the new porno's buy early get now, which also offered fans the chance to hear the music immediately after it was
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can i get it on 8-track tape? how do those things work? love the album.......would love to see them come back to the dirty dirty.....
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"would we have kid a or amnesiac if he had used this logic ?"
"PACKED WITH LAME 'protoolsy' RECORDINGS OF GREAT SONGS"
I know it's not really worth picking on Justin Kelly (also, his photos are kinda cool), but you realize that Kid A and Amnesiac are the most 'protoolsy' Radiohead albums ever, right? And that In Rainbows is indeed far more live-sounding and organic than either of those albums?
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I agree In Rainbows is definitely on the more conventional side, though is that necessarily a bad thing? As a big fan of Kid A/Amnesiac and the more "traditional" Radiohead, I think the band did a fine job combining the more experimental with the more organic on IR (an effect they also seemed to shoot for on HTTT, though I think they've pulled it off far more effectively on this album.)
P.S. If Grateful Dead fans are "Dead Heads," does that make Radiohead fans "Head Heads?"
Range Life Music
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most of in rainbows is done in bad taste
when i say protoolsy i guess i just mean cheesey, like the cheap weird ambient guitar that comes in for the chorus on house of cards....thats protoolsy to me, granted they could have used any program, or even tape, i suppose 'protoolsy' means contrived or even bathetic if you will
as for kid a and amnesiac being there MOST protoolsy, i can see how one might think that, it sounds the most edited and sequenced, but remember life in a glass house??? the drunk horn section, so organic and awesome
i like to think those albums are just more CRAFTED,like you can tell they put more time into them, reckoner does not sound like this, nor does house of cards or jigsaw falling into place etc....more crafted makes it more organic to me, kinda fleshs it out, arpeggi sounds like the skin and bones of a song that could have been a body builder, same with house of cards
optimistic, knives out, dollars and cents,pyramid song ,you and whose army these are LIVE sounding recordings, they breath, they have live drums ,they swell and feel alive,, the kid a / amnesiac albums are wrapped in sequenced cut up edited songs but at the core you still have these before mentioned live songs that feel organic, like the piano in pyramid song, or the ondes-martenot in optimistic, soo organic, but organic or not, those 2 albums are done in MUCH better taste, thats what really needs to be said
in rainbows feels very flatline to me, like the beat in arpeggi or the beat in reckoner (think cheesey moby) or boring b side sounding 'all i need', some of these songs are worse than some of there b sides
man i think everyone needs to go listen to hail to the theif, this album is a force,....historyman68 its a shame i cant click on YOUR name and see who YOU are, glad you KINDA like my photos
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This album is OK. But I'm going to wait until the Timbaland remixes come out.
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Radiohead is really a band for the future. As you can see they see what most of us didnt see ( yet ). This move, in my opinion is the best business move by the a band. Here in my third world country ,it is stupid to buy $ 8.50 worth of an album when you earn $ 4.50 a day. Plain stupid isnt it? Because here in my country you can barely eat a descent meal for only $ 2 dollars. but we love music and arts. so we buy pirated. Cause the distributors are so over pricing it. In this move i bought radiohead's in rainbows for $ 2.00 which is just the right price in my country.
In the CD generation this is the 2nd time i bought
music legally. ( the first one is The Clash ).
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Kristin Hersh, bitches. She may have been the first.
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Justin's pictures are sort of neat, though ideally he should have gotten a shot of the guy who pissed in his corn flakes.
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Pitchfork finally posted their review for the album. I don't know why i've been waiting for it but i was. It's worth looking at just to see the 9.3 rating after you click on the you decide parody
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I think one thing that hasn't been mentioned too much is the fact that you can download and listen to the album first, and then decide how much you want to pay afterward. Plus, it makes me pretty happy because I generally wait until I can get a used copy of anything that comes out (college income + high GPA = low) and this way the money at least goes to the band and they know how many people got it. Cheers, Radiohead!
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wow, long response. I'm sorry for the ad hominem, I'm linking my band's page (only this once) so you can make halfhearted comments on my art too.
I don't know anybody who would define "protoolsy" as contrived or bathetic... "Everything in Its Right Place" would be a great example, as well as most of Linkin Park's catalogue (esp their earlier stuff).
Very good point about "Life in a Glasshouse", "Optimistic", etc... those aren't the types of songs I think about when I think about Kid A & Amnesiac (those would be "Everything", "National Anthem", "Idioteque", "Crushd Like Sardines", "Pulk/Pull")... It's true that some of the best songs on those albums do feel more "live". And I would agree that those albums are very well crafted.
The thing is, I don't know really what you mean about "better taste". I would say "Hail To the Thief" has by far the worst taste of any Rhead album, from the corny, too-obvious album art "REMEMBERING PROSECUTED HAMBURGER SECURITY" to the pretentious subtitles for every song ("Little Man Being Erased", "Brush the Cobwebs Out of the Sky") to the silly, pretentious, and stupid songs (imo, "We Suck Young Blood" and "Sail to the Moon").
There are some great songs on HTTT, and the characteristic of the best songs is that they are pretty modest, simply building an atmosphere - "There There", "Punchup at a Wedding", or elegant songwriting: "I Will". But so much of it is hit-or-miss.
I agree that In Rainbows is maybe not quite as exciting - flatline as you would say, but it just doesn't seem very corny to me. It feels more mature to me... I'm just kind of over all of the studio trickery, and it feels like Radiohead is too.
In essence, I would say I disagree with you 180 degrees on the taste issue. So We probably won't be able to come to a 100% agreement. But you make some good points.
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There are about to be four entries about Radiohead in the top four slots on the most commented section.
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I completely agree with historyman68. I can hardly imagine a radiohead album with worse "taste" than Hail to the Thief. I think in Rainbows is great -- really growing on my after a week.
But the title of the post was "it's up to you", so I'm surprised that more people haven't talked about how much they paid for the album. I'm really curious to see any statistics on that -- maybe the band will eventually share those -- the number bought, the average paid, etc. I paid the US equivalent of about $7.
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