This isn't exactly the newest news ever but it's something I had to comment on because it makes me happy to see.  Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails fame is now free from the stranglehold of a record label and, as a result, has been able to stick it to the recording industry by putting Nine Inch Nail's new album on the cheap.  Really, really cheap.  So like five dollars, right?  I mean that's been done before.  Take Radiohead for example, "just pay what you think the album is worth" they say....but now it has been taken one step further.

theslip You can get Nine Inch Nails - The Slip right now for free.  Not free and then pay later if you like it, just free.  Not only that but you can get it roughly a billion different formats ranging from your standard .mp3 to better-than-CD-quality 24/96 WAVE all for free.  What happens is you put in your email, the email addresses of a couple friends if you want to give them the heads up, and they email you the link.  You hit up the page, decide which format you want and grab your free album.  It's pretty much awesome, and I can see it becoming a bit of a trend as we move forward from independent artists especially.  The reason?  Well, piracy is an issue.  Not nearly as big of an issue though as the people who see the negative side-effects of piracy without actually being pirates themselves.  For example, I can buy an album but making a back up copy is totally not cool with the RIAA.

It's becoming more and more true that artists aren't apt to make money off of their actual music (even if they sell well they don't see a very big percentage anyways) but rather off of merchandising and live shows.  The only problem with trying to sell merch and tickets is that you need people listening to your music first, otherwise they'll never fall in love with it enough to spend some cash.  That's why giving away your music is so powerful.  Without a monetary barrier in place there's a way higher chance that someone will pick up your music and give it a listen, even if they aren't a fan or aren't familiar with your music.  I have known about Nine Inch Nails for a long time, even liked a few of their more popular songs, but wouldn't classify myself as a fan.  Any other time if there was a new NIN album out I would say "that's great" and ignore it.  When I heard I could get it for free though, I went ahead and did so.  I'm just one person but I'm sure a lot more were in the same situation.

There are some artists that have made their careers on giving their music away for free - the first artist I think of off the top of my head would be Jonathan Coulton.  He gives away all of his music and has formed a huge cult following as a result.  That's especially huge with the younger crowds, the people who are most likely to come out to a show and get into your music and most importantly spread it among their friends.  If you look up a Coulton gig on YouTube you'll see they're totally nuts, and I have to say a lot of that has to be because he's played to his audience and made it easy for them to get into his work.  Another artist that's much less known (I've heard very little about him personally besides once that he was mentioned on a podcast) is Brad Sucks.  I heard a sample of one of Brad's songs on a podcast like I said, and I went out immediately and grabbed his whole album for free.  It's really good stuff too, music that I would have missed out on had there been a monetary barrier in the way.

Now Playing:
Nine Inch Nails - Discipline
Grand Theft Auto 4, Mythos beta