Artists giving away their music via free downloads on the internet isn’t anything new: Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails have both jumped head first into experimenting with this. On February 14th, 2010, Blink 182 singer/guitarist Tom DeLong’s side project Angels and Airwaves (AVA) released their new album, available for free download. Appropriately enough, it’s entitled ‘LOVE’.
The band funded the whole thing themselves, spending about $500,000, sources say. If you are willing to do that, you are committed to your music no matter how good or bad people may think it is.
The whole concept of the ‘free’ download and releasing the album digitally only is more of a goodwill gesture towards the fans, with the hope of unlocking new revenue streams by enticing fans to pay for new content. In AVA’s case, this comes in the form of fan club membership ($20.85 every 3 months). By joining you get an assortment of early access passes to soundchecks, exclusive video and blog content, etc.
As a guy who still buys CDs and vinyl, I’m amazed to see how the music world is changing. Some bands and labels get it and are diversifying their ‘brands’ to cater to how music fans consume their product now, as well as trying to identify what that product will be in the future. If giving away your stuff for free is any indication, the product certainly may not be music. The reality is, even though listeners can donate after they download albums like this, I think most artists realize this isn’t really going to happen, or if it does, that it won’t amount to much.
Regardless of whether you like music or the bands who are giving stuff away, this is still an interesting situation, and since no one’s quite figured out the ideal model for selling modern music yet, you can bet that fun stuff is ahead.
Tags: consumer engagement, music
I’ve been in similar situations before. It is not as easy an answer as you thought it is, its something that you’ll have to write out for yourself over time.
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“”Great work buddy, keep it up”"