Legendary post-punkers Gang of Four have announced that they will follow the latest trend of label-less means of releasing music. On Dave Allen's Pampelmoose blog, the Go4 bass player made the announcement and included a demo of new song "Password." (More of which can be found at Amie Street.)
In the blog entry, Allen wrote:
"After spending the last 3 days with various friends and acquaintances from my past days in the music industry and having made friends with some new, young web pioneers, I came to some more thoughts about new G4 music and its distribution.
01. We need to make a cheap quick recording of no more than 6 songs. The days of spending forever in a studio are over.
02. It cant be called an album, that format is over - case in point - after downloading the Radiohead In Rainbows album I found various remixes of songs from that album and so I deleted the originals as the new mixes were preferable to me. I then built my own running order. Goodbye to having an album formatted in advance.
03. As we write and record in rehearsal we should post the demos, as rough as they are, to our website and also to Amiestreet so that fans can download them. Comments would be offered and that way we could gauge response. Also word of mouth will get the message far and wide that these demos are available and that we are working on the new recordings - no PR required.
04. Understanding the data which will then help us understand our fans behaviour.
05. Its imperative that we give away MP3s.
06. Enroll our most rabid fans to help us market and promote the band.
07. We must partner only with an indie label for any physical good that we release.
08. We must take meetings with people like Kevin Arnold at IODA and Shane Tobin at iMeem whose companies offer very distinct ways to reach music fans.
One intriguing light bulb moment for me was the realization that being out of any contracts for a long time and being well beyond any re-recording restrictions, we now own the master copyrights to any and all of our live concert recordings.
And then the big one - Whats our brand and whats its value? And is this what a new record label looks like?"
Gang of Four "To Hell With Poverty"
In the blog entry, Allen wrote:
"After spending the last 3 days with various friends and acquaintances from my past days in the music industry and having made friends with some new, young web pioneers, I came to some more thoughts about new G4 music and its distribution.
01. We need to make a cheap quick recording of no more than 6 songs. The days of spending forever in a studio are over.
02. It cant be called an album, that format is over - case in point - after downloading the Radiohead In Rainbows album I found various remixes of songs from that album and so I deleted the originals as the new mixes were preferable to me. I then built my own running order. Goodbye to having an album formatted in advance.
03. As we write and record in rehearsal we should post the demos, as rough as they are, to our website and also to Amiestreet so that fans can download them. Comments would be offered and that way we could gauge response. Also word of mouth will get the message far and wide that these demos are available and that we are working on the new recordings - no PR required.
04. Understanding the data which will then help us understand our fans behaviour.
05. Its imperative that we give away MP3s.
06. Enroll our most rabid fans to help us market and promote the band.
07. We must partner only with an indie label for any physical good that we release.
08. We must take meetings with people like Kevin Arnold at IODA and Shane Tobin at iMeem whose companies offer very distinct ways to reach music fans.
One intriguing light bulb moment for me was the realization that being out of any contracts for a long time and being well beyond any re-recording restrictions, we now own the master copyrights to any and all of our live concert recordings.
And then the big one - Whats our brand and whats its value? And is this what a new record label looks like?"
Gang of Four "To Hell With Poverty"