Radiohead graces the world with a new album a day early
Radiohead unexpectedly released their eighth studio album this last Friday solely as a digital download. The CD and Vinyl will be made available on March 29th.
In what is another innovative technique for releasing records, the band is hoping to stimulate a market that is washed out and hurting from torrent websites like Limewire.
As we all know making money for bands has been a problem since Apple flipped the music industry upside down with the advent of the iPod.
Radiohead is coming up with clever ways of sneaking around these modern dilemmas. Their last studio release, "In Rainbows" allowed buyers to go to the album website and give any amount they wanted, even if it was zero.
This method in fact sold 1.2 million copies through the website before the physical release of the album. The band never the less managed to make more money before the actual physical release of the album than the gross total of their prior album, "Hail to the thief".
This new method of first releasing the digital version, then waiting a few months for the CD and vinyl, allows time for the album to promote itself. A unique experiment they're trying again with "King of Limbs".
Musically Radiohead have never been a band to do what is expected, often taking huge risks with the electro driven "Kid A" or the studio masterpiece "Ok Computer." They're still further pushing the experimental process that yields their sound, proving yet again you don't have to make pop music to be a pop band.
This album is strongly bass and drums driven with the guitars and synthesizers adding delayed loops and textual ambience. Thom Yorke's falsetto vocal lines are haunting and angelic as usual, as the band creates altogether, a uniquely new sound.
The future of the music industry is very uncertain, but albums like this give us optimism that our favorite bands will rise above the past's burden of big record deals and studio musicians.