Drop This Issue #40

Alternative release formats bring power to the people

By Selena Fragassi
Published: August 1st, 2009 | 12:00am

Ever since Radiohead offered In Rainbows as a “pay-if-you-like-it” digital download in late 2007, bands large and small have been motivated to find novel methods for album releases. Eschewing the longstanding out-on-a-Tuesday formula may be an effort to stay viable in an over-saturated digital market, but as alternative releases become more common, it’s clear that many artists aren’t missing the hype associated with “dropping an album.”

Take Jill Sobule for example. The mid ‘90s hitmaker was at a crossroads when it came time to release new material after previous albums had floated into oblivion.

“The thought of trying to get another record deal seemed ridiculous and painful. I wanted to do it myself, but I had absolutely no money,” she says. “I’ve always had a really good connection with the fans, so I thought, why not get out the middle man and go directly to the people who care.”

And she did, using her web site to ask for fan donations in exchange for gifts: from $10 for a free digital download to one fan who donated $10,000 and was able to sing on a new track. Through word-of-mouth and promotion by Perez Hilton, Sobule raised $85,000 in just a few months. With the money, she was able to open her own label, Pinko Records, and produce the 14-track California Songs.

“I felt like the kid at the lemonade stand,” she says of the end result. “I never made a cent off a record before. So this was the first time I held a record and felt like it was actually mine.”

Up-and-comers like Detroit’s the Hard Lessons and Pennsylvania’s Illinois have used less conventional releases as a way to be attentive to fans, especially in today’s economy.

“When CDs were $21.99 at Tower Records, that’s when people stopped buying them,” says the Hard Lessons singer-keyboardist Korin Louise Visocchi. “We believe that everyone should be able to hear our music, which is why you’re able to download our entire albums for free.”

Last year also saw one of the band’s most impressive album sales to date, the limited-edition EP collection, B&G Sides (Quack! Media) which was divided into four separate records. “Releasing slowly gave us the opportunity to break it up over time,” Visocchi says, “and it became a creative outlet. Of the four releases, each touched on a different part of our style.”

Illinois singer Chris Archibald seconds the notion that bands should look for ways to stay stylistically independent in today’s market. “I find it difficult to tie my music together in a fluid sense, so I like shotgun releases,” he says. The band’s latest, The Adventures of Kid Catastrophe, is a prime example, offered in chapter-style EP releases accompanied by online video content. Although Archibald has set a goal to make it into the Guinness Book of World Records for most songs released in a year, he, like many other artists, was hard pressed to find a record label to help him at first.

Some record labels actually condone alternative-style releases, like Positron! Records which was started in Chicago in April 1998 by Elle Randall and her husband, Chris Randall of the now-defunct Sister Machine Gun. After traditional album presses, Positron! embarked on digital downloads around the boom of iTunes in 2006, as a way to save money and capitalize on creativity. “With no physical media involved, an artist could have a creative burst one week and have that music on sale the next week,” says Elle.

After growing success, the label went digital-only in 2008. “In the beginning, it was an uphill battle finding, keeping, and getting paid by a distributor,” says Randall of her decision. “When I started selling digital downloads in 2006, it really was just a way of offering a new format. But by the end of that year, it was becoming clear that digital sales were outpacing CD sales.” It’s a trend that she doesn’t see stopping, and she’s baffled by why the industry themselves didn’t see it coming.

“They could have been the ones to design how digital music was sold, distributed, and downloaded. They could have determined the format and price,” Randall says, noting the industry’s previous power in making people switch from vinyl to 8-track to cassette to CD. “But this time, the industry didn’t make anyone switch from CD to digital — the consumer made them and they kicked and screamed the entire time. While they were busy behaving like idiots, Napster determined the format of delivery, iTunes designed the interface to sell it, and CD Baby and TuneCore took over distribution. Thankfully, the music industry no longer belongs to the select few, and in my opinion, that is a very good thing.”