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Thoughts on Radiohead's new distribution model and their album

I know others have talked about it, and in some ways, the actual album is getting lost in the talk of how Radiohead, still a major band (especially since they are a bit experimental) are releasing the album on their own at inrainbows.com where you can name your own price and download the album.  I was more surprised that they announced the album is coming on out October 1, and it was coming out the 10th (today).  Besides downloading it from their site, you can also buy a "discbox" that costs a hefty $81 (USD) that includes two CDs with the album and a 8-10 additional songs, plus artwork, a booklet and two 12-inch vinyl records.  (Sounds like a Christmas gift.)

So, a lot of people are talking about how crazy and cool it is that Radiohead are releasing their album on their own (though they're working out a deal with a label to get the CD into stores in 2008--even they don't have the infrastructure to do that), and now Nine Inch Nails, Oasis and Jamiroquai are going to distribute their albums in a similar fashion.  It is mind-blowing to see a non-unsigned indie band doing this, but what about the music?  Are we going to want our money back?

No!  This is truly a great album and worth whatever you paid for it.  I am a long-time Radiohead fan, and felt like Kid A was great but very different from what they put out before.  Amnesiac had great songs, but as a cohesive whole, it didn't feel right.  Hail To The Thief was very uneven, and the only songs that sounded new and evolved were 2+2=5, Myxamatosis and especially A Wolf At The Door.  It feels like they have evolved, and I love it!

So what can we, in the film, video and television industry learn from this?  Well, honestly, I feel like it's being done, in a variation of what Radiohead and others are doing.  We create webisodes, we put segments of TV news or narravtives on the web, etc.  Heck, newspapers and magazines put stories online the day of, or perhaps a little later, after they see print.  I think with downloads and streaming video and music, and written articles and blogs (like DMO's), are where we're at and where we're going.  I guess Web 2.0 is delivering on stuff promised in the go-go late 90s before the Internet bubble burst, and then some.  I don't remember video being as big a part of it, but it's taking over.

Okay, I may have gone off track a little, but I think this is the future of entertainment, while still maintaining the "classic way" of doing it (watching broadcast TV, going to concerts, seeing movies and plays in theatres, etc.).

Posted at 05:43PM Oct 10, 2007 by Heath McKnight in General  |  Comments[4]