By Mimi Turner
2 hours, 37 minutes ago
"I think it was a one-off response to a particular
situation," Thom Yorke said of the band's decision last October
to let viewers pay what they wanted for digital downloads of
the new album "In Rainbows."
"Yes. It was a one-off in terms of a story. It was one of
those things where we were in the position of everyone asking
us what we were going to do. I don't think it would have the
same significance now anyway, if we chose to give something
away again. It was a moment in time," Yorke told the Hollywood
Reporter.
Radiohead's decision to allow fans to pay into the online
equivalent of an honesty box for the album came shortly after
it walked away from troubled record label EMI, sparking acres
of comment about the future direction of the music industry and
the dwindling revenue pot from CD sales.
The band has remained quiet about whether the experiment
was a success, with many fans thought to have downloaded the
album without paying anything at all. "In Rainbows" was later
released conventionally as a CD, and topped the U.S. and U.K.
charts.
The groundbreaking move towards potentially free music has
been adopted by a number of artists including Prince and Nine
Inch Nails. Most recently fellow English rockers Coldplay said
Monday that they would give away its new single "Violet Hill"
free of charge, resulting in the group's Web site crashing the
next day due to demand.
Reuters/Hollywood Reporter
No comments:
Post a Comment