ATO Records, the label started by Dave Matthews, has apparantly signed Radiohead for North American release. Shiv from WOXY got an email from the label about using songs on the station, and there’s a lot of articles popping up in the news.
Fader is releasing the Trent Reznor / Saul Williams collaboration The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of NiggyTardust! free of charge in DRM-free 192 kbps MP3 format. If you want a choice of formats, or you just want to directly support the artist, you can shell out $5. The album will be available for download November 1, but you can pre-order now.
In some ways this is awfully similar to the Radiohead model, with a few improvements. First of all, the higher baseline kpbs encoding is nice, but I really like the fact that if you pay, you can get the download in whatever format you’d like on up to FLAC.
Secondly, I don’t think this is physically coming out, so it won’t be viewed as a leveraging ploy / future CD-sales tactic. In fact it’ll probably give Williams more recognition than he’s (ever?) had. This is not just due to the sales model, since obviously Reznor’s involvement is pretty noteworthy … especially given his own recent outspoken disdain for the Major Label model of distributing music.
I’m liking these changing times.
In Rainbows .. available now! With liveblogging!
15 Step
Getcher hip-hop on boys, including the trademark Yorke yowl.
Bodysnatchers
A rocker, but in the “anthemic” sense, a la “National Anthem.” Get it? Anthemic sense? Whatever … next song.
Nude
All I can say? finally.
Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
The title would lead one to believe this is a throw off track .. but it’s not. In fact it’s a slow builder in the vein of King Crimson. That is if Fripp when knew when to hold back, which he doesn’t. A great bridge too, by the way.
All I Need
Mmmmm … bass keys. Nice and claustrophobic. Slowly expands,. but never really resolves itself.
Faust Arp
Think “Row Your Boat,” if “Row Your Boat” was sailing on the seas of paranoia. Also, file under folk tinged disaster.
Reckoner
I’ve heard this before … the band is beginning to repeat themselves. But at least their cribbing from some of their best moments. Creepy, subterranean, folk.
House of Cards
A distant cousin of “Pyramid Song,” only with a taste of The Bends.
Jigsaw Falling Into Place
Oh! Now we’re back in OK Computer territory? I suspect this is the one that will have have fans wetting their pants. Aside from the inclusion of “Nude” of course/
Videotape
And again, a taste of the past, sort of “Exit Music.”
Overall, well worth the four bucks I paid for it — with is twice what the band would have made from a physical copy sold through a label.
Color us pleased androids.
BTW: The downloading process? Seamless, super-quick, and painless.
Ok. The new Kells is so amazing to me that I was surprised it hasn’t been universally heralded as a classic by the critics of the world. But I guess it isn’t, according to metacritic.
In my mind, Justin Timberlake is Radiohead. You know. Anyone with taste would see that its great music.
And if Timberlake is Radiohead, then Kells is Bjork. You know—>acclaimed music by a quirky weirdo pervert. (watch a Matthew Barney movie. I dare you. Thats Bjork’s boo. His films are borderline as bad as Kells’ urinating video)
After the break.
It’s Your Boyfriend!!
Kells.
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