Indie Band Pays Fans To Download Album
As part of a marketing campaign motivated by tough economic times and a cluttered music marketplace, Indie rock band Officer Roseland is paying fans $1 to download their new album from the website MyStimulusPackage.org.
The band will offer fans two option: The first called "TAKE" pays $1 to download the album Stimulus Package. The second "GIVE" donates that $1.00 to the charity Mr. Holland's Opus Foundation. In either case, the fan receives the album at no cost to them.
Formed in 2000, Officer Roseland is a 4 piece independent rock band from Philadelphia, PA. The band has recorded 4 studio albums, has had music featured in independent films and animations and toured internationally.
Stimulus Package is an album with a distinctly satirical edge, skewering the commercialism of the recording industry – and of American society at large – with a warped sense of humor that is the band's signature. "We were definitely aware of the thematic tone the album was taking on pretty early in the writing process" said Daidone.
UPDATE: Band Responds To Criticism
I’m really curious about the how’s and why’s of this. I mean… if this is being considered as a marketing investment for marketing purposes only, then I wonder how much money are they putting into this. If this is an attempt to get revenue in other ways (selling their previous CDs and merch, doing money on gigs), how much do they expect to invest and get in return… Stuff like that 🙂
Great question. I’ll try to get an answer.
Utter rubbish. Bands are working too hard to draw attention to themselves instead of putting up a good show or writing good music. Radiohead move was stupid enough for the damage it did while trying to change the model for something only profitable to anyone who already sucked on a big label tit.
It just sounds like an attempt to make the news. IMO, something’s wrong if you have to pay people to download your music. On the other hand, I’m sure music fans will eat this up.
Thanks for negatively contributing to the already pathetic situation of music value around the World.
Personally I think its a creative way to get above the noise at a minimal cost.
FYI – The band is going to respond to some of the questions in the next 24 hours.
This promotion was already done by Neko Case earlier this year.
http://www.antilabelblog.com/?p=1301
I can certainly understand how this can seem like a way to “just gain exposure”, but you have to understand there is much more to it than that.
As a band, Officer Roseland been making music for almost 10 years now. Nothing will change that, including the fact that we are a completely independent band, from top to bottom. Music is our passion, and even if we aren’t “commercially” successful at it, we will continue to make music because we truly enjoy it. So working hard to promote ourselves is just what we do after working so hard on making the best album that our ability allows.
With that said, we decided to try something different with this album. Something unique, against the grain, and if we can help out a great Charity along the way, that’s even better. Sure, there’s the underlying “gimmick” so to speak to gain publicity and spread our music, but how is this any different from Pepsi giving away free stuff when you earn enough “Pepsi points” from their bottle caps. This kind of “Freemium” marketing isn’t done by mistake. The music industry is evolving, and if we can find a way to take advantage of that by sticking out a bit, then so be it. We’re going to make the music anyway, so why not try to let as many people hear it as possible.
So, to answer some questions…
As for the “Take” Portion of this campaign, the band is paying the fan. We send the money to the fan via paypal, directly from OUR OWN account.
With the “Give” option, we are recieving sponsorship money that we are then going to use to pay Mr. Hollands Opus Foundation, and donate it on behalf of the sponsors in conjuction with Officer Roseland. If we do not get enough sonsorship money, we will cover the remaining cost.
I appreciate the comments – good and bad. We cant please everyone, but if someone out there can relate to one of our songs, or just enjoys it, well then we did our part.
You haters are a joke.
What the hell do you care how this band wants their fans to have their music? Is it such a goddamn shock that SOME PEOPLE are not in this for the money…Yes your comments tell us all why you are in it.
As far as Radiohead damaging anything…10 million Radioheads, distributed by a billion Piratebays, Adworded by a trillion googles could never hope to damage the music industry 1/2 as much as these major label, gold pinkie ring, baby boom, gangstar, mouth breathing, fascist, dinosaur, guest list cunts who have been stealing from the young and beating the public to death with BAD BAD RECORDS and a deluge of their own nostalgic incompetence for 25 years.
baby boomers go away = everything OK
brendan b brown
wheatus.com
My feeling is that this is an age old marketing trick that works for many companies. PayPal paid customers $5 to join the service back in the day. ING pays you $100 to open a new account. As long as there is a plan to make money some other way, why not?
…impressions….good/bad/indifferent…they got what they needed….recognition. next on the list..growth toward sustainability…that usually takes some music performed by musicians presented in a variety of ways, some of which will actually return more money than the cost of doing so in the first place. they call this “profit.” Not prophet.as in this is the way “it’s” going to be in the music business for all eternity, .profit..as in we have some money to do something else now….create toward sustainability. Good luck boys and girls…if you have the light for a moment…it better be a good time to shine. you can only give it away for so long..