We just published a fantastic article (read it!) by staff writer David Freed about the future of the online music market. Spotify, Pandora, and Rdio have taken up where Napster left off, and, so the industry cliché goes, things will never be the same again.
What better illustration of this last point than Los Angeles-based funk group Vulfpeck, who recently released a completely silent album on Spotify in order to fund a ticket-less tour. If enough people “listen” to the album, called Sleepify, as they go to bed, the $.005 per song royalties will eventually pay off the band’s tour expenses.
It would have been foolish to publish a silent album for a traditional brick-and-mortar record store (unless you’re John Cage), but Spotify has changed the rules.
Here’s the band’s video introducing the idea: