Over the Rainbow Posted on October 18th
Although it has been available for eight days, I am just getting a chance to spend time with Radiohead’s latest release, In Rainbows. While it is certainly a Radiohead album and there is a lot to love, I think the most striking thing about this album is how it was released.
Radiohead, free of any label and the old thinking the music industry seems trapped in, released their album in two innovative (for a big class-A artist at least) ways; via online download, and a via a discbox collection. The discbox is available for 40 British Pounds Sterling (about $81.50 at current exchange rates) and contains the album on CD, on (2) 12″ Vinyl Records, a second enhanced CD with more songs and digital artwork, and a lyric booklet all encased in a hardback book with a slipcase. In addition, buyers of the discbox also can download the album.
The really interesting thing about releasing their album via download is that they didn’t set a price for the download. They allowed the buyer to assign value to the release. It is possible to “buy” the album for nothing except that there is a small transaction fee. The download comes as a zip- compressed folder containing the following 160 kbs DRM-free tracks:
15 STEP
BODYSNATCHERS
NUDE
WEIRD FISHES/ARPEGGI
ALL I NEED
FAUST ARP
RECKONER
HOUSE OF CARDS
JIGSAW FALLING INTO PLACE
VIDEOTAPE
Yes. That’s right. DRM-free! Radiohead gets it and they are making a big statement in the face of a music industry that has done everything it can to restrict, limit, and frequently attack its customers in a useless attempt to control music. They are suffering as a result and I predict that bands that get it like Radiohead will reap a huge reward for their intelligence.
The music is music from Radiohead with an overall sound that is a little more mellow and at ease in the world than I have heard from them in the past. There isn’t the tension that I found so appealing from their earlier releases. This is a good album and I am looking forward to spending long hours with it, but it never reached out and grabbed me by the ear and dragged me into a new universe. Buy the album in whatever form or forms you prefer and cast a vote for intelligence in the music industry.
In Rainbows : 
Ingredients :
Innovation : 
Presentation :
