Radiohead pulls off what should be the first significant blow to the music industry by going straight to the fans. While industry reaction has been what you’d expect (mixed but trending negative), this movie is brilliant for fans. It seems odd to me that so many are focusing on the fact that Radiohead has allowed fans to pay what they want (anything, literally, including $0) because the real significant story here is that the band is distributing their album on their own, like an indy label, but with lower distribution costs associated with doing it primarily online.

This isn’t the end of the music industry, but it does signal a shift in the role these companies play in a digital world. It seems unclear that we’ll see a world where marketing doesn’t play a role in finding new music, so there’s definitely a space for that part of the recording industry. The thing is, they should just be providing that service. Where they’ve gone wrong is getting into owning the copyrights of songs and superseding the musicians in terms of control. Control should shift back to the people that actually create the music. Advances and fat record deals may still be part of the picture, but hopefully more artists choose to go this way. So far, NIN has chosen to go direct, and Oasis and Jamiroquai are rumored to be considering the same. This quote sums up the picture well:

But Jamiroquai, another former Sony artist with a live following, is said to be interested in pursuing the web-only route because the band makes a large amount of its earnings from live performances.

That’s true of nearly every band regardless of their popularity.

I received my download of In Rainbows today and am listening to it now. They chose to deliver a 160kbps MP3 file without DRM of any kind. Very sweet and very rewarding as a fan to see a band letting me actually own my music.

I’m not a Radiohead fan and, to be honest, I never really got the supposed brilliance of OK Computer. Even then, I’m a fan of this move and so I had to give the album a try. I’m still listening, so no opinion yet.