Nine Inch Nails does the Radiohead thing: Free(ish) music downloads

by Brad Linder Mar 3rd 2008

Trent Reznor has followed through on his promise to release the latest Nine Inch Nails album without a record label. Fans can buy the complete album online in a variety of ways or they can download ~~1/3rd~~ 1/4th of the songs on the album for free. Considering the complete album packs 36 songs, that means you can pretty much get a full album's worth of music for free.

Plenty of musicians have been releasing digital music downloads for free or for a small fee for years. But over the past year we've seen several high profile acts including Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails try to establish a more direct relationship with their fans. With no middleman, the bands may very well be making more money even though they're charging less for their music.

We'd be surprised if many people to spend $75 o $300 on the deluxe or ultra-deluxe editions (which come with a DVD, Blu-Ray disc, and other goodies like an autograph). But $5 will get you all the songs in DRM-free MP3 format.

Right now the official web site excruciatingly slow. We've had our downloads time out on us a number of times. But as with any new release album, you can already find pretty much every track for free using your favorite BitTorrent tracker. We hope Nine Inch Nails deals with its server issues soon, because it kind of defeats the purpose of this experiment if people just go ahead and download the music ~~illegally~~ without paying anyway.

[via Techmeme]

Tags: ghosts, ghosts i-iv, GhostsI-iv, music, nine-inch-nails, trent-reznor

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Todd said 10:38AM on 3-03-2008

You are looking at the future of music distribution. Direct relationship, one to one, me and the artist. Plus sliding scale marketing.

What's missing? All the hundreds of greedy do nothings who artificially insert themselves between me and the artist, extracting their pound of flesh at each stop along the way.

I predict that in less than five years this will be the only method of music distribution. Charles Darwin would be proud.

Guille said 10:47AM on 3-03-2008

According to the FAQ the whole thing is released under a Creative Commons license. So downloading it via BitTorrent is not only legal, but in my opinion encouraged, since the success of the experiment depends not only on how many downloads they sell, but also on the how much exposure the music gets and how much of that exposure is translated into revenue from shows and other merchandise. Granting permission through a CC license to freely redistribute and remix the music is a good way of increasing that exposure.

And if you really want to pay for the music you can always get it from AmazonMP3, or go back to the site later and pay the $5 without getting the download.

rndmnme said 11:26AM on 3-03-2008

@Todd:

Darwin? Try Milton Friedman.

Ben said 11:29AM on 3-03-2008

Actually, it's 1/4 free. ;) Though, you underestimate the fanbase of NIN. Personally, I would pay for the $300 edition had I the money. I'm glad the money is going to the artist rather than the recording industry.

I already downloaded the MP3s earlier as the site was down, but I'm certainly going to be purchasing the MP3s at the very least.

Radiohead's album wasn't too great, neither was the album by Saul Williams (produced by Reznor). At least neither was in my taste. So far, this album is great. Well worth the money. The first actual music purchase of my life, to be honest.

izzy said 11:34AM on 3-03-2008

http://www.amazon.com/Ghosts-I-IV/dp/B00158SHD8/ref=pd_ts_th_1?pf_rd_p=369090201&pf_rd_s=center-6&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_i=163856011&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1ZM13E4G91RBM1N5HDB0

gAt0 said 2:22PM on 3-03-2008

"But $5 will get you all the songs in DRM-free MP3 format."

For 5 bucks you'll get FLAC version -besides the MP3 and AAC ones, all of them-, that is lossless. That is if you buy the album using the official webpage ( http://ghosts.nin.com/main/order_options ).

If you order through Amazon you'll only get the 256kbps MP3 version, instead of the 320kbps one.

izzy said 2:23PM on 3-03-2008

1/4 of the music is free not 1/3 and you can download the whole album from amazon's mp3 store for only $5 too.

koan said 2:25PM on 3-03-2008

Don't be surprised: I've preordered the 75$ pack :)

RaP said 2:25PM on 3-03-2008

well I gave Amazon $5 for it (couldn't get the NiN site to work) I figure even in the worst case scenario if I don't like much of the album I'm encouraging the shift away from the current model.
Personally I saw RadioHead's move as more of a publicity stunt than an actual jab at the industry. On the other hand, Reznor has a history of butting heads with record labels.

Chad said 9:15PM on 3-03-2008

NIN being my second favourite band after Tool, I will be more than happy to give Trent my money.

It's good to see 'The Downward Spiral' of record labels continue with another artist taking their business into their own hands.

Chris said 8:03AM on 3-04-2008

Good on them, nice to seem someone taking a step forward. They've got the pricing spot on, I'd be happy paying that for an album (if I listened to NIN).

Pete said 12:40PM on 3-04-2008

I cant download their songs.... because of the server load yesterday, the download link expired... and I can't get what I paid for! :(.

John said 12:44PM on 3-04-2008

I bought mine yesterday and had to wait till today. If your link isnt working, email them. I'm sure they will get you your music.

In fact, I downloaded mine this morning at >1000kbps (gotta love the work internet speed)

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