Down with the hacks

It's no secret that I don't like Radiohead. There was even a regular joke with an ex of mine that we couldn't date Radiohead fans: I still can't. I found the band's music pretentious, boring and uninspired. I'm quite willing to admit that I'm prejudiced, but you know, whatever. Normally, I would not bother post about that, but a couple of recent events infuriate me.

As a follow-up to their last winter PR stunt, where their album "In Rainbows" was available online for what you deemed it worth, the band recently opened a contest to remix the second single from the album, "Nude". The intention could be laudable. After all, it is an original way to involve their fan-base and bringing a happy few some recognition.
However, apprentice remixers have to download one to five different stems at $1 each from iTunes in order to enter the contest. That, in itself, is already a despicable maneuver. On top of it, as Ms Watercutter reported on Wired:

What's sort of unclear is what actually happens to remixers who get the most votes. According to iTunes' New Music Tuesday e-mail, "Select mixes will be made available on iTunes later this year." Uh, OK. Then what? Do the creators get a portion of the sales revenue? A "thank you" e-mail from Thom Yorke and Co.? The glory of saying, "You love me! You really love me!"? Or perhaps some American Apparel back-warmer emblazoned with "I Won a Radiohead Remix Contest and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt" (front) "The Free Economy Sucks" (back)?

So, Radiohead will make money on the back of their fans ? Well, after all, that's what fans are for, right. And Radiohead, or at least, their representatives and publisher, already sent a cease-and-desist letter to Amplive, an Oakland DJ who had remixed the whole album and was offering it for... free. Gasp. Free... Anyway, that's old news, an agreement has been reached between both parties and the whole album is now available online. Get it here.

Now, the cherry on the cake is that this contest stunt seems to work very well: the song made the Billboard Hot 100. Turns out that each stem is counted as a regular download of the whole song (because Billboard considers each stem a different remix). As Wired points out:

Radiohead made the Billboard Hot 100 for the first time since 1996 because the remix stems for "Nude" counted towards sales totals for the song.

And of course, higher positions in the chart usually translate in higher sales, more frequent airplay, and therefore yet higher rankings...

OK, maybe the band members are for nothing in that matter. Maybe the blame is only on the representatives, on iTunes, on Billboard or any combination of. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Still, that stinks of scam, and I'm surprised that nobody tried yet to expose the band for the commercial hacks they are. Ah, where's the indie police when you need it ?


BTW, the picture is from the hilarious rainbowpuke site, about puking rainbows...