http://www.nme.com/news/thom-yorke/51422

Man, I love Radiohead, and have a lot of respect for Yorke (and it's not like I entirely disagree with him here), but sometimes he forgets how he got where he is. Radiohead can do whatever they want now, but it’s only because for years they were on a major label who had the resources and power to deliver their music and press worldwide.

It’s easy for him to say “we don’t need the labels and the industry” – but now, more than ever, it’s near impossible for a new band to break through the deluge of artists out there, get noticed and covered by national / international press, have the money to book tours outside of a specific region, get extensive radio airplay, have your release taken out of the pile and reviewed by key publications….

wrong.

Surfer Blood.

I guess that's proof that anyone can do it, huh.

nobody has heard of surfer blood, dale, though i do agree that bands still have ample opportunity to "make it" now they just might have to work at it a little harder themselves but then, guess what? they don't owe their success (or failure if they dont make it), not to mention a pile of money, to some corporation.

and that, friends, is a good thing in my book.

Surfer Blood's label, Kanine, has a distribution deal with Universal. They get some of the advantages of the surviving system that Yorke is railing against.

oh snap

seeing that they're playing many of the larger music festivals in the U.S. and Europe, regular play on Sirius, interviews in all of the large music mags, music in film, etc., i'd have to disagree with you.

even before they signed to the album deal with kanine, they were playing all over the place, hyped online, and selling their demo/album.

the dudes in surfer blood still probably have day jobs when not touring.

I think the holy grail for any new band these days seems to be a mediocre-to-favorable review on Pitchfork. Instantly opens doors for you. It's the new "getting signed".

I could say this about dozens of bands. How many are able, financially and buzz-wise, to sustain it in the long run on their own?

I'm not saying it's not possible. I'm saying that Radiohead certainly had help from mammoth corporate entities, and that it has become much much more difficult for any band to reach the levels of success and wealth they have, with or without the majors behind them.

Hell, most of the guys in Okkervil River have day jobs when they're not touring.

Wasn't Dischord, by which I mean almost all the DC bands (save go-go acts), doing this thirty years before Radiohead?

With all this and despite the fact that they are from your hometown, you never felt the need to mention them here until October 20 of last year...after they were on a label and getting national hype.

Surfer Blood obviously had money to hire an in-demand publicist (http://www.motormouthmedia.com/home/) and agent (http://www.panacherock.com/index.php)

The difference here is that Dischord folks aren't constantly bitching in magazine articles about the corporate music industry. And even if they were, they don't have a history of benefiting from and utilizing the corporate machine.

I think Yorke's views are informed, and often realistic. I just think he might want to preface such comments with acknowledgement about his own ties to the "business" he denounces regularly with such fervor.

thom yorke is not a very good prognisticator. there is absolutely no way that the entire music business will fold up in months or even the next few years. too many people have too much invested in their labels for that to happen. there are really great small labels (i'll say trouble in mind right now since i love what they're doing locally) that have fresh approaches to releasing music and aren't in imminent danger of collapsing.

are some labels in trouble? yes, of course. but it's go time for people in this industry. and just like with every other industry in the world, bright ideas will vault some companies just like poor intuition will cause others to die.

This raises another interesting point. The larger management and booking agencies have always had pull, but I think a large portion of the balance of power has shifted to these entities in recent years. Music fans will always look to labels that they trust for a certain calibre or quality of artist, but radio, venues, and the press are now all taking cues from who companies like the Agency Group, or Creative Artists, etc have signed on or are pushing.

i'd agree with that above about agencies having more pull now than ever. there was a time when regular fans would have no idea who windish or billions were because they were simply cogs in the system. now i hear their names tossed around regularly.

True. I think Ian's a little bitch, sometimes -- especially when he's talking about Jeff Nelson, his putative partner in the label -- but Dischord('s scene) has been largely detached from the industry as a whole. & that's what I was trying to say. While the "pay what you want" online model for iN ra /inb oW (s) was (somewhat) novel, going it alone (i.e. without the backing of a behemoth record label) is not. At all.

Plus, that's how the DC scene started out. Radiohead, clearly, did not. (In fact, they were Bush, before Bush was Bush, famous for (a) Nirvana-aping song(s).)

that doesn't change the fact that they were doing quite well before then.

obviously they are not going to "fold". the majors still control the rights to millions of songs. that is not going anywhere.

i would love to know if radiohead could have started from creep without major support and risen to super-stardom? most likely not.

There's a chance I could start selling demo cds out of the trunk of my car and "make it" to the level of success of Surfer Blood. That doesn't mean Modem's proposition is wrong. He's talking about the general state of music not every band.

how many bands have successfully or even noticeably released a record for pay-what-you-can-if-anything purchase since in rainbows?