Green Plastic Radiohead

Hopefully you all have heard In Rainbows by now. If not, go over to www.inrainbows.com and purchase (or not purchase if that’s your thing) the album. Excitement is in the air and we at GP are reminded of how wonderful it is to hear a Radiohead album without it being leaked first. It’s similar to when OK Computer was released and all we had to go by were live recordings of the songs.

Anyway, Thom wrote on Dead Air Space today:

hope you are enjoying listening to the download of In Rainbows.
its a relief to us all that finally its out there.
its been a mad couple of weeks.. as i’m sure you can imagine…
“I love pop music to death….. Most great composers rely on folk music. I rely on pop music.
I’m not saying I’m a great composer or that pop music is folk music. There’s a whole endless thing going on out there.
You make your little pond but if your pond isn’t connected to the river, which isn’t connected to an ocean,
it’s just going to dry up. It’s just a little piss pool. I’ve lived too long to be happy in a pond.”
I found this in WIRE magazine over a pint in the pub last night.. its Robert Wyatt

In other news, our server has been taking a beating over the last day. Our dedicated server also hosts Mortigi Tempo, which is our Radiohead message board. Because of all the crazy traffic, we’ve had to switch MT to a lo-fi version for the time-being so that you can still post and talk with other fans. Hopefully we’ll be back to normal soon.

Finally, what’s up with Radiohead and the number 10? Conspiracy theory or just plain silly?

That’s right folks, people are reporting that they have been receiving emails from w.a.s.t.e. with links on how to download In Rainbows. If you haven’t received yours yet, don’t fret. You’ll get it soon…

Our verdict: Quite possibly the best Radiohead album ever made.

Tomorrow is the day! Some fans are already getting emails with downloading instructions for tomorrow morning.

THANK YOU FOR ORDERING IN RAINBOWS. THIS IS AN UPDATE.
YOUR UNIQUE ACTIVATION CODE(S) WILL BE SENT OUT TOMORROW MORNING (UK TIME). THIS WILL TAKE YOU STRAIGHT TO THE DOWNLOAD AREA.
HERE IS SOME INFORMATION ABOUT THE DOWNLOAD:
THE ALBUM WILL COME AS A 48.4MB ZIP FILE CONTAINING 10 X 160KBPS DRM FREE MP3s.
MOST COMPUTERS NOW HAVE ZIP SOFTWARE AS PART OF THE OPERATING SYSTEM; IF YOUR COMPUTER DOES NOT, YOU NEED TO GET WINZIP OR ZIPIT INSTALLED PRIOR.
YOU CAN DOWNLOAD THEM HERE:
PC: http://www.winzip.com/
MAC: http://www.maczipit.com/
IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS OR PROBLEMS DOWNLOADING YOUR FILE, PLEASE CONTACT OUR DOWNLOAD CUSTOMER SERVICE TEAM AT
downloadinrainbows@waste.uk.com”
(thanks to Rex)

Radiohead’s PR company (Nasty Little Man) sent out a release explaining that the new album will not have any promos at all and also confirming that you can pay whatever you want for the downloads.

There will be no advances, promotional copies, digital streams, media sites, etc. of RADIOHEAD’s In Rainbows.

Everyone in the world will be getting the music at the same time: Oct. 10. That includes us. We don’t have anything to play anyone in the nine days until the record is available. Everyone at nasty has put his or her order in and just to clarify: you are not being asked to pay for a promo (as some have inquired). you can pay nothing or as much or as little as you want.

There will be no promotional copies of the discbox either, as each discbox is being made to order. Sorry.

(via Stereogum)

Buzz is everywhere this morning about Radiohead’s decision to release a new album on their own through inrainbows.com. We caught wind of this Time article which is a good read, especially the part about how the labels are reacting:

While many industry observers speculated that Radiohead might go off-label for its seventh album, it was presumed the band would at least rely on Apple’s iTunes or United Kingdom-based online music store 7digital for distribution. Few suspected the band members had the ambition (or the server capacity) to put an album out on their own. The final decision was apparently made just a few weeks ago, and, when informed of the news on Sunday, several record executives admitted that, despite the rumors, they were stunned. “This feels like yet another death knell,” emailed an A&R executive at a major European label. “If the best band in the world doesn’t want a part of us, I’m not sure what’s left for this business.”

Labels can still be influential and profitable by focusing on younger acts that need their muscle to get radio play and placement in record stores — but only if the music itself remains a saleable commodity. “That’s the interesting part of all this,” says a producer who works primarily with American rap artists. “Radiohead is the best band in the world; if you can pay whatever you want for music by the best band in the world, why would you pay $13 dollars or $.99 cents for music by somebody less talented? Once you open that door and start giving music away legally, I’m not sure there’s any going back.”

Best Week Ever has put it perfectly: Radiohead Bends Record Industry Over Conference Table And Goes To Town.