Danger Mouse selling blank CD-R

[MalaCloudy Black]

Awesome:

If you follow copyright issues, you're no doubt aware of Danger Mouse. He's the DJ who got quite a lot of attention a few years back for creating one of the very first mainstream mashups -- mixing the Beatle's The White Album with Jay-Z's The Black Album to create the rather unique The Grey Album. Of course, one of the main reasons why the album became so well known was because EMI sent cease-and-desist letters to everyone who posted copies of the album, and then to anyone who posted that they were going to participate in the "Grey Tuesday" protest. The whole thing seemed pretty silly. It's not as if anyone listening to The Grey Album would find it a substitute for either of the other albums.

Since then, of course, DJ Danger Mouse has gone on to even more mainstream success with his Gnarls Barkley project, a collaboration between Danger Mouse and Cee-Lo Green. However, it looks like DJ Danger Mouse has another album that he's been working on, in association with Mark Linkous (of Sparklehorse). Yet, due to ongoing legal troubles with EMI, he can't actually release the music. So he's come up with a rather creative solution. Found via Andrew Dubber, the news is that the next album will be released as album artwork with a blank recordable CD.

Yes, a blank CD-R.

There is no music on it. Because if there were music on it, it would get him in more trouble with EMI. Yet, if you have that blank CD and all the artwork, you certainly could (not that they're suggesting you do...) find that music elsewhere and burn it to the CD. The statement from Danger Mouse reads:

Danger Mouse's new project Dark Night Of The Soul consists of an album length piece of music by Danger Mouse, Sparklehorse and a host of guest vocalists, along with a collection of original David Lynch photography inspired by and based on the music.

The photographs, which provide a visual narrative for the music, are compiled in a limited edition, hand numbered 100+ page book which will now come with a blank, recordable CD-R. All copies will be clearly labeled: 'For Legal Reasons, enclosed CD-R contains no music. Use it as you will.'

Due to an ongoing dispute with EMI, Danger Mouse is unable to release the recorded music for Dark Night Of The Soul without fear of being sued by EMI.

Danger Mouse remains hugely proud of Dark Night Of The Soul and hopes that people lucky enough to hear the music, by whatever means, are as excited by it as he is.

In some ways, this is reminiscent of what the band Green Day did many years ago, offering up blank CDs with artwork for fans who had downloaded the music from unauthorized sources. Yet, in this case, it's even more interesting since there are no authorized sources at all for the music. It'll be fun to see how EMI reacts.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090515/1154504899.shtml

That's pretty fuckin' cool.

[Baddar]

Heh, just read about this on BBC. Good on him.

[Lint]

man i forgot about dj danger mouse...i came into this topic expecting discussion on my favorite childhood cartoon of the crimefighting british mouse....

anyway, not a huge follower of dj danger mouse, but i think its a cool "fuck you" to emi

[Skummy]

A little bit of a PR stunt, but it's a nice enough idea, and yet another artist that can at least accept that the rules and methods of the music industry, and of the relationship between the music industry, the artist and the consumer, are changing all the time. Which is nice.

More importantly, the album itself is very good indeed. A lot more Sparklehorse than it is DJ Dangermouse, to my ears, and a really fantastic set of contributors. Wayne Coyne, Black Francis and Vic Chesnutt especially are fantastic on their respective tracks. Looking forward to seeing David Lynch's contribution too, his photography is superb.

[lari]

Blank CDs?

How about he just stops ripping people off and actually purchases the license to sample those two albums? Then he could actually sell the product legitimately.

[Skummy]

Yeah, I prefer consumerism to innovation too.

[K]

Blank CDs?

How about he just stops ripping people off and actually purchases the license to sample those two albums? Then he could actually sell the product legitimately.

.. what two albums?

[Skummy]

I'm assuming he means The Black Album and The White Album, and also assuming that he didn't properly read the article, and has a fundamental misunderstanding of how copyright law works.