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De La Soul to Make Entire Catalog Available for Free
- aye 13y agoThis is huge. This is amazing. Not only are De La Soul incredible artists, but their work isn't available on Rdio. I had De La Soul is Dead on cassette -- I definitely know what I'll be doing at 11 am (servers willing).
- eponeponepon 13y agoIf this turns out to be all 128k mp3s, I am going to be thoroughly irked. ...and then proceed to grab the lot anyway, of course.
- codelap 13y agoI'm sure you didn't mean it to sound entitled, but it's free music. Disappointed in 128k is fine, as you can't get the sound quality that would meet your requirement to be in your library. But it shouldn't annoy you.
- delluminatus 13y agoWhy not?
- eponeponepon 13y agoNah, it doesn't actually annoy me - forgive my hyperbole. It would be more exciting to have lovely clean flacs than to have dirty mp3s, though. :)
- at-fates-hands 13y agoAnd then you can download Audacity and covert them to 320K or FLAC and be happy.
- eponeponepon 13y agoUmm. Not totally sure if you're making a joke or missing the point - there's no point making a lossless file from a lossy source, and even less point making a higher-bitrate lossy version...
- chadwickthebold 13y agoCan you actually do that? Up-convert from a lossy source so that the file reads that it's 320kbps or whatever, but sounds like its coming out of an old telephone?
- eponeponepon 13y agoOf course :) A single generation from 128 to 320 wouldn't be too terrible, mind - it'd probably be noticeable to most people on half-decent speakers, but it wouldn't totally wreck the music. A second generation from that lossy-sourced 320 would probably start to get pretty grating, though. If you're thinking of doing it for artistic reasons, though, I'd say you're more likely to get better results from a judicious selection of high- and low-pass filters, with a flanger or two thrown in.
- fuzzywalrus 13y agoJust to expand on what eponeponepon said, digital generation loss (by transcoding/compression) sounds quite a bit different than analog generation loss.
- jgeerts 13y agoNoooo... I want to give them my money.
- ItendToDisagree 13y agoIsn't there a way to do that? For some reason I thought I read in another source about this that there was a donation type link?
- Jacqued 13y agoNope, you just leave your email and they send you the links by mail. They don't even offer a way to send money.
- ItendToDisagree 13y agoDo we think Trent Reznor, Thom Yorke, and others may follow suit? I really hope so!!
- k-mcgrady 13y agoRadiohead were one of the first major artists to do a 'pay what you want' which included $0. I believe they regretted it and I think I read one of the reasons was that it devalued music for everyone. e.g. if they are giving it away why do others think they can charge?
- mjn 13y agoA few years ago, Reznor tried a kind of shareware-style "first episode is free, buy the full version" model with the Ghosts 4-disc set: Ghosts I was free, but you had to pay if you wanted Ghosts I-IV. You could buy either physical version of various levels of fanciness, or DRM-free downloads (MP3 or FLAC).
- jfasi 13y agoHere's my thinking about the decision on the part of an artist to release their entire catalog to the public for free: if digital distribution has rendered direct sales to the customer significantly less worthwhile than it once was, they need some alternate source of promotion and revenue. A move like this would likely increase the artists' visibility in the public's eye without significantly harming their total revenues. Notice that they give out copies of their songs, but don't release their copyright: want to download their music to listen to it on your iPod? Awesome, enjoy. Want to remix it or use it in a commercial setting? The music isn't licensed for that, you're going to have to talk to their agents. This move is genius: it increases artists' exposure, ultimately leading to increased sales, licensing, and presumably also concert revenues. There's basically no downside to this.
- jmngomes 13y agoActually, I think there's a major upside in revenue as the artist profits way more from live shows than from album sales, which are a low margin business as record companies take its lion's share. Getting their music out there increases their visibility and, therefore, desirability, meaning more people will be willing to pay to see them live. One trouble is that booking artists for live shows is (or used to be) very driven by album sales, so perhaps we'll start seeing other interesting metrics - like Youtube/FB followers, # downloads, etc - achieving the status a "more official" indicator.
- davidw 13y ago> Getting their music out there increases their visibility If everyone did it though, they'd be back where they started in terms of visibility, and short the money they were earning through album sales.
- luxpir 13y agoOr, the potential market could grow along with the deluge of free music, no longer restricted to the credit card-holding western adult listener. This would have the potential to trigger increased popularity in radio and other media, benefiting both the artists and listeners. Pure speculation, of course.
- hiphopyo 13y agoCheck my homage to the guy who produced their best beats: http://bit.ly/1dOAbq9 http://bit.ly/1dOAbq9 http://bit.ly/1dOAbq9+ http://bit.ly/1dOAbq9+ (preview)
- josteink 13y agoFrom http://unshort.me/index.php?r=http%3A%2F%2Fbit.ly%2F1dOAbq9 http://unshort.me/index.php?r=http%3A%2F%2Fbit.ly%2F1dOAbq9 Actual URL: http://home.no/dwaynie/beat_scene.png http://home.no/dwaynie/beat_scene.png Edit: Need to double-read what I respond to.
- hiphopyo 13y agoWhy respond at all?
- ehsanu1 13y agoI found it useful. Makes me more likely to click the actual link when I can see what it might be (an image in this case). Seeing the real domain and path is also nice. I gotta say, "homage to the guy who produced their best beats" seems very inaccurate, you sure that's the right link?
- hiphopyo 13y agoThe link tracks J Dilla's posthumous influence. J Dilla, a.k.a. "your favorite producer's favorite producer", the man behind De La Soul's Stakes Is High among others.
- donretag 13y agoWhy use shortend links?
- hiphopyo 13y agoSo I can check the stats, dawg.
- bashcoder 13y agoNot a good enough offer - they would have to pay me to download these.
- bashcoder 13y agoSeriously though, I hate to see these kinds of unforced errors. Especially from guys who should understand that the only reason people know who they are is because of a business model that is under siege. Now is a time when the music industry desperately needs to make the case for value. These kind of gags don't help anybody.
- jessaustin 13y agoKeep telling yourself that, just like those old-fashioned newspaper people. I'm sure it will work out.
- bashcoder 13y agoOf course the old model is upended - that's fine. Adapt and rebuild. Not telling myself anything. Just making the point that maybe this wasn't a genius move on the grand scale.
- bashcoder 13y agoOK, so I get downvoting a joke that someone doesn't think is helpful to the argument. No problem. But why would someone downvote a legitimate music industry opinion that they disagree with? As someone with over 35 albums to my credit, I just happen to think this isn't a good strategy. Is the groupthink so strong on HN that someone can't express an opinion supporting the commercial value of professional artists and their work?
- mratzloff 13y agoI up-voted the comment before I saw this response, as I always do when I see a valid opinion down-voted. Down-voting opposing viewpoints is annoying, but generally people like me will negate it, so there isn't much to be gained from complaining about it.
- yardie 13y agoTo me "Stakes is High (1996)" was their first album I really liked. And I can't find it online anywhere (not the warez servers, I support my artists). At the moment all I have is an empty CD case as someone has absconded with my CD.
- rjtavares 13y agoAlthough I can't understand why you didn't like 3 feet high, I agree with with on Stakes is High. One of the most underrated albums in hip-hop.
- yardie 13y agoI'm not sure why 3 feet high did not resonate with me. It was good but not great album, IMO. Me, myself, and I was getting too much commercial play so I never took it seriously. It might also be timing. When 3 feet was released I was a pre-teen. Stakes is High arrived when I was a real adolescent, I was dating, working part-time, and hanging out with friends. Buying music was a big decision back then, a $15 CD required 3 hours of minimum wage, fast food work.
- Tashtego 13y agoOne thing I don't see anyone in these comments taking into account- this is music that, for various sampling law / licensing reasons, they have never been able to sell or stream online. They seem to be giving it away because they've run out of options for getting it in the hands of their fans otherwise.
- relaxatorium 13y agoThis should get more upvotes as it is pretty important to understanding why they did this. The earliest De La Soul albums were jam packed with samples that wound up getting them hit with a few lawsuits/out-of court settlements that severely hampered their ability to release this music in various new media/formats. They're definitely an artifact of the more wild-west times of hip-hop sampling.
- ghx 13y agoYeah, the story isn't quite as compelling when you put it that way. That first album would cost millions of dollars to release if they put it out today. The list of expensive samples (Johnny Cash, Led Zeppelin, Michael Jackson, etc.) on that album is totally out of control...
- e12e 13y agoOh, I don't know -- at least now new artists can (more easily) sample them, and continue making art under equally unclear legal status. One can always hope this will help push fair use to become broader, rather than narrower.
- windsurfer 13y agoThey could host it and sell it on Legitmix.
- grahamel 13y agoThey've started now - http://www.wearedelasoul.com/ http://www.wearedelasoul.com/ Process is: choose an album/albums, enter an email, click link in email, get message saying they'll be ready in about an hour
- gonzo 13y agothen dropbox saturated, and you can't get the zip files.
- orblivion 13y agoI entered my gmail address with a "+" in order to differentiate mail coming from this direction, and it considered my address invalid.
- wlj 13y agoYou can put in an invalid email address and then click through to Mailchimp's signup form, which does respect the + sign.
- Jacqued 13y agoFor those wondering, I've just started to download them, the albums are 100-160MB each, so that seems to be in the range for FLAC or 320 MP3 Edit : I can confirm, they are 320 mp3s
- darklajid 13y agoChecked 5 out of 6 (after that the links were down) and only track 01 - but all of these were mp3@320
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- cycojesus 13y ago"Error (509) This account's public links are generating too much traffic and have been temporarily disabled!"
- thaJeztah 13y agoYup, same here..
- cstross 13y ago+1. (Me too.) I suspect De La Soul hit some sort of quota limit and Dropbox will either (a) hit them up for a bandwidth bill, or (b) decide to raise the limit as a goodwill/marketing gesture, later in the day. Edit: Downloads working now, 46 minutes after release time.
- darklajid 13y agoWell, that was an interesting idea.. They decided to distribute the files via ... Dropbox. Missing AOI: Bionix now, because Error (509) This account's public links are generating too much traffic and have been temporarily disabled!
- famousactress 13y agoI was super curious about the delivery mechanism. Wildly bold choice, presuming Dropbox wasn't collaborating.
- darklajid 13y agoI'd guess Dropbox wasn't informed. The way this plays out, someone thought that this might be a good idea and didn't think it through - or didn't expect the reaction. I'm not sure about the legality of sharing what I got - as I said, I finished 5 out of 6 downloads, missing just AOI: Bionix (well, the last one to click in the mail...). Edit: Yeah.. The people who did this? Not technical.. ;-) inflating: __MACOSX/De La Soul Is Dead/._.DS_Store Edit2: I even got a Thumbs.db!
- gonzo 13y agoOS X... funny.
- evan_ 13y agoLooks like they've got 'em up on S3 now.
- deanclatworthy 13y agoThe links from their public bucket that you receieve once you get the mail. For those that don't want to sign up to the mailing list or wait: http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/3-Feet-High.zip http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/3-Feet-High.zip http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/De-La-Soul-Is-Dead.zip http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/De-La-Soul-Is-D... http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/Buhloone-Mindstate.zip http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/Buhloone-Mindst... http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/Stakes-Is-High.zip http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/Stakes-Is-High.... http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/Art-Official-Intelligence.zip http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/Art-Official-In... http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/AOI-Bionix.zip http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/AOI-Bionix.zip http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/Remixes-Rarities-Instrumentals.zip http://de-la-soul.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/Remixes-Raritie...
- n2j3 13y agoSo who's gonna be the one to tell De La Soul of the BitTorrent file distribution system?
- reticulated 13y agoProbably the Dropbox sysadmins!
- gaadd33 13y agoYou mean Amazon?
- chadwickthebold 13y agoNot sure if that's the route they'll want to go, seeing as how this is supposed to be limited to 25 Hours.
- pit 13y agoI've been pimping BitTorrent Sync pretty hard lately, so B547XI66CJZ6P2TFZBAWZ5QX5RB3ECBM2.
- pit 13y agoSorry, I got really excited and forgot about the 25-hour thing. I took it down. :( Seriously, though, BitTorrent Sync is amazing.
- dylanz 13y agoThey take the marquee up out of the biz. As a long time De La fan, this was a great thing to wake up to. They fell out of my daily playlist for a while because I'm horrible at keeping my devices synced. Now I have it engrained in my mind that I can download their catalog at anytime, so they'll probably be the first "go to" music in a lot of future situations.
- barlescabbage 13y agoThere's some bands like wilderness survival(http://www.wildernesssurvivalmusic.com http://www.wildernesssurvivalmusic.com) that have always given away their music. Perhaps, this is how things will work going forward.
- Edd314159 13y agoWhat's funny is one of the albums they've put up for download ("De La Soul is Dead") seems to itself been downloaded from a piracy website. This album lacks any ID3 data except for a link to "http://rappalata.net/" http://rappalata.net/". I can't read Russian, so forgive me if I'm wrong, but it doesn't look too legitimate. (EDIT: Correction: all tracks have that link)
- waylandsmithers 13y ago...for 25 hours starting at 11AM Eastern, not indefinitely
- ndrake 13y agoThe Dropbox links are working for me now.
- fuzzywalrus 13y agoI haven't even gotten a confirmation e-mail.
- NAFV_P 13y agoTalking about sought after hip-hop, the article reminded me of this: http://www.discogs.com/KMD-Black-Bastards/release/4762758 http://www.discogs.com/KMD-Black-Bastards/release/4762758
- dorfe 13y agoThe context here, which I haven't seen mentioned, is that De La Soul cannot release much of their catalog digitally given the way their contracts are structured. As a result, all material before Grind Date (2004) is not available on digital stores/platforms like iTunes, et al. De La negotiated their contracts well before Internet distribution and revenue was germane. Oddly, this is sometimes described as distribution "throughout the universe". This is actually not an uncommon problem for artists from this era who relied heavily on samples (i.e., hip-hop). Would they have cleared samples used on their albums "in perpetuity", giving De La the widest distribution license available (read: for use forever), we would not be talking about De La Soul releasing music for free online. We'd be buying it on iTunes and they'd be compensated for it. End of story. Instead, De La makes most of their money off CD sales and touring, which is a tough spot as CDs are entering obsolescence and touring, especially at their age, must be grueling. On the flip side, the good news here is De La Soul and early hip-hop pioneers are seeing a resurgence (IMHO well-deserved) and getting the music out there by any means necessary is a crucial step to be heard. Go see them on tour, buy their gear or even a CD (ha) if you're feeling it.
- isa 13y agoAbsolutely. As more people crave for personal experience, their live shows will mean more. Plus, if you've never been to a De La show, you're missing out on life. One of the best show's I've ever been to, hands down.
- vfarmm 13y agoReceived my download link downloaded to my galaxy phone but reads file cant be opened
- antocv 13y agoAwesomeness, De La Soul is the cream of Hip Hop. More artists should follow this example, and we HNers should listen to Stakes is High and "What we do for (love)" when nature calls. Its valentines after all.
- majani 13y ago"Much more than they can see is how it'll always be, believe me" De La Soul - Much More http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VojfkAZZqXA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VojfkAZZqXA