Netlabel Shares Music on BitTorrent Sites, for Free
Written by Ernesto on January 08, 2009An increasing number of musicians are experimenting with giving away their music for free on BitTorrent. This trend has led to the formation of a new Netlabel, CXCR6, which specifically targets the BitTorrent community with new album releases. We got in touch with its founder about his motivation to promote free music.
Unlike traditional record labels, CXCR6 doesn’t work with contracts, nor does it claim copyright to the music of the artists that join. It’s a non-profit operation whose goal is to get the music out in the open by distributing it to as many people as possible. That’s where BitTorrent comes in.
The label distributes its artist’s albums on well know BitTorrent sites such as The Pirate Bay, Demonoid, What.cd, Waffles.fm and Indietorrents – and doesn’t mind when they leak to even more sites. TorrentFreak spoke with Lloyd Cox, one of the founders of CXCR6, who is a musician himself. We asked him how the label operates, and why he feels BitTorrent is such a great way to share music.
Lloyd told us that CXCR6 is more like a collective, although it functions as a label. “The label works because it’s basically pooling resources. Under a ‘label’ we essentially share any promotion we get, because everything comes back to CXCR6. So if one of the artists blows-up, the other artists get more promotion and downloads through it,” he explained.
The main purpose of the label is to promote the artists in any way possible, free of charge. “As well as just promoting the music, we also send copies for review to various sites and publications, general ‘label’ things like that. We don’t sell anything at CXCR6 but you can donate directly to the PayPal of the artists themselves,” Lloyd said.
CXCR6 is just starting as a Netlabel, but they already have 5 artists on board. Three of them – Xihilisk, Slicepad and Severn – have posted their albums already. The other two musicians are expected to follow soon. Lloyd already has some experience with BitTorrent as a promotional tool. Last year he released one of his albums exclusively on Demonoid.
CXCR6 on The Pirate Bay
This experience was one of the things that encouraged him to motivate others to join in the concept. “Some artists I’ve found make incredible music, but aren’t getting heard by anywhere near the amount of people they deserve. With CXCR6, I can potentially get that music to a ton of people,” Lloyd said.
“I’ve been sharing my own music on BT for a few years now, but the precursor to CXCR6 was organizing a couple of unsigned music compilations on What.cd. They’ve had nearly 30,000 downloads in a few months, and that made me realize that using BT is the right way to promote new music. I don’t know many other ways you could get 30k downloads of some compilations by a load of artists no-one has heard of.”
“BitTorrent provides the ultimate convenience,” Lloyd explained. “You can try something new, for free, and if you don’t like it, you can just delete it. If you really like something, you can donate to the artist, buy one of their CDs or go see them live to show your support. And who doesn’t like getting something for nothing?”
We have to agree with him there, don’t you?
Previously: Netgear Unveils its TV-Torrent Player
Next: BitTorrent as Marketing Tool, Nominated for an Interactive Award
31 Responses
I think artists coming over to the piracy side of things is a good thing, It shows they want to share there music, Not just eat the money
Http://burn-blue.com
And netlabels could use legaltorrents also.. It is a good place ;)
I agree the more people realise that bittorrent is the way to go for content delivery the better.
Good on cxcr6
nice idea and its cool – i want to respond to Nick's comment of "coming over to the piracy side of things" – its not coming over to the piracy side of things! its using p2p technology to distribute music.
you can get chlamydia for nothing
Nick– (great way to tell everyone that you support P2P for the wrong reasons, BTW)
NeonFloss++
This is about a label using P2P because P2P is simply the best medium for sharing. The only link this article has to RIAAcrap is that this netlabel doesn't steal copyrights, where RIAA labels DO steal copyright from the creator.
This is indeed the role that I think labels should play in the first place. Perhaps all this could potentially make P2P even more mainstream.
Incorrect. It is possible to make a living through free music. NIN does it already.
Anything released by this label is free, therefore downloading it is not illegal. As such, your comment is rather off topic…
Nick– (great way to tell everyone that you support P2P for the wrong reasons, BTW)
NeonFloss++
This is about a label using P2P because P2P is simply the best medium for sharing. The only link this article has to RIAAcrap is that this netlabel doesn't steal copyrights, where RIAA labels DO steal copyright from the creator.
Correction: it is just not worth it to support the MAFIAA. Independent groups are fine, though.
Where can i get mine?
i dont think anyone is going to make a liveing from giving away their music for free
This is excellent, great to see someone's trying to do it right. Lets just hope the net labels stay honest & don't get corrupt like the other money hungry unsavory types that are in the already polluted music industry.
Roze, are you a member of the MAFIAA? You sure sound like it sometimes.
Correct. Nine Inch Nails distributed their last album via their website before it was released. It worked really well.
Of course, NIN are already rich enough to give away an album so meh, but most artists who give away music do it because it makes them happy and hope they get donations. Not bad, eh?
I just want to point out a something: RIAA labels do not steal copyright, the artists are freely signing away PART of their copyright. Much in the same way that CXCR6 is freely giving away music.
It's a great thing to see more artists and labels distributing free music. For every new artist and every new label that makes a living from giving away music it becomes soooo much harder for the RIAA to claim that piracy is killing the music industry.
Test
Sorry Roze for using your name.
it was a testing
some of that music, such as Xihilisks is really rubbish though and would have no chance of selling if it were in the shops
http://www.inyourspeakers.com/node/92
I got 2 DMCA last year, I am NEVER downloading illegal again, it is just not worth it.
And thats why your a peon tool.
Nice, gotta just love FREE music!
Jess
privacy.es.tc
Cool! I run a netlabel myself.
http://archive.org/details/brennan-worldwide
Some of our stuff is on Bit Torrent.
We make noise, not music.
I wasn't aware that 'experimental' meant 'up-my-own-arse', but i am aware that my music isn't for everyone.
This also highlights the ease of giving it away for free on BT, you've lost nothing so you can just delete it. But for every 10 people that hate it, i like to think i've reached 1 person that does like it. And that's good enough for me.!
I love FREE music to! But just because its FREE does not make it good!
I dled all of his stuff and, neh, its still shit whatever they may say, "Up his own arse" is a phrase I find quite fitting when describing this type of electronica.
but horses for courses I suppose, and full power to him anyway for doing what hes doing…
At FrostClick.com we're doing something very similar. Perhaps we should create a "FrostClick Label"
Musicians of all kinds are welcome to send their material for free promotion on the FrostWire network, more info here:
http://www.frostclick.com/wp/index.php/promote-yo...
We'll be contacting CXCR6 to help them with distribution.
Can anyone tell who is the real band that plays that song? It was confirmed some years ago that it wasn't TPS.
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