Downloadable mixtape

I was reading the latest issue of Disrupt Magazine and came across an advertisement for Aussie hip hop duo Weapon X and Ken Hell. It was advertising their latest mixtape and contained the text "GET YOUR COPY NOW OR DOWNLOAD IT AT www.illflow.com" I was interested in the "OR DOWNLOAD IT" part and decided to check out the site. A simple click on the "Download" section of the website takes you to a page where you can download the entire mixtape, track by track, for free.

While I'm sure this is not a new phenomenon, it was a good example of musicians embracing mp3 technology and recognising its potential benefits. Mixtapes are used as promotional tools to get an artists name out there and what better way of increasing its potential distribution than offering it for free download online. While some factions of the music industry are busy trying to monitor and limit mp3 downloading/sharing, some are accepting that mp3 is here to stay and are discovering ways of using the format for their benefit.

On a related note, I remember a year or 2 ago seeing a TV advert for a NZ band where you could preview the album by calling an 0800 number to listen to snippets of each track on the album. Pretty innovative thinking I thought.