Tilly in BusinessWeek

We mentioned here a couple weeks ago that Tilly and the Wall, on the new record label Team Love, made all the tracks from their new album available online for free (also check out the photos on that page by DB’s our very own Rebecca Laurie). Now BusinessWeek has picked up the story with this article. Serious bands putting full albums online for free is a trend that’s going to grow fast– keep your eyes peeled. It could become the most compelling challenge to the major labels’ increasingly desperate PR machine.

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The Illegal Art show opening last night was a lot of fun– thanks to everyone who came out. Here’s a small photo of the DVD Art, the Grey Album listening booth, and Jay-Z Construction Set display. The video, edited and narrated by Tiffiniy, went over very well. I think the tangibility of seeing a lot of this art in print and on screen really helped give people who don’t study this stuff a more concrete understanding of the issues.

And as we mentioned in the previous post, we’d love to turn this project into a nice digital package that people can use to put on quick, fun art shows wherever they live. Realistically, we’re totally overwhelmed with other things right now, but if someone wants to volunteer for this, we’d love the help and it would be a great thing to make. Any meticulous curator types out there? We’ve already laid a lot of the groundwork, so here’s what it would entail from here:

• We’ll send you all the digital print and video files that we have.
• Together, we’ll come up with a list of other things that we might want to add.
• For things we don’t already have, you’ll get in touch with as many of the artists as possible and try to get their permission to include digital versions of the art in the show kit.
• You’ll clean up the DVD we’ve made, try to get higher quality versions of some things, and add new stuff (video editing experience would be really good).
• You’ll make a CD of all the print art in the show, so that anyone with a little money can drop it off at a copy shop to have nice prints made.
• We’ll make a nice website about the project and host (probably with Bit Torrent) all the files that people need.

If we do this right, people will be able to put on a really good illegal art show with $150, a simple space, and about a half-day of setup. This could also be a nice model for shows with other themes. Interested? Email me: npr(at)downhillbattle.org.