Making the case for music as art

CD sales and especially online tracks have been in a race to the bottom in terms of pricing over the past few years. A new Canadian record label Victorious Kiam (http://www.victoriouskiam.com/) is now launching an unknown artist with only 100 copies of the single and charging roughly $200 per copy (UK£ 100).

You heard that right, $200 for a single track from an unknown artist.

The artist is Thurston Revival and the name of the track is "Somewhere There's An Angel."

The point being made here is that music is art just like a painting or sculpture or whatever. It has an intrinsic artistic value and Kiam is trying to make a point more than anything that a well crafted song is worth as much in time and effort as a wonderful piece of art from another medium. Even better, they have a series of awesome album art pieces included in the package to really drive home the point that the song and album art together make up the artistic ideas and are one package.

I am definitely on the bandwagon of music as art. The issue here is that you are not paying for the master (as you would when you buy a one-of-a-kind original painting or sculpture.) Instead, you are paying for a reproduction (more like a reprint or replica) which is worth MUCH less than the original. If they were selling the master tape, then that would be one thing. But this is a copy, digital by the way, that is exactly the same as the original but reproducible for almost nothing.

What they do have going for them on this is the point that good album art is part of a greater artistic package than the track alone. Definitely agree there. It is a crime that we have lost the album art from the digital music experience (don't tell me a 100 x 100 pixelated album cover I can barely make out is cutting it iTunes!). The other thing is the scarcity of the track. I can see paying a lot more for something that only 100 people are "ever" going to be able to own. If they stick to their guns, there is value in it. This is definitely an interesting experiment in a new model.