As Trent Reznor himself said, people will download music for free - no matter what.
You need to accept this. Period! The record labels have not accepted it. Many artists have not accepted it. But it's the truth of the modern music industry. People will download music for free whether you choose to offer your own music for free or not. Would you rather them have your music and potentially spread it or not? In fact, you not only need to accept the fact that people want free music. You need to embrace it and make it a core part of your promotional strategy. This is not the time to offer poor quality preview snippets of one song from your album. We are in an age of instant gratification, and if we don't get it, we move on.
The more music you have distributed for you free of charge, the more you will sell. Some of the people who catch the "virus" will be the ones who prefer to support the artist by paying for music. Just remember, right or wrong, it's the nature of the business today that music is essentially free. The only people who pay for music currently are people who:
a) Prefer to support the artist and have the funds to do so
b) Good samaritans or people who feel it is wrong to download music for free
c) Do not the have means (such as a computer or file-sharing network) to download for free
d) Do not have the technical know-how to download for free
It's time to embrace the future and become your own torrent site. The days of hoarding your music are over. Release your album digitally on your own website free of charge and advertise the fact that it is freely available. Make it easy and convenient for people to get your album. Upload torrents of your album to the major Torrent websites yourself. As your band gets more recognition, many people will search your band name on Google. If they can't find torrents of your latest album, they will bypass your band and move on to the next artist on their download list. It may not be fair, but it's the way things are. If you want your music to be played in their music library and potentially spread virally to more people, you need - at the very least - for your music to be accessible and free for digital download.
James Moore is a Canadian music consultant and author of the popular music marketing book "Your Band Is A Virus - Behind-The-Scenes And Viral Marketing For The Independent Musician". For more information please visit http://www.yourbandisavirus.com/.
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