Radiohead Frontman: Music Biz Will “Completely Fold” in Months

Thom Yorke calls record labels “sinking ships” that young musicians should avoid getting too entangled with, and that their departure will be “no great loss to the world.”

Thom Yorke, Radiohead frontman and longtime critic of music industry excesses, is warning emerging artists in a new school textbook for students of GCSE Citizenship Studies not to tie themselves to the “sinking ship” of the music industry, suggesting it will soon collapse.

“So, I guess I would say, don’t tie yourself to the sinking ship because, believe me, it’s sinking,” he says.

Record labels have been sinking ever since digital music undermined their stranglehold on distribution. Record labels are merely marketing and distribution entities that have grown increasingly irrelevant in a world where the Internet allows artists to do both of these of things on their own and practically for free.

If record labels wanted to stay relevant they should’ve seen the handwriting on the wall and embraced the new paradigm from day one. It’s hubris was it’s downfall.

Yorke and Radiohead have always been at the vanguard of emerging music industry trends. It shocked the world back in 2007 by releasing its album In Rainbows online directly to fans and allowing them to pay whatever price they felt comfortable with. The move rattled already nervous record labels and raised the ire of many whom aware afraid of the sea change it foretold.

U2 band manager Paul McGuiness who said the plan to “some extent backfired,” and Kiss frontman Gene Simmons asked aloud if the band was “on f*cking crack.”

Yorke discusses his conversations with fellow bandmate Ed O’Brien who he says warns that “it’s simply a matter of time – months rather than years – before the music business establishment completely folds.”

O’Brien sits on the Board of Directors of the Featured Artists Coalition, the group dedicated to helping artists “take control” of their destiny and music, and “making the most” of the opportunities presented by digital technology.

“He is involved in trying to build a world where artists would finally get paid,” adds Yorke. “But we are up against the self-protecting interests of that industry.”

That’s the rub Yorke and O’Brien are trying to make clear: record labels and artists are two distinct entities of the music industry, and each have their own concerns.

As NIN frontman Trent Reznor pointed out last April, all record labels are concerned with is profits, they only see an artist as a “means to make revenue.”

“At every fork in the road that will be what’s put first,” he says. ”Not your longevity, not your vision. How can we make money from you.”

So it stands to reason the collapse of record labels should be of no big concern for artists and music fans who care most about the music.

“When the corporate industry dies it will be no great loss to the world,” adds Yorke.

He’s right.

Stay tuned.

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