Digital Rights Network

Putting their music up for free download online has helped new Yorkshire band the Arctic Monkeys sell out concerts across Britain and have their first single go straight to number one. All of this despite the absence of a traditional marketing campaign and only getting a record deal with Domino in July.

Such success would seem to bear out many of the predictions of the benefits for bands of sharing music freely online. It demonstrates that doing so can help sales as well as making a big difference in concert attendance (the band has already had a sell-out UK tour which included headlining at the 2000 person Astoria Theatre in London). It also highlights how such an approach can help in creating a more direct relationship betweens a band and its fans. As the Daily Telegraph explained:

While established record companies struggled with internet piracy, the band used the net by allowing young music lovers to swap their songs free, creating a huge underground fan base.

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When they began to play their high-energy brand of post-punky guitar pop, the entire audience seemed not only to know the words, but to be screaming along in unison, as they danced enthusiastically to every song.

This whole experience, even the more cynical industry insiders present had to agree, was something new. How had all this happened without them?

The answer lay on the internet, where the band, who are barely into their twenties, have made available two dozen or more songs as MP3 files on their website. Through touring the country, mainly in the North, the band have created their own following and encouraged their fans to distribute their songs via file-sharing sites for nothing. Thus far, there have been no publishing royalties at stake.