Lots of news lately about Radiohead offering its newest album as a download (choose your own price). Saul Williams and Trent Reznor decided to do the same with their new album. They’ve made a lot of headlines, though Issa (Jane Siberry) has offered self-determined pricing for her music for some time. We’ve been offering our music online in download options of free or purchasable as high quality MP3/Ogg formats or physical CD for the last five years. I’m sure many other artists have offered their work this way but the method is getting large-scale attention and, it seems, acceptance.

UnKindness Of Ravens recently may have been heard by way of CKDU 88.1 in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Ron Bates’s The Threat is an “eclectic show of noise, jazz, indie rock, and other avant garde weirdness,” which presented (among exciting bits of thumb-piano joy from Konono No.1 and well-placed rock) some UKOR too. Fortunately for those who missed it, there is a podcast (episode 35 from 19 Aug 2006). It’s not just back-scratching that I’m recommending downloading the The Threat podcast (more like skin flaying), Ron’s put together a solid history of interesting music.

Need something to download podcasts? The site recommends this ipodder program (for Linux, Mac, and Windows)–I’m using a great Linux app, amaroK.

Adam Gould’s aesthetic marries mesmer with manacles of a definite love sort. This is some fine video experimentation set to Gould’s own creative mix of UKOR’s “Softs” and “Backwards Cereberal Heartbeat.” Watch it courtesy of the Internet Archive.

Cheers Adam.

A subtle note to the reader. UnKindness Of Ravens (UKOR), while a little slow is far from dead. Material in the works will provide a double album within a year.

Relieve your pressing need for Spring with the noise of myth on a Ukorian stride.
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- Purchase the compact disc of Obsidian Smoke Rings.

- Purchase the MP3 package of Obsidian Smoke Rings, encoded in a high-quality, 320 kbps bitrate (instant download from Lulu.com includes liner notes and artwork - about 130MB).*
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