The Pelican’s Perch

(and I quote Johnny Greenwood himself)

Hello everyone.

Well, the new album is finished, and it’s coming out in 10 days;

We’ve called it In Rainbows.

Love from us all.
Jonny

First off, if you want a respectable take on this news that is actually somewhat professionally put together and gives you the info without being surrounded by fanboy excitement and rambling, I’d just go to one of the 100 blogs that posted about it yesterday, like Brooklyn Vegan’s post.

For the rest of you still here, are you kidding me!? THE greatest news I could have ever stumbled upon tonight has made not only my night, quite possibly my musical year. A simple stop to Digg.com led to me finding out the bombshell Radiohead just dropped on us. Those of you like me, who’ve spent your whole weekend away from the computer, I’m sure you’re just as floored by this announcement as me. What was thought to be a hoax has turned out to be the biggest surprise of the year. Radiohead announced this weekend that their new album is called In Rainbows, and will be available for download in 10 days. That’s right. You’ll be listening to the new Radiohead album in 10 days!! How surreal is that. Something I’ve waited over five years for has become a reality in such a sudden and shocking fashion that I was literally sitting at my computer speechless for a good five minutes.

Here’s the main reason I was speechless though. The album will be available for as much or as little as you want to pay for it. Exactly how we plan on doing things over at LemonDrop Records. Having the biggest band in the world backing our philosophy definitely makes me feel happy to say the least. But you can head over to their site right now if you want and pre-order it, where you’ll pay online and fill out the price with a zero if you want, or $500. It’s honestly up to you. Once you order it, you’ll receive an email October 10th with your name and password and before you know it, the new Radiohead album will be playing on your computer. This has to be one of the best kept music secrets in recent memory, because they told people it was done and mastered and that they were just in talks trying to get a label to sign with, but little did we know what they planned on pulling. Obviously, they had this planned out for a while considering the artwork for the album is done, CDs and vinyls are already made, and there’s other stuff available that would’ve taken a while to have made.

Besides the immediate downloading option, there’s option #2 which is a “discbox” that will take a hefty chunk out of your wallet (ends up being something like $82 once you convert to the dollar) but includes the following:

THIS CONSISTS OF THE NEW ALBUM, IN RAINBOWS, ON CD
AND ON 2 X 12 INCH HEAVYWEIGHT VINYL RECORDS.
A SECOND, ENHANCED CD CONTAINS MORE NEW SONGS, ALONG WITH DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHS AND ARTWORK.
THE DISCBOX ALSO INCLUDES ARTWORK AND LYRIC BOOKLETS.
ALL ARE ENCASED IN A HARDBACK BOOK AND SLIPCASE

CD 1 AND VINYL
15 STEP
BODYSNATCHERS
NUDE
WEIRD FISHES/ARPEGGI
ALL I NEED
FAUST ARP
RECKONER
HOUSE OF CARDS
JIGSAW FALLING INTO PLACE
VIDEOTAPE

CD 2 AND VINYL
MK 1
DOWN IS THE NEW UP
GO SLOWLY
MK 2
LAST FLOWERS
UP ON THE LADDER
BANGERS AND MASH
4 MINUTE WARNING

Downloading the album will only get you the first album of the two, with the second album only being available to those purchasing the discbox. I don’t know if the second album is completely new songs as well and the first is just considered the official album, but it kills me knowing I won’t be hearing the second album until the rabid Radiohead fans inevitably find a way to get it on the net. Until then, I’ll be plenty content listening to the first new Radiohead since 2003. Oh man has this been a long time coming, but what a way for Radiohead to reveal it. If the LemonDrop “pay what you want” model was ever going to take off, we were going to need something big to happen in the music industry to get people thinking about how great a fan controlled pricing system could be. Well, I’d say this Radiohead release qualifies as “something big” and hopefully the music industry will be shaken up enough by this Radiohead release and their fans making the pay what you want model a success, that our similar LemonDrop model will work even better now that the idea has reached the masses.

I haven’t been this excited to hear an album in who knows how long. The suspense is killing me, but if I had any doubt before about who was my favorite band ever, I think this pretty much set things in stone. I’ll see you guys back here on October 10th with my first day review of Radiohead’s In Rainbows. Now go to their site and pre-order your download! I paid $7. I’m curious to hear what you guys chose to pay.

Official Site / Dead Air Space / Pre-order In Rainbows