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Radiohead sells recordings to public after hacker threatens to leak them

359 points| Bender | 6 years ago |scmagazine.com | reply

175 comments

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[+] strictnein|6 years ago|reply
It's strange. There's two version of this story going around. Kind of the mainstream media version, and the version from the "hackers" themselves.

Pitchfork does a good job of following up on the second version, which may be the more accurate of the two:

https://pitchfork.com/thepitch/radiohead-fans-vs-black-marke...

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1kA8u6UhjbutZ-b7TXzmX4qkO...

[+] SmellyGeekBoy|6 years ago|reply
This version makes a lot more sense than the "blackmail" story I keep hearing on the news. Thanks for the links.
[+] huis|6 years ago|reply
Yes this also fits the note on Basecamp: "as it’s out there it may as well be out there".

I don't think they would say this if a hacker was holding it back for ransom.

So the hacker tried to sell it for $150000 but now everyone can buy it for $18.

[+] StavrosK|6 years ago|reply
I'm confused, did the band release the material or did the fake Hoserama?
[+] tomglynch|6 years ago|reply
It's wrong to even refer to them as 'hackers'. There's one 'leaker' and the group of people that first found out about this.
[+] Dowwie|6 years ago|reply
BandCamp has been my primary source for indie music of all genres. It's great to see Radiohead using this platform to share their work.

One example of a label I would have never known about is Daptone Records, from NYC. The Budos Band, Sharon Jones, the Frightnrs and many more great artists have produced really great albums with this label. Sharon died in 2016 but will live on through her work as an artist and through the label she made as long as platforms such as BandCamp support it.

[+] ErikAugust|6 years ago|reply
Radiohead was quite prolific around this period. The release of OKNOTOK (and the bootlegs before it) show the band had a bunch of good material that didn’t make it to OK Computer. And now here we are 20+ years later releasing (or hacking) more material.
[+] marban|6 years ago|reply
On a side note, I miss MiniDisk — It was somewhat of the pinnacle of mixtapes with best of all worlds. Tangible, digital, compact, non-destructive and joyfully tedious to create.
[+] guggle|6 years ago|reply
That was lossy audio compression.
[+] necovek|6 years ago|reply
While they are certainly in a rare position to do this, and public story from their side sounds a bit worse on the leaker, I still have to commend their approach to it.

Just like I had to get their first album they sold online for pay-as-much-you-want to show music labels the finger (even though I am not a huge fan of their music, I am a huge fan of showing the finger to conglomerates that seem to forget their founding roles).

Sure, that was a move out of privilege too, but not many in that position have done it anyway, so kudos to them.

[+] 52-6F-62|6 years ago|reply
That was revolutionary for me. I was a poor kid at the time, but a huge fan—so I was able to pay very little at the time to hear it. I was able to buy it again later at a fair price.
[+] vmurthy|6 years ago|reply
Fascinating way of gaining the upper hand on your opponents (the "hackers" in this case). Best of all, the proceeds go to charity. Thank you, blackmailers. Reminds me of what Bezos did when some dickheads at National Enquirer decided to blackmail him with disclosing personal data [1]

1: https://medium.com/@jeffreypbezos/no-thank-you-mr-pecker-146...

[+] analogmemory|6 years ago|reply
Right? This is the best way to make the story a non-issue.
[+] ralphstodomingo|6 years ago|reply
A true power move. Not something everyone could do if they were threatened with the same, though.
[+] vorticalbox|6 years ago|reply
Seeing as they were never intending to make profit from them any artist in the same situation could easily do this.

It's pure profit, what is nice to see is that they are giving the profit to charity. Now that's really not something everyone would do.

[+] misiti3780|6 years ago|reply
TLDR: This dump proves the Radiohead purposely scrapped a song (Lift) that was going to be a hit single because they wanted to change direction with OK computer.

As a huge radiohead fan, the interesting thing about this dump is that the version of Lift (disk 15 starting at 9:30, but can also be found in other places in the dump) is totally mastered and ready to go on the album.

Fans heard this live a long time ago, but when they released the first recorded version on Lift the b-sides of the Ok Computer 2017, it sounds much slower.

The band stated that they recorded and mastered Lift in 1997, but they knew it would be a huge hit single and they didnt want that for OK computer so they scrapped the whole thing. No one understood this until now.

Other highlights discovered in the dump:

- Karma Police with different lyrics

- Longer version of paranoid android

- Exit Music and True Love Waits used to be the SAME song

[+] farmerbb|6 years ago|reply
If you're referring to the first song on the first disc, it's a combination of Exit Music and Life in a Glasshouse.
[+] tclancy|6 years ago|reply
My wife and I were fascinated by a version of Nude from 10 years before In Rainbows.
[+] taneq|6 years ago|reply
Seems like instead of pursuing legal action they're just waiting for the karma police to arrest that man.
[+] kowdermeister|6 years ago|reply
Wow, this will spark a lot of "amateur" remixes and bootlegs. Nowadays music technology is very accessible to anyone who's willing to put in some time.
[+] pcf|6 years ago|reply
One would think so, but if you look at the amount of available multitracks vs actual fan remixes made with those multitracks... it doesn't seem like people are very interested in making new mixes of old material.
[+] SuperNinjaCat|6 years ago|reply
After reading this I couldn't help but remember an interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono (on the BBC world service in 1980) where John was talking about Phil Spector calling him up after a recording session saying:

whispering over the phone "John....I've got the tapes...I've got the tapes, but there are helicopters flying around my house"

It took them a while to get them back from the guy.

[+] cm2187|6 years ago|reply
How does a minidisc archive gets "hacked"?
[+] dagw|6 years ago|reply
Nothing appears to have been hacked. Radiohead sent a bunch of their old minidisc off to be digitized and someone at the company doing the digitizing appears to just have made a copy of the files for themselves. What we don't know is if that was the person that also released the files or if they handed them off to someone else who then released them.
[+] imtringued|6 years ago|reply
I don't really get it. How can a "leaker" have any leverage at all? The type of person that will stumble on a leak wasn't a customer in the first place.
[+] FillardMillmore|6 years ago|reply
If this "hacker" really wanted something lucrative (or possibly fame), they would find a way to procure Wu-Tang Clan's "Once Upon A Time In Shaolin" - the double album they released a single copy of that was bought by Martin Shkreli. According to Wikipedia, it's the most valuable album of all time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Once_Upon_a_Time_in_Shaolin

I won't lie, I'd be quite interested to hear it.

[+] jamesb93|6 years ago|reply
Great marketing campaign. Definitely not staged...
[+] code_scrapping|6 years ago|reply
Assuming you're ironic - do you really think Radiohead needs elaborate ruse to release their junk tapes? I had the feeling they're doing fine in their own trippy world. (RH fan, btw)
[+] newaccoutnas|6 years ago|reply
Interesting they're not DAT's but Minidisc (given the quality difference)
[+] celticninja|6 years ago|reply
For price and versatility though a minidisc recorder/player wins out
[+] acomjean|6 years ago|reply
My understanding is the Magneto-Optical properties of mini-disc are quite archival. Having retired my box of minidiscs last year, the ones I tried all still played.

The quality was very good, (Could not tell the difference from the CD, Sony optimized compression for quality, thinking people cared about it..then 128kbps mp3s showed up). And discs always beat tapes for convenience...

[+] toyg|6 years ago|reply
Music people here in Europe liked minidiscs a lot. If the internet had not happened, that’s probably what we’d be using now.
[+] darkpuma|6 years ago|reply
Media stunt to promote the album? Is there any third party confirmation of this extortion plot?
[+] sleavey|6 years ago|reply
Doubtful. They are giving all the proceeds to Extinction Rebellion, only selling it for 18 days, and in the past they've sold albums as "pay what you want". This is typical Radiohead.
[+] coffeedoughnuts|6 years ago|reply
I can confidently believe that this album was never meant for ‘real’ release and therefore that this is not a stunt.

While the archive has some gems and recordings that many in the Radiohead fan community have heard whisper of but certainly never thought they would hear - it also contains some very rough recordings, some poor playing and singing and some pieces that I’m sure the band find embarrassing and would never choose to release themselves unless forced into a corner like this.

[+] cstrat|6 years ago|reply
To promote their album from last century? Seems a bit far fetched to me.
[+] avip|6 years ago|reply
Radiohead needs "media stunt" to promote themselves?
[+] hoolm|6 years ago|reply
I think this is a fair question, how did a hacker steal data off a minidisk like they claim?