[bemyrecordlabel.com]

If the Police, Journey, Depeche Mode, U2, or Duran Duran did this kind of deal, I'd rob the CEOs of AIG, Merril Lynch, and Bank of America for the cash!

@supercereal: If anything, just listen to some Vandals stuff that he's done and talk to him about that. They're great.

@AshleyKeen: There are people who would spend a lot more than $45,000 for a night with Hannah Montana, although I suspect they're not children.

@StutiCebriones: Plus the best comment you can come up with is about his preference for chain restaurants? As much as the masses on this site think otherwise, not everyone in the world is "obsessively anti big business."

'Cause if he does... I'm in.

@gStein: Just think of the bandwidth charges.

Thanks!

[marketplace.publicradio.org]

@Jim Topoleski: Amen! Me too. I love A Perfect Circle, NIN, etc. If I had the money I'd SO be there! Thow in MJK and I'd die of a heart attack right then and there.

I think doing what Shindell did is a great way to let fans feel like they helped to make the album possible. I think doing what Freese is doing is a great way to maximize profits after the fact.

@I__have_something_to_say: I found the $250 package the most interesting, too, and if it were someone I really liked, I would pay in a heartbeat. Music heroes that you can not only meet, to have lunch with- That is pure 100% awesome.

That is awesome. Even if nobody takes him up on the more odd packages, this will increase awareness of his album. A lot. I wish I was wealthy enough for one of those middle packages.

But I am going to check out the $7 album.

Can you imagine if this caught on with the managers of "Teen Idol" Pop stars? o.o "Mommy I have to have the $45,000 package where I get to stay with Hannah Montana in the Princess Suite at the Castle in the Magic Kingdom, pleeaaaase."

I don't know how much of that was "statement" so much as an artist needing to pay the bills. I know plenty of artists today who are incredibly clever & talented, and still have to do neuterific corporate work to get by. The lines they can feed people as excuses just don't sound as snappy and fresh as they did a few decades earlier.

Do I sense a business opportunity? Create a digital/online system that schedules everything up, accepts payments, and keeps everyone's numbers confidential (maybe as simple as using a phone bridge?)-- match up B, C, even D-list actors, politicians, and musicians (probably through agents, if they still have one) with their fans for 5 minute chats. Maybe even have a bidding system for certain big names, hook it up with charities so some (or all, after cost) of the proceeds go to a charity if the celeb wants it to do so...

c'mon people, I want ideas out of the box here... help me out...

I think we may have just seen a glimpse of the future..

@h3llc4t: +1 for mentioning Aphex Twin.

Salvador Dali did ads for Nestle candy bars. I think the surrealism of him doing that was intended to be art.

At a certain point, is your means of being a consumer whoreism art in itself?

Christ I'd pay 1000 bucks just to be a fly on the wall for a meeting of the musical minds that interesting.

Okay, I would LOVE to play minigolf with Devo.
This has gone past the point of sickening pleas for money/consumer whoreism and directly to awesome because it's just so frigging weird. It makes me wish I was a bigger fan of his. His solo stuff is like Aphex Twin Lite.

I mean if the guy's THAT good (he might be) it might be worth the money. The $50 tier actually sounds like a pretty good value. I mean I've never purchased any creative work for $50 that included a 5 minute phone conversation with the artist himself.

[www.cnn.com]

Oh!! I wonder if I got the $20,000 package, if I could play the cow bell?

Then I could have all the cowbell I want!!!!

eh, somebody might take him up on it since you can't quite download a foot massage. a volvo seems an unlikely target of internet piracy as well.