Dr. Dre, Interscope Make Peace With the Internet for Detox Album
Last Monday, "Kush", the first finished leak from Dr. Dre's long-delayed album Detox, hit the Internets. By Wednesday morning, Interscope Records was selling it on Apple (APPL) iTunes, which was not only a wise and swift action, but a total about face from the company's decade-long war against online consumers.
When his last album, Chronic 2001, hit the shelves, Dr. Dre, along with Metallica, was the biggest voice against Napster. They testified before Congress, threatened lawsuits against file sharers, and claimed it was the equivalent of taking food out of their mouths. The problem for them was that the digital revolution was already happening: Broadband becoming more commonplace, CDs turning outdated, and consumers wanting to find the latest music online. Customers may have been stealing, but, as iTunes sales proved, most were happy to buy music if it could be done conveniently.
The leak of his song "Kush" this week could have gotten ugly, but Dre and Interscope realized that free content is the new way to get buzz. Most famously, Kanye West has done the G.O.O.D. Friday series, releasing a free song every week from the My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy recordings. About half of these songs will be on the actual album coming this Tuesday, and the first official single, "Runaway", was number one on iTunes despite being available for free online the day before the single's release.
"Kush" is just shy of the iTunes Top 10 at the moment, and it will be interesting to see how much Dre embraces the free culture that didn't fully exist when his last album arrived in 1999.
Photo courtesy of Dr. Dre
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