Elbow: Pushing the boundries of internet music marketing

Elbow is one of the most wonderful bands in the world. I blew the chance to play with them and South a couple years ago when we took another gig at the same club a few weeks earlier. Jesse and Stacy from my band got to do an acoustic opening set for the show, though. Broke my little heart.

Anyhoo, they’re finally working on a new album and have decided to give this ‘online single’ thing a shot. On May 26th (the day before my birthday), they’ll release a new single called “Ribcage” available only at their web site, elbow.co.uk. You can go there now to ‘pre-request the online single.’
Really curious? You can hear clips of the song by viewing Elbow’s e-Card, or the song’s promo video and audio clips on the site.

In keeping with Elbow’s hopeful experiments in current eMusic trends, they’ve released an ‘intelligent screensaver.’

“Why,” you ask? “I thought screensavers were obsolete unless you’re running a ten year old monitor?”

Well, they are. That is, unless they give you concert tickets.

Elbow is planning a one-off concert with general admission tickets only available through the screensaver. The program will also offer advance news, info, tour dates and audio samples. Heck, I’ll try it.

By the way… anyone familiar with my photography will understand my fasciation with Elbow’s single cover artwork. It’s just amazing.

The screensaver is available at elbow.co.uk/screensaver.