Published on June 12th, 2019 📆 | 1678 Views ⚑
0Radiohead sells recordings to public after hacker threatens to leak them
The English rock band Radiohead has decided to sell some of its unreleased recording materials after a hacker stole them and threatened to leak them in an extortion scheme.
The proceeds will go toward Extinction Rebellion, an environmentalist movement that relies on nonviolent resistance to generate awareness and advance its causes.
In a tweet today, Radiohead guitarist and keyboardist Jonny Greenwood said a hacker last week stole lead vocalist Thom Yorkeâs minidisk archive, which contained recordings from around the time of the bandâs 1997 studio album, OK Computer. Reportedly, the hacker threatened to publish the materials if he (or she) did not receive $150,000.
âSo instead of complaining â much â or ignoring it, weâre releasing all 18 hoursâŚâ Greenwood said in the post, which was retweeted by the official Radiohead Twitter account.
For just 18 days, the band is making the sessions available via the online music service Bandcamp for a price tag of ÂŁ18. âSo for ÂŁ18 you can find out if we should have paid that ransom,â joked Greenwood.
âNever intended for public consumption (though some clips did reach the cassette in the OK Computer reissue) itâs only tangentially interesting,â Greenwood continued. âAnd very, very long. Not a phone download. Rainy out, isnât it though?â
A brief product listing on the Bandcamp website, apparently written by Yorke, describes the materials as âmy archived mini discs from 1995-1998(?). Yorke added: âitâs not v interestingâ and thereâs a lot of it.â
â[A]s itâs out there it may as well be out there until we all get bored and move on,â Yorke concluded.
Gloss