September 26th, 2014 
Nina Corcoran 
Well, there’s some good news to wake up to today. Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke just announced he’s putting out a new album, Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes, via BitTorrent — and we don’t even have to wait. Stream it in full after the jump or go here to purchase it right now.
This isn’t entirely out of nowhere, though. A few days ago, Yorke and his longtime producer and collaborator Nigel Godrich both shared a photo of an unnamed album and artwork by longtime Radiohead collaborator Stanley Donwood. In a note Yorke and Godrich released to the press today, they explained that “The torrent mechanism does not require any server uploading or hosting costs or ’cloud’ malarkey,” and, “If it works well it could be an effective way of handing some control of internet commerce back to people who are creating the work.”
Listen to the album (!) and read the full press note below:
As an experiment we are using a new version of BitTorrent to distribute a new Thom Yorke record.
The new Torrent files have a pay gate to access a bundle of files..
The files can be anything, but in this case is an ’album’.
It’s an experiment to see if the mechanics of the system are something that the general public can get its head around …
If it works well it could be an effective way of handing some control of internet commerce back to people who are creating the work.
Enabling those people who make either music, video or any other kind of digital content to sell it themselves.
Bypassing the self elected gate-keepers.
If it works anyone can do this exactly as we have done.
The torrent mechanism does not require any server uploading or hosting costs or ‘cloud’ malarkey.
It’s a self-contained embeddable shop front…
The network not only carries the traffic, it also hosts the file. The file is in the network.
Oh yes and it’s called
Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes.
Thom Yorke & Nigel Godrich
Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes tracklist:
01 A Brain In A Bottle
02 Guess Again!
03 Interference
04 The Mother Lode
05 Truth Ray
06 There Is No Ice (For My Drink)
07 Pink Section
08 Nose Grows Some02 Guess Again!
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