thurston moore launches "protest-records.com"

From Neil Strauss's March 26 "Pop Life" column in the NY Times. (The first part of which, by the way, is devoted to ILM's current fave MTV Europe memo... Oddly, the memo also mentions "Invasion" by Radiohead, although a spokesman for the band said he was unaware of any song by the group with that title.)

Free Music

After 9/11 one of the first musicians to take on an activist role was Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth, the highly influential 22-year-old underground rock band. Mr. Moore began compiling little-known articles on world events, most with a liberal intellectual viewpoint, and distributing them to friends.

"I've always been a frustrated editor," he said.

Another one of Mr. Moore's longtime fantasies was to have a label that gave away music free. "I thought it would be great to be in a band that made millions of dollars that could do something like that, but it never panned out," Mr. Moore said, referring to earning millions. "I liked the idea because it would drive retail stores crazy. Originally the ideas were more far-fetched, like hiding the records around the city so that people had to find them."

Now, with Chris Habib, Sonic Youth's Webmaster and technology whiz, Mr. Moore has started his own free music label, Protest Records. Using more practical means of distribution, Protest Records is giving its music away as MP3's on the Internet at www.protest-records.com.

Eight songs are on the site, most advocating peace or questioning the motives for the current war. Besides songs by Cat Power, the Beastie Boys, and Stephan Smith, there is music by more avant-garde acts like Eugene Chadbourne and Sharon Cheslow. Mr. Moore also said that he had been contacted by R.E.M., Mudhoney, Zach de la Rocha, the Fugs, Christian Marclay and Ian MacKaye, who all intend to submit songs.

The inspiration for the label, he said, came when he attended a benefit at the Poetry Project at St. Mark's Church in the East Village and heard Steven Taylor, a guitarist in the current incarnation of the Fugs. Mr. Taylor sang a song called "Go Down, Congress," which he wrote about the relationship between Dick Cheney and the oil-services company Halliburton. "I thought, this is a great protest song, but there are only a hundred people in this room who are ever going to hear it," Mr. Moore said.

So he decided to start Protest Records, so little-known musicians and songwriters could have their work appear alongside that of higher-profile bands. He is accepting any protest music by any act, especially those making more challenging and avant-garde music. And the songs do not all have to be about the current war, he said; they can be in opposition to any issue.

"The music can even be instrumental," Mr. Moore said. "It's all about the intent of the expression. Someone can send in a 15-minute drone piece and say it's their antiwar song, and if they're sincere about it, I'll see it as a valid criteria for adding it to our site."