Wu-Tang Clan's new album has only one copy. It will tour museums as a piece of art before being auctioned to a private buyer

[number8]

THIS IS FUCKING CRAZY. (http://scluzay.com/)

Here's RZA's explanation:


History demonstrates that great musicians such as Beethoven, Mozart and Bach are held in the same high esteem as figures like Picasso, Michelangelo and Van Gogh. However, the creative output of today’s artists such as The RZA, Kanye West or Dr. Dre, is not valued equally to that of artists like Andy Warhol, Damien Hirst or Jean-Michel Basquiat.

Is exclusivity versus mass replication really the 50 million dollar difference between a microphone and a paintbrush? Is contemporary art overvalued in an exclusive market, or are musicians undervalued in a profoundly saturated market?

By adopting a 400 year old Renaissance-style approach to music, offering it as a commissioned commodity and allowing it to take a similar trajectory from creation to exhibition to sale, as any other contemporary art piece, we hope to inspire and intensify urgent debates about the future of music.


We hope to steer those debates toward more radical solutions and provoke questions about the value and perception of music as a work of art in today’s world.

While we fully embrace the advancements in music technology, we feel it has contributed to the devaluation of music as an art form. By taking this step, we hope to re-enforce the weight that music once carried alongside a painting or a sculpture.

The album will be put on listening display in renowned galleries, museums, venues and exhibition spaces around the world for only the most dedicated to experience before it disappears into the private collection of a buyer.

The public will know that what they will hear will be a once in a life time experience.

[dreamdead]

On the one hand, this is totally the right kind of move for a musician to make. That it's WTC is all the better.

On the other, they're going to get so much shit for this, and the music is going to be judged so much more harshly--and likely contemptuously--because of its appearance in this type of public space.

[Idioteque Stalker]

I'm not sure Wu-Tang currently has enough credibility to make it work, assuming this model could ever be "successful." Pretty fascinating though.

[Ezee E]

I anticipate EWO's review.

[slqrick]

Should be glorious.

[D_Davis]

Conceptual sound artists have been doing this for ages. Maybe the big deal here is that its coming from a pop band, and then end product will be something that would be popular if played on the radio. I've got bootlegs of Brian Eno audio installations that were only supposed to be heard at a certain given time at a certain place. The idea of sound as art in a museum that people pay to listen to like any other piece of art is of a well known quantity.

It's an installation piece that happens to be for sale at the end.

[D_Davis]

While we fully embrace the advancements in music technology, we feel it has contributed to the devaluation of music as an art form. By taking this step, we hope to re-enforce the weight that music once carried alongside a painting or a sculpture.

Music still carries a ton of weight, and it's still of the utmost vital importance for many millions of people.

What technology has done is eroded the ability for a few people to make millions of dollars selling their music, or be involved the distribution of the music.

The artistic value has not been devalued at all, but its value as a commodity has, and that is a good thing.

[ledfloyd]

Music still carries a ton of weight, and it's still of the utmost vital importance for many millions of people.

What technology has done is eroded the ability for a few people to make millions of dollars selling their music, or be involved the distribution of the music.

The artistic value has not been devalued at all, but its value as a commodity has, and that is a good thing.
I don't know. I think musicians should be able to make a living from making music. That's becoming more and more difficult for artists to do. There are upsides, but there are also problems as well.

[D_Davis]

I was addressing the fact that RZA said that music has been devalued.

That's not true.

The value of music does not come from how much money it made the artist, but in how much it emotionally connected with the listener.

If an artist can make a living making art, great! But, more importantly, if an artist can make an emotional connection with an audience, well, that's even better.

But art is also different than the paintings and sculptures he's comparing it to. The live performance is the touring exhibit of the music world, and the recorded media is the reproduction sold at galleries and gift shops. Each live performance is a unique experience shared between the artist and the audience, and that has a ton of value, far more, IMO, than going to see a classic work of art, because at a live concert their is an immediate interaction between the artist and the audience. That can never happen when people flock to see something like the Mona Lisa.

So what they're doing is turning the reproduction into the unique experience, which is just like what a lot of conceptual installations do.

I'd be more impressed with the WTC if they toured and did full concerts for 1 single person. Now that, THAT, would be something truly special and unique.

I've always wanted to do a series of micro-concerts for people. Just a super small, intimate show at a table at a coffee shop, with some tiny speakers, just loud enough for 2-4 people at the table to listen to. I think something like this would add a great sense of value to the listener.

[D_Davis]

Another thing is that I don't think music or the musician have become devalued. What has happened, though, is that because it is now easier for a lot more musicians to make and distribute their music, the old guard has realized that they aren't really special. There are millions of amazing musicians out there, all making amazing music; there always has been, it's just easier now for all of those DIYers to release stuff at the same quality as the "pros." There is so much amazing music out there, that it's impossible to listen to it all, and it's harder to centralize the money-making powers.

This is why I think it's important to look for value in the emotional connection your music makes with an audience, rather than at the potential monetary earnings.

But there is also a ton of money to be made in big productions and elaborate concerts. There are still mega pop-stars make millions.

[Winston*]

I've always wanted to do a series of micro-concerts for people. Just a super small, intimate show at a table at a coffee shop, with some tiny speakers, just loud enough for 2-4 people at the table to listen to. I think something like this would add a great sense of value to the listener.

This would be the ideal environment for a Wu Tang Clan show.

[Winston*]

The concept of having 8 Wu Tang members yelling their lyrics at one guy is amazing.

[D_Davis]

The concept of having 8 Wu Tang members yelling their lyrics at one guy is amazing.




Wouldn't that be hilarious?

[number8]

I do love the stipulation that anyone who buys the album is free to do whatever they want with it, for the social experiment of it. Is the eventual owner of this album going to donate it to a modern art museum? Digitize and release it for free on the internet? Or build a giant vault under their mansion and keep it locked away for 100 years?

[Qrazy]

Does the owner of the album own the rights to the album? As in if they released it would they make all the profits?

[Derek]

This would be the ideal environment for a Wu Tang Clan show.

They could tour coffee shops around the globe and start a web series: Fans Getting Coffee With Wu Tang.

[EyesWideOpen]

I'd listen to it once and then destroy it.

[Qrazy]

I wonder if a kickstarter will be created to purchase it.

[number8]

Does the owner of the album own the rights to the album? As in if they released it would they make all the profits?

Pretty sure that's the case, yeah. Which is why they're selling the one copy in the millions. Honestly they could make more with this one sale than earning pennies per copy sold as they usually do with big labels.