It's a question philosophers through the ages have grappled with: if a band makes an album, but there's nobody around to hear it, does it make any money?
US band Vulfpeck might just have solved this riddle for good: yes, it does make money, about $20,000 thank you very much.
The Michigan funk outfit made headlines in March when they released Sleepify, 10 songs of silence that varied between 31 and 32 seconds. The result was a five-minute album of nothingness that the band asked fans to stream on repeat while they slept. The aim was to generate enough royalties for the band to go on tour – promising free shows in return.
At the time, commentators questioned how much money it was possible to make from such a scheme, but now it seems they have the answer. According to a royalty statement shown to Billboard by Vulfpeck keyboardist Jack Stratton, the band's earnings from Spotify came in at $19,655.56. This figure could have ended up bigger had Spotify not removed the album in April (the company never specified why).
Spotify only pays $0.007 for each track streamed, but this soon starts to look like real money when you consider that 100 streams makes 70 cents. Throw in a modest fanbase and take into account that each track only lasts just over 30 seconds (the minimum required by the service to count as a full stream) and you can begin to see how the band cleverly used the streaming to their advantage.
According to Billboard, Vulfpeck have yet to finalise plans for their tour although they aim to take in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, New York and their hometown of Ann Arbor, Michigan around late September.
- This article was amended on 25 July 2014 to correct the spelling of the band name.
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