“Those quirky alt-rocker's, The Crimea, are celebrating the release of their new album by giving fans the chance to download it for free! Yes, you read that right! As free as a bird, and that whale Willy, this interesting marketing ploy may well have the record label frowning and sweating in panic, but like those beardy-led guys from the 70's, Free, it's all right now.” R13 writer Jim Ody
Several months before Radiohead were hogging the headlines by giving their fans the chance to name their price for ‘In Rainbows’, the Crimea were saying “here, have our new album for the single cost of getting on the net and downloading it!” And remember the Crimea haven’t had number 1 albums in the UK and US to bolster the bank balance.
In the run up to the release of ‘Secrets Of The Witching Hour’, the Crimea played a residency at the Proud Gallery in Camden, with the LP available to be acquired, whether cash was parted with or not, on May 13.
Jim Ody on the band: “What you get with The Crimea are well crafted songs that build slowly in your brain with such great poetic lyrics that they live out long past the trash that the youngsters are being fed by way of what the radio and PR companies want you to hear. There has always been a slight similarity between The Crocketts and The Crimea, with the latter certainly being the more mature and polished version, who is musically superior without losing Davey's abstract clasps of poetic meandering.”
Read more from Jim’s review
here and if you like what you see you can still
download or buy it from here.
A full UK tour followed, with R13
catching them in Reading.
At the end of August, news reached us that The Crimea had parted company with guitarist Andy Norton, who flew the proverbial to pursue his musical career elsewhere. This split was with the full support of the other band members, as just days later the rest of The Crimea were heading in the general direction of China for a few gigs. At the same time we learnt they were at 60,000 downloads for the album.
A few more dates in the UK followed to round off 2007, including a support spot on the Stereophonics tour. Their final gig of the year is at London’s Bush Hall on Tuesday December 18,
check their website for more.
So what’s next? Frankly your guess is as good as ours. Rest assured though it’ll be worth taking note of as the Crimea continue to fly the flag for the intriguing, doing it their way, whether it gets them cash and column inches or not.
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