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Artist News Business News
Public Enemy to record fan-funded album
By CMU Editorial | Published on Wednesday 3 November 2010
Much was being made yesterday about the fact Public Enemy had hit their target to raise money from fans to fund their next album, though as far as I could see that was mainly achieved by cutting the amount of money they were asking for by 75%.
Public Enemy were the biggest established act to go the fan-funding route when they signed up to Sellaband in October 2009, giving the whole crowd-sourcing model a bit of a morale boost. But, alas, despite an initial flurry of fan commitments, raising $71,000, the fund-raising campaign soon ran dry, a long way off the rather optimistic $250,000 the legendary hip hop outfit had said they needed for their next venture. Shortly afterwards Sellaband itself went under, albeit then being bought out of bankruptcy with already pledged funds still in place.
Now Public Enemy seem to have accepted their initial budget was unrealistic for a fan-funded venture, and have decided to take what is already available out of the Sellaband bank and record their next album with it. Despite the false start, if it’s a great record Public Enemy could still prove to be good ambassadors for the fan-funding system.
