SonyBMG are releasing a digital soundtrack to go with a new book - something which the major reckons could be a rather nice and possibly profitable new sell-through revenue stream moving forward. The book is by American author Brad Meltzer and is called 'The Book Of Lies'. The accompanying soundtrack is plugged in the book and is linked to from the book's page on Amazon.
It's not the first time a record company has had the idea of releasing soundtracks to go with popular novels in the hope they'll cash in from fans of the book, but the financial risk of such projects in the CD age often made the idea unviable. With the risks so much lower in the digital age, it may become a much more common occurance.
SonyBMG Commercial Music Group's John Ingrassia told Billboard: "I would love for it [the 'Book Of Lies' soundtrack] to be successful enough to prove that it's something other writers and publishers would want to do. We've tried in the past to do various promotions with book publishers but the emphasis is on try. Part of the problem in the past was that pairing a physical CD with a book proved to be difficult and expensive. By going digital those problems are eliminated".
Meltzer himself compiled the soundtrack, which takes many tracks from Sony's own catalogue, but the major has also licensed a few from other record companies.