Swedish hip hop group Advance Patrol, one of the acts whose copyrights were listed as having been infringed in the recent trial of the Pirate Bay Four, have hit out at being named in the court case, and have responded by making their new album available via a BitTorrent stream listed by the notorious torrent tracker.
As previously reported, the three founders and principle financial backer of The Pirate Bay were ordered to serve a year in jail and pay huge damages to the record companies after being found guilty of enabling mass copyright infringement at a high profile trial in Sweden, though they are yet to do any jail time or hand over any cash as they appeal the ruling against them, and also push for a mis-trial because of the allegations the judge in the case was biased towards the content owners.
Anyway, after seeing themselves listed as affected artists in the International Federation of The Phonographic Industry's submission to the Pirate Bay trial, Advance Patrol's Gonza told fans: "We never asked to be plaintiffs in this case, they used us as a weapon in a fight in which we don't wish to participate. We refuse to be used in a war against our fans! You cannot legislate away file sharing. Those who share our music are also those who appreciate it the most. They are my friends, and friendship is something to be valued highly. That's why we're giving away 'El Futuro' to the internet, to our friends".
Advance Patrol are the second artist namechecked by the prosecution in The Pirate Bay case to distance themselves from the music industry's legal action. Swedish rapper Max Peezay previously asked to removed from the IFPI's list, and also subsequently released an album via a BitTorrent stream.