This year Irritum Records is going to launch its new concept. Our goal is to collaborate with artists from all over the world to create a rich and special content for our visitors and a creative, supportive and stimulating environment for the artists. We want our customers to become not only fans of our artists but also fans of Irritum Records.

Irritum Records is a record label but we have redefined what that means. Irritum Records works with artists regardless of their geographical location. Communication techniques today are sophisticated enough for us to overcome the obvious difficulties. This is equally true in our communications with our customers/visitors. We want to get in touch and stay in touch! Shortly several new areas and services will be launched on our web site that facilitate communication between us and the customers and between the customers and the artists. Such services can take the form of mailing lists, chat rooms, forums, etc.

We focus on one channel for all our services and activities: The Internet. We attract, look for and work with artists via The Internet. We publish, market and sell our products and services via The Internet. We aim to create a dynamic and interesting music community on The Internet. In short we are a Virtual Record Company.

The artists are just as much our customers as are the consumers. Without them there would be no musical art. Art, now there is a word rarely used in the music industry today. Music is the most abstract of all arts. And it should be valued as such. Music has the power to bond subcultures around the globe, make a cow produce more milk and make you feel alive. The cultural and artistic value of artists and their music is not measured by the amount of people that are willing to pay eighteen dollars or euros for an album. It is measured by individual standards.

So how are we different? We are no hypocrites. We want to make a living. So do the artists and so does everybody else. We do not need to make a fortune though. Irritum Records does other stuff too. We create software, we make music for films, games, events, etc. If we have enough we are in business. Many artists think the same way. Not all artists want to become mega superstars. They just want to make music and share it with those who are interested. Those who are interested are willing to pay reasonable amounts of money to obtain the music. Today, prices are not reasonable. And still nothing is left for the artists who make the music. Only the mega stars have enough volume to get by. We are different in that we do not believe in giving an artist eighty dollar cents per sold CD, we do not believe in the record company being a financial institution and we certainly do not believe in the record company creating demand, trends, consumer patterns and stars by excluding all others from the media under their control.

That is what The Internet does not need: control. Anybody with a modest budget can interact with the rest of The Internet. So our idea is: let us delve into new ideas and concepts that will shape the music industry of the future.

Unfortunately we are not yet able to support professional artists that are dependent on their music for survival. We are working on that. Nevertheless we are willing to help with almost everything if we can but we are not able to sit in meetings with producers, managers, radio stations and the lot. We want artists that create their own material. In the genre we are focusing on most artists/bands have a lot of technology behind them and know how to use it. On that level we hope to establish creative and stimulating collaboration to achieve the best results. But in essence this is artists working together and sharing knowledge with each other instead of producers and record companies optimizing the commercial value of a song.

We do not order a few million copies of a CD. We are going to create CD's on demand. You want a CD and we burn it for you. You order the music you want from our web site. You may even combine certain songs of various artists. We do create regular CD's but only if there is a demand for them. We are currently developing the system to support this concept. Give us a few months and it will be on-line.

We have many ideas and there are a lot of obstacles but we are determined to make this work for all parties involved. With a bit of patience and a lot of work we will. And now for the best bit: We are going to set an example. From today a full length CD from our shop will cost € 10. We hope you like the idea of music CD's on demand, we hope you like the price and we hope to hear from you soon.

Cheers,
Peter Friebel (Irritum)
Art/Technology Director