An indy band needed to raise money for their tour, and the payments received from Spotify weren’t cutting it.

They came up with a remarkably innovative way to monetize the streaming service:

Last month, indie band Vulfpeck wanted to go on tour. Like most indie bands, though, they didn’t have the money. With streaming dominating the industry and music streaming giant Spotify paying a grand $0.007 per stream (Vulfpeck sights it at $0.005), it didn’t look like they’d be making money anytime soon. Spotify had been promising they’ll start paying more — just as soon as they grow their Premium user base from 6 million to 40 million. In short: never.

So scrappy soul band Vulfpeck came up with a plan of their own.

They uploaded 10 tracks of silence to Spotify under the name Sleepify. Then, they put out this video, urging fans to stream the album on repeat while they slept. The band pledged to use the royalty revenue they racked up to fund a tour, where all shows would have free admission. And it worked.

Short version, the netted over $20K before Spotify sent a C&D for violating their TOS,^* but they have the folding green to tour.

I will note that while musicians compare about the rates for streaming, they typically compare it to selling an album, which a user can listen to many times, to a single streamed song listened to once.

Of course, bands have been f%$#ed by the middlemen since ……… forever ……… And the real question is how a model that disintermediates between them and the fans.

^*E-I-E-I-O