Rob Zombie recently sat down with Loudwire for an interview where he talked about his time as a filmmaker, his approach to writing music and the fact that his new album is basically done. All of that is plenty exciting, but what really piqued my interest was Zombie's unique take on illegal downloading.
"I think, in a funny way, everyone is always complaining about the record business and complaining about illegal downloading. I don’t care about any of that stuff. In fact, in a funny sort of way the fact that nobody buys records doesn’t bother me. In fact, I feel like it’s freed me. I never did anything to sell records, per se, but when you take that pressure away 100 percent, I swear to God you get more creative because it doesn’t matter anymore. That’s really been the case, I’m happy to give it away for free. I don’t care. I just want to make it, play it, get crazy with it and I think this new climate is — I hear a lot of musicians crying about it but for me, it’s re-energized us."
I'm not sure I understand his logic here, honestly. Last week Nine Inch Nails mastermind Trent Reznor said he objectively thinks paying for music is a relic of an era gone by but subjectively disagrees with piracy. Zombie on the other hand is saying it gives him artistic freedom… but isn't that what being an artist is all about? Caring about what you put out into the world?
I understand he's talking about it from a business perspective where the pressure is off to sell records a little bit, but that kind of implies Zombie wasn't making the music he wanted to make when he was being pressured to make sales quotas. Plus wouldn't labels want the record by a certain date anyway? Meaning there's only still a certain amount of time to work on the records.
I think Zombie's heart is in the right place when he says he personally would love to give away his music, but not at the cost of others' jobs.
Zombie has been keeping busy this year making trailers for Assassin's Creed and working on his new horror film, 31.
