The Suicide Denial

Let's be honest. When was the last time you actually bought a CD from the store?

Recording industry conglomerates are a thing of the past, as is their monopolization of artists' CDs in the marketplace.

"Anything related to a major label is not artistic," said Chad Gerber, a member of Los Angeles band The Suicide Denial. "It's canned, formulated music."

Artists like Gerber are rebelling against the industry's conformity and choosing new paths.

"We don't want to be like the mainstream music industry that's constantly fighting a battle with customers, trying to get them to purchase music that's quite frankly most of the time overpriced," said Jessica Williams, The Suicide Denial's manager and an employee at indie record label Divulge Records.

Williams took an idea from Gerber and his bandmate, Chad McKinsey, and ran with it. The Suicide Denial gives its music and CDs away for free in stores and makes its albums downloadable online. They make money from merchandise and concert tickets.

"We were tired of trying to win over the major labels and make them like us so they can make us sound like everybody else," Gerber said. "Why don't we just do what we like, sort of like a revolutionary thing. We're tired of bad music, and a labels control over everything. We think that music should be free."

Radiohead joined the music revolution with a similar approach last year with their album, In Rainbows. Fans could name their own prices for a digital dowload of the album for a few months after the release, according to Rolling Stone...U.S. consumers bought 25 percent fewer albums from 2000 to 2006, including CDs and downloadable albums, according to Nielsen SoundScan...that's one reason The Suicide Denial gives away free music.

..."They don't fit in," Williams said. "That's the coolest thing, they're doing everything so different." - Arizona Daily Wildcat

Internet's most visited blog Mashables.com featured artist on Free Music Monday's. - Mashables.com

National publication Dig This Real Interview in issue #15 - Dig This Real

DRUM! Magazine feature on 2012 of The Suicide Denial Issue #154 - DRUM!

Special guest blogger for Modern Drummer - Modern Drummer Magazine

By: Samantha Johnson

Visualize yourself picking up a CD in a record store and just walking out. Sound familiar? Well hopefully not, but soon this act may be the norm. According to a hardworking, independent band from Los Angeles, there will be a time when all music is…free.

The two-man band, The Suicide Denial, is a self-proclaimed alternative, rock, ghettotech duo consisting of guitarist and singer, Chad Gerber, and percussionist, Chad McKinsey, who have bravely chosen to sell their music for free.

"If people see what we're doing," said Gerber, "more are going to want to jump on board."

The idea for the no-cost music came from the steep economy and the need for change in the music industry.

"We see where the system is going and we don't want to fight it," said Gerber. "So we just decided to go along with it."

In means of not fighting the system, the band has to fight the music industry and the media with their activism on changing the future of music.

"Not everyone agrees with us," said Gerber. "They think that it won't catch on [and that] musicians will have no income."

The duo does make an income, to many peoples surprise, just in a different way than most musicians; They have their own clothing line. They made a deal with an urban clothing company called 7 Lightningbolt which will buy albums from the band. Their logo will be seen on the band's album, which can be bought at Target stores coming soon.

The independent record label for their album is called Divulge Records in which Gerber said they took a chance to choose a band who they knew were selling their albums for free.

"They thought it was a good idea," said Gerber. "It is different and a big risk, but changing the future has to start somewhere and they were on board."

Despite having issues with the system and the music industry, the two Chads are all about the music. In their own tunes, Gerber writes the songs and McKinsey does the beats. The ghettotech aspect of the music can be heard through the adding of odd noises in the background that give it a more hip hop feel.

Gerber noted that their music is similar to The Killers meet Coldplay or The White Stripes. Curious about the name The Suicide Denial, Gerber said that it was thought of after, and based on, the suicide attempt by actor Owen Wilson.

"It is the denial of doing something stupid," said Gerber.

The band is currently on a press tour, but take a handheld video recorder along the way to let the fans be a part of their long musical journey. The humorous and insightful webisodes can be found on YouTube or by going to their official site thesuicidedenial.com.

"The webisodes are just a way for our fans to get closer to us," said Gerber. "It's fun."

The band will be touring in 2009, which is a little wait, but their free CD can be downloaded online at either their official page or their MySpace.

- The New Hampshire

By: Henry Taksier

Imagine a world where music is free: Where struggling bands can survive without charging fans for their albums. It's not a socialist society, and it's not a utopia. It's already happening.

The Suicide Denial, an independent two–member band from Los Angeles, is giving its music away for free. The band's percussionist, Chad McKinsey, said he considers himself to be part of a revolution against the music industry.

"Radiohead made a lot of news when they went on their Web site and said, 'You can pay whatever you want for this CD. We don't care,'" McKinsey said.

McKinsey said he thinks once people see his band doing well with this, other bands will want to pick up on it.

Unlike the legendary alternative rock bands Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails, the members of The Suicide Denial are giving away their music without reaching the apex of fame.

"I could probably speak for both of us," McKinsey said. "We don't have vacation homes in Hawaii or Mexico."

Still, the band is well–off enough to keep making music. They make some money selling tickets to shows. The rest will be made through a deal with an urban clothing line called 7 Lightningbolt, which will buy albums from the band and place promotional stickers on the corner of the album's wrapping.

Because of this revenue from 7 Lightningbolt, fans can download the albums online for free and soon will be able to pick up free copies of the album at Target. Everyone wins in the end – the band gets paid, the clothing line gets advertisement, and the fans get their music for free.

Furthermore, the band doesn't have to deal with record companies.

"Album sales have been going down for quite a while now," McKinsey said. "And everyone knows how to pirate music in some way. It's getting harder to fight the system, so we might as well go with it."

The band's guitarist, Chad Gerber, said he's glad to break away from the music industry and its major labels.

"The major labels keep blaming all their problems on illegal downloads," Gerber said.

He cited a study from the University of Kansas that showed that illegal file sharing had a negligible effect on music sales.

Gerber said the majority of music sold by major labels is "formulated, canned crap" and mentioned Britney Spears and the Jonas Brothers as examples. The reason labels are losing money, he said, is because "their music sucks" and people are sick of buying it.

Gerber said record labels take the art and edginess out of music and try to lull consumers into a dull sitcom sleep. Now they seem to be waking up.

UF freshman Spencer Simonsen thinks bands should be free to express themselves without being controlled by record companies. He thinks music should be free, but bands should be paid for what they create.

Simonsen created a Web site called IndieMundo.com, which allows independent bands to upload songs and share them with fans. Fans can download the songs for free, but the bands get paid five cents each time it happens. Running the site and paying the artists costs about $175 each year, which comes out of Simonsen's pocket.

For now, the site hosts 41 bands, 66 fans and 30 users labeled as "both." When the site gains momentum, Simonsen plans to sell advertising space so bands can get paid more and the site can financially sustain itself. Gainesville, with its thriving independent music scene, is the ideal launching point.

Aaron Wessling, a Gainesville musician, said his band gets more views, downloads and friend requests on MySpace after it joined IndieMundo.com. His band, The Early Twenties, has recorded one album and plays three to four local shows each month.

"We're more concerned with getting our music out there any way possible than making money at this point," Wessling said.

He said he likes the idea of bands getting paid to give out free music but warned that it may lead to unforeseen problems, just as the original formula of record companies did.

Both bands, The Early Twenties and The Suicide Denial, agreed that it's not worth it to deal with major record labels.

If presented with the chance to sign with a label, Wessling said he would chose an independent label because it's more accessible to local artists and gives more creative control.

Cameron Taylor, a promoter for No Idea Records, an independent label based in Gainesville that coordinates the popular music festival The Fest, said the majority of artists signed under major labels don't get much money anyway. Besides what gets spent on recording and distribution, most of the money goes to the labels, forcing the artists to survive off shows.

Taylor said music might as well be free because society has technologically passed the age where music can be protected.

"You can write all the computer code you want to protect your MP3s," he said. "But in the end, someone is going to get around it, so I don't see the point in bothering."
- The Independant Florida Alligator

Copy and paste the link to watch the interview:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJ4FBIyj_5w - The Rock it Out

Copy and past the link to watch the interview

http://www.planet1067.com/pg/jsp/media/flashvideopopup.jsp?pid=1260&playlist=true&js=true&autostart=true&charttype=chart&chartID=304&playlistSize=5 - Planet 106.7

http://www.revolt-media.com/guest/?p=48


Blizzarding

Laramie, Wyoming might honestly be the coldest, dead piece of earth to which we had ever been. When we got there, the place was covered in snow and was nothing but howling winds. We had a few interesting things happen in this town, but the place was especially fun for ChadM.

After pulling into town - despite blizzard warnings and closed roads saying to stay away from Laramie - we headed to a local grocery store to get some lunch. ChadM got his stuff and headed through the checkout where this little old lady was ringing people up. She didn’t speak very loudly, so when she asked ChadM a question, he didn’t hear her, and didn’t respond. I guess this made her mad, so she yelled at him and called him Pee Wee. I laughed incredibly hard, but ChadM was pissed for hours after we left, and honestly wanted to go back and fight with the little old lady. I calmed him down, though.

The Suicide Denial has this secret hobby of ghost hunting. We take cameras and little recorders to strange places in between shows and working in studios, and catch disembodied voices. We were hoping to do some ghost hunting that night in Laramie, but arranging a ghost hunt in old buildings at the last minute, late at night isn’t easy to do. We opted for going geo-caching in the middle of the night with a local instead. Geo-caching is when you take a GPS, get some coordinates off the internet, and look for pointless crap hidden in fields or wherever.

We followed the GPS to some area on the outskirts of the University of Wyoming, and got out of the car to start looking. The fact that whatever we were looking for was probably buried under 7 feet of snow never crossed our minds. Once outside the car, we realized (while wearing only our hoodies) how incredibly cold it was. We’re talking like below zero. Still, ChadM and I are troopers, so we forged on.

Knee deep in snow, we walked in circles looking for this stupid thing, and with each second of our search, the wind picked up and blizzard conditions increased. I have no idea how long we were out there, but finally we gave up. I called our local Laramie contacts on my cell, and told them to pull around and find us. Once they came into sight, we sprinted the best we could through the frozen tundra down to the warm car. After getting inside, ChadM realized he lost his freakin’ phone somewhere out in the hills. I tried to talk him out of looking for it, but it was hopeless.

We jumped back outside, and were basically geo-caching once again, but this time for his stupid cell phone. It wasn’t even a cool phone, by the way. As our faces burned from high speed snowflakes hitting our juicy skin, the local dude and I lost hope, and tried to talk ChadM into leaving his fallen phone behind. I yelled through the wind, “There’s nothing we can do, he was a good phone, but we can’t help him now. He’s on his own!” Still, ChadM didn’t lose hope, and came up with the idea to have me call his phone. I did, and sure enough, a patch of snow glowed blue through the dark blizzardy night.

The next morning on our way out of Laramie, heading to Denver, we had to pull over because a door flew open, and we almost lost some of ChadM’s kit. He got out (still blizzarding) and the wind blew his hat across the freeway. He immediately ran after it, and was almost hit by a semi before reaching the center median to get his hat.

My only regret after entering that town under extreme blizzard conditions is that we didn’t make a webisode of the adventure. Since then, we film and post everything.

By Chad Gerber
The Suicide Denial
December 2008
- Revolt Magazine