" The New [insert artist name] Album Leaked!"

What's the deal with albums leaking on the internet? How does that happen? Maybe I'm just being ignorant, but who are these jerks? Is it someone in the studio who has access to the files? Is it a friend of the band who has been given an advance copy or something? It's a very strange phenomenon that now seems to be commonplace in the music industry and somewhat accepted.
I remember a couple of years ago the new broken social scene leaked about a month before it came out and Kevin Drew made a post on his website that indicated he was genuinely hurt that the album leaked and seemed almost disappointed by the fans that downloaded it. I believe it went something like this:
"You seeked our souls and you found it. The album you have is the finished product." referencing the popular file-sharing program SoulSeek. But then after the BSS show in Kingston that fall one of the guitarist commented that he was happy that the album leaked, because all the fans at the show knew the new material and were able to rock out harder. So there you go.

So the question is: Is leaking a good thing or a bad thing? I mean, once the album is finished and mixed why don't they just release it right away? (feel free to make a jab at Fat Robot here) I'm sure there is a reason having to do with maximizing profits or something like that. However, everyone knows you're not supposed to make money from music so I don't know if that's a good reason. Artists are supposed to be poor.

The band The Books are a perfect example of this. Despite a large fan base, most of their music is downloaded illegally, and they don't really make much money at all. However, if no one downloaded their music, a large percentage of their fans would have never heard of The Books, and The Books would not be able to go on tour.

So it seems that the situatiton is what one would refer to as a "Catch 22":
Illegal downloading = no money for the artist
No illegal downloading = noone listening to the artist.

Luckily I have a solution:
Illegal download all you want, never buy a CD again (who has CD players anymore anyway?) HOWEVER ( and this is a big one) whenever a band that you like comes to your town or city go to the show. And if you live somewhere that sucks (insert small town name here), make frequent road trips to see the bands that you like.

If you really like the band that you are seeing, you can buy a t-shirt. That way the band members get some extra drug money so they can continue destroying their body AND all your friends will know how indie you are when you where it. So it's win-win. If you're feeling really generous because of how much money your new blog is making, you can buy a record of their album. Records are really cool because you get all the album artwork four times bigger than it would be on a conventional CD, and also they last forever because vinyl never deteriorates (unless you play it too much, but remember you've already downloaded the album so just listen to it on your iRiver). Anyways, that's my idea, take it or leave it. Since I know the three people who read this blog very well, I'm sure they/you will agree. And I know that I sort of strayed away from the main discussion topic of this post, which was: The Deal With Leaked Albums and and ended up writing To Download Or Not To Download, but that's just because I'm not that good of a writer. Maybe I should go back to University.

Anyway, I've decided to start a new feature of the blog: Leaked album of the week, so stay tuned.