Gang of Four have announced that they will release a four-song digital EP, the making of which bass player David Allen has posted quite an inventive list of rules for on his blog. And lucky for fans, rule number five plainly states, "It's imperative that we give away MP3's." Already on Allen's website are demo versions of the new tracks "Second Life" and "Password," which according to the man himself, will precede next week's "Faking It," "American Man," and another version of "Second Life."
It seems that David Allen is among the most recent of musicians whose outlook on the traditional album format has been altered by the release of Radiohead's In Rainbows. After downloading the album, Allen explains, he discovered several remixes of songs from it. He goes on to tell readers that he was so impressed with them that he deleted his copies of the original tracks and substituted them with his own play list of remixes. "Goodbye to having an album formatted in advance," he concludes.
If this cyber craze seems a little too modern for certain post-punk puritans, take comfort in knowing that Gang of Four might still plan on doing some things the old fashioned way. If suggestions on the band's website are true, they're planning to tour next year. No dates as of yet, though. [Pitchfork]