Birmingham, UK (Top40 Charts/ Haslimann Taylor PR) - Webby award-winning mashup collective The Kleptones are enjoying new interest in their work both sides of the Atlantic currently, thanks to the hit US television series Glee - which featured mashups in the episode aired last night on E4. 'Mashups reflect the state of mind and speed of life of the online generation. The
Internet has accelerated the average intake of cultural information, with the public expecting a huge amount crammed into a small space or their attention starts to wander.'
The Brighton-based group have been releasing Internet-only albums of their work since 2004, receiving plaudits from the New York Post, BoingBoing editor Cory Doctorow and Twitter co-founder and CEO Evan Williams. The Kleptones released their fifth album, Uptime/Downtime, at midnight on 1st January 2010 - the first album made available this decade.
Eric Kleptone, the DJ/producer who fronts the group, commented: 'Mashups reflect the state of mind and speed of life of the online generation. The Internet has accelerated the average intake of cultural information, with the public expecting a huge amount crammed into a small space or their attention starts to wander.
'They are the absolute 'now' art form, thanks to a combination of readily available technology and digitised raw materials. Mashup producers like myself tear apart and reassemble our musical and cultural heritage, trying to present our conclusions in a listenable, danceable and accessible form that the public will recognise and appreciate. It's a vibrant form which indexes and cross-references the density of history to create an exciting new musical vision.'
Combining current chart hits with classic anthems, well-known riffs with obscure cuts, the mashup aims to enthrall, entertain and educate. Copyright law means that The Kleptones' work is illegal - made without permission of the record labels who control the intellectual property rights of the tunes sampled.
The mashup meme has now spread into mainstream culture thanks to inclusion within television series such as Glee. However resurgent interest began to develop last year in the US, with artists such as The Kleptones, DJ Earworm and Girl Talk popularising the mashup to an eager new audience.
The Kleptones' new album Uptime/Downtime is available to download free of charge from www.kleptones.com. The second single from this album, Welcome Back, is due for release on 22nd March 2010.
The Kleptones have been distributing their material illegally and free of charge via the Internet since 2004. To date they have received over 1,000,000 downloads of their work.
The group achieved critical acclaim with their album A Night At The Hip-Hopera, combining hip-hop vocals, film and spoken-word samples, and the music of Queen. The success of this album prompted legal action from Disney, whose Hollywood Records imprint control Queen's catalogue. The resulting take-down notice was entirely unsuccessful, as it targeted a website linking to a peer-to-peer torrent rather than the content itself. Reports of the court order on Reuters prompted 250,000 further downloads within one week alone.
In 2005, The Kleptones were awarded Webby 'Artist Of The Year' by The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, who declared the band to have 'achieved new critical heights' and be 'true internet renegades'. Previous recipients of this award include Gorillaz, Trent Reznor and The Beastie Boys.
Eric Kleptone spoke at the O'Reilly Web 2.0 conference in San Francisco, going head-to-head with David Munns, vice-chairman of EMI, on the panel debate 'The Pirate and The Suit'.
The Kleptones played a number of festivals last summer, including Glastonbury, Bestival and Festinho. The group will be touring extensively during 2010, including confirmed dates in London, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Portland during March and April.
