FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 17, 1998
Contacts: info@rtmark.com (http://www.rtmark.com/)
illegalart@detritus.net
(http://www.detritus.net/illegalart)
RTMARK FINDS BUCKS FOR BECK RIP-OFF
Group channels money for subversion,
hopes to spark dialogue on corporate wrongs
RTMARK is pleased to announce the February 17 release of a new Beck CD:
Deconstructing Beck.
Recording artist Beck might be less pleased. Why? Because it
isn't really his work. Deconstructing Beck is a collection of brilliant
but allegedly illegal resamplings of Beck, produced by Illegal Art with the
help of $5,000 gathered by RTMARK from anonymous donors.
Deconstructing Beck is the latest of more than twenty successful
sabotage projects made possible by RTMARK since its beginnings in 1991.
RTMARK's aim is to further anti-corporate activism by channelling funds from
donors to workers. Other recent and upcoming acts of RTMARK-aided subversion
are documented on RTMARK's web site, http://www.rtmark.com/.
According to an anonymous RTMARK spokesperson, RTMARK was first approached
by Illegal Art last November. "Using artwork illegally helps fight the stranglehold
that corporations have on our lives, and that's what we're all about," the spokesperson
said. "We weren't sure about this project at first, since RTMARK usually
targets the crassest of mass-produced items. But while Beck may be a superb
artist, his lucrative persona remains just another product that others get rich
from, and one that we need to subvert."
Philo T. Farnsworth, the pseudonymous main force behind Illegal Art, says
his label exists to provide "an outlet for artists interested in exploring an
illegal palette. Corporations invade our lives with product but forbid
us to use it--in our art, or in any way they don't want. This just doesn't
make sense."
What does makes sense, given the corporate climate, is that record stores
won't touch this CD. It is available only from Illegal Art (illegalart@detritus.net),
and costs just $5, including US postage. Illegal Art was able to keep
production costs low by packaging the CD in a plain white box and putting its
liner notes on their web site. Even more importantly, the cost of the
CD reflects a markup of only 100%, instead of the industry-standard 800%.
(The page with the liner notes, http://www.detritus.net/illegalart/beck/,
also features 30-second RealAudio(tm) clips of each track.)
Illegal Art's email and web service, incidentally, is provided by detritus.net,
an internet site dedicated to the artistic reuse of pre-existing culture.
"We're happy to be helping out with the Beck project," said Steev
Hise, Detritus webmaster. "Copyright laws are too restrictive, and
they're counterintuitive. These laws in their present form are there just
to funnel money to corporations, not to protect artists. As artists we
need to fight that."
Information on Illegal Art's other activities can be found at http://www.detritus.net/illegalart/.
The RTMARK website (http://www.rtmark.com/)
serves as a clearinghouse for sabotage projects awaiting completion, and also
features press about RTMARK, interviews and other statements of philosophy,
and links to like-minded sites. A copy of this press release can also be found
there.
Beck's publicist, Dennis Dennehy, can be reached at dennehy@geffen.com,
or at 310-285-2723. He is not involved with Deconstructing Beck
in any way.