- “We’re about to sell an album like nobody else sold it before,” says Robert “RZA” Diggs, the first Wu-Tang member to speak on record about Once Upon A Time In Shaolin, in an exclusive interview with FORBES. “We’re about to put out a piece of art like nobody else has done in the history of [modern] music. We’re making a single-sale collector’s item. This is like somebody having the scepter of an Egyptian king.”
Little side story that this bit made me think about: My neighborhood has a strip of houses on it that sit on a bluff overlooking the ocean and downtown Vancouver. It's a wealthy place no doubt, but a fine one at that. One day, my girlfriend somehow got word that there was a show going down around one of these houses. This particular house happens to be beside a little public path that leads to a park / beach area so the side of the property is more visible than others. The house is owned by Chip Wilson - a la Lululemon fame. New new big big money. $54 million dollar home. Turns out it was his wife's birthday and the one thing, or one of the things, that she asked for was that the Red Hot Chili Peppers play at their house. So Chip calls them up and gets 8 songs for a million dollars - in their back yard. Through a bit of fence and some shrubbery, my girlfriend got to see it. Couple of things about the WU. I saw them in 98 as the opening act for Rage Against the Machine. Great show. Ol' Dirty wasn't there cause he was in jail. I always liked the RZA though. I think he could push this idea even further. They could design a new music player or format for this thing. Make it so only one mechanical device in existence can play it. In fact, they shouldn't even sell it afterward at all. If they think this concept is so great, why muddy the ending with a sale? Let it just be in a museum. Sure people might lose interest and it will eventually be shelved, but how many masterpieces are sitting in storage at the Moma?But it more closely mirrors the centuries-old patron model, where aristocrats would commission painters or bankroll resident musicians to create works of art.
William Gibson wrote a novela in the 90's that coud only be read useing a special destructive reading machine. (It was encoded in g a c and t's a bright light erased each page as you read it)
I think there was only 20 made. I read it. Down loaded from the nets. I expect more of rza because Wu tang clan ain't nothing to fuck with.
While everything in postwar art is the fault of Duchamp Gibson's thing reminds me of certain Cuban artist (I can not remember the name of) she wrote novels longhand with a nib pen, crossing out revisions, in big leather bound books. Only one copy of each novel exists. A little more wistful than dada.
Whoever buys it - are they allowed to sell it? Or are they not allowed to make a direct profit from it? Even if that is the case, a company could buy it and just give it away and get their name associated with awesomeness - brand awareness etc. If they want to make it all valuable and stuff - whoever buys it will have to literally never connect the computer that rips the CD to the internet. You've got a million little hackers who will be trying to grab it for the lawlz or recognition. No security can stand being Wu Tang and hackers.