Pocket Gods issue one copy of new album for £1m

The Pocket Gods frontman Mark Christopher Lee said musicians routinely get underpaid for their work by the music industry

A record-breaking band that campaigns for higher online royalties is selling just one copy of their new album - for £1m.

The Pocket Gods, from St Albans, said the copy of Vegetal Digital, on vinyl, would go on sale at a record store in the Hertfordshire city at 14:00 BST

If sold, they planned to use the money to fund a rival streaming platform that pledges to pay artists more than Spotify and other streaming services.

Spotify has been contacted for comment.

The four-piece band said Spotify currently paid it a royalty of £0.002 per stream, but a track had to reach 30 seconds in length to qualify.

Frontman Mark Christopher Lee said musicians routinely get underpaid for their work by the music industry and they have released albums of 30-second songs since 2015 to highlight the lack of what they call fair royalties.

Founded in 1998, the group has been recognised by Guinness World Records as having the most studio albums released digitally, with 75 by 5 November 2021, and previously held the record for most songs on a digital album - with 446.

None of their albums have got in the official UK charts.

'Something positive'

The band's 76th album consists of 10 new full-length songs and will be on sale at Empire Records, which is also the only place fans can hear the album. It will not be available on CD or other formats.

At the same time it goes on sale, the band said they would begin removing their entire catalogue from Spotify.

The money will fund Nub Play, a streaming platform, which Pocket Gods said would guarantee to pay artists and songwriters a minimum of 1p per stream.

Lee said he was hoping the album was bought by somebody who was "obviously rich, someone who loves music and wants to see it have a great future".

"I'm pretty confident," he said.

"It's time we stopped moaning about Spotify and how unfair the current streaming system is for artists and songwriters and did something positive," he said.

"What I want is for artists and songwriters to be valued by their listeners and to be fairly compensated for their life-changing craft.

"I envisage a world where musicians, artists and songwriters will change the world for the better... we must pay them fairly."