DIY: The Metric system

Metric are just about ready to release their new album, Fantasies. And it's more-or-less self-managed, says the press release:

Always up for a worthwhile challenge, METRIC self-financed the recordings, set up their own global label operation and assembled a team to release the new album in major territories around the world. "But we're not doing it totally on our own" comments guitarist Jimmy Shaw. "In Canada it's coming out with Last Gang who released Live it Out and Old World Underground, Where Are You Now? and our friends at Arts & Crafts will be releasing the album in Mexico. We've set up distribution and hired our own staff to handle releasing the record in the USA, the UK, all throughout continental Europe, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. It's pretty insane, but it's really exciting. We might go down in flames, or it might be the best move ever. Either way it will have been on our terms, and that for us is success."

Yet another model which doesn't rely on the majors - and for a band who you wouldn't peg as having the self-financing clout of, say, a Radiohead, but whose needs are greater than a small band who can produce a local release off the support of a dozen or so ardent fans. It's surprising what you can afford if you skip the cost of helping your label purse expensive legal actions against fans.