10 Times Rock Bands Trolled You
9. OK Go - 9027 KM
Following the fall of Napster, record labels were starting to win the war against anti-piracy in the mid-2000s, but that didn’t mean labels let their guard down.
When Capital Records wanted to add DRM software to make it harder for mp3 files to be ripped from OK Go's 2005 CD Oh No, the band blocked this move by extending the running time of the album.
Sometimes this is padded with hidden tracks in albums where there’s just white noise for a certain amount of time to fill out the rest of the CD. But with the Chicago power pop act being renowned for their out-of-the-box thinking, they saw this as an artistic opportunity.
The track 9027 KM was included with a full 34 minutes 46 seconds of audio - without a single instrument being played. The recording is of lead singer Damian Kulash’s girlfriend sleeping; a love note she sent to him while the band recorded the album 9027 kilometers away in Sweden. A mild f*ck you to the label's DRM desires, with OK Go's artistic integrity intact.
Despite hidden tracks being a relic of the CD era, the lengthy track can be streamed fully today, and has over 180,000 plays on Spotify. Creepy.