Various Artists: Kindred Spirits 3 | 4ZZZ Brisbane 102.1FM

- It may just be because I know a lot of musos, is anyone’s else’s social media feed overflowing with posts berating Spotify? In the last couple of years the “too-cheap-to-steal” business-model has finally managed to turn a profit in the music industry and the corporate megalith that crazily optimistic investors kept pumping funds into is actually showing a return on investment. Forget the investorsv though, it’s mostly doing so off the back of artists who are seeing their own ‘returns’ diminished to fractions of cents -somewhere around 0.00331USC per play right now- which is not really a living wage. As if 2020 wasn’t tough enough already! But before you curl into a foetal ball, warding off this latest, undignified blow, here are a couple of trends to feel just the slightest bit positive about.

Bandcamp is a digital music sales site and sort-of streaming service and by any standards -other than Spotify’s- a big business, but one that under modest scrutiny consistently fails to try and liquefy its artistic assets for shareholders or turn a DIY music success into a Silicon Valley, new-tech nightmare. I don’t know how they do it, but as every other digital delivery service slowly collapses under the weight of late-capitalism (hello Soundcloud), Bandcamp continue to be a pretty sweet way to actually support artists.

The economic holocaust that has been visited on many by the pandemic has truly devestated the music community: touring, especially international touring has been largely cancelled by the pandemic and even the capacity to make new music, which, devoured whole by major streaming services, would only make any dividends through playing shows, is in jeopardy. I’ve talked about it before and it’s only a small bright spark, but the inability to complete large-scale recordings has seen a lot of labels return to a format that had largely been killed off by streaming: compilations.

Some of my favourite releases of the year have been composed of little musical fragments, gathered up from across label rosters and carefully curated into big musical frescos and all of them, incidentally, have found their way on to Bandcamp. A new one came across my desk just this afternoon in the form of a surprise release, Kindred Spirits: Volume 3. Masterminded by the Spirit Level label, which started, several years ago, as a vanity project between broadcaster and beatmaker Tim Shiel and Gotye’s Wally De Backer, it’s blossomed into a place where Shiel, mostly, can give a boost to all of the little leftfield beatmakers and electronic pop artists that delight him. Just proving that this is the year of the compilation, the first volume of Kindred Spirits was a 2017 collection of special piano vignettes from Spirit Level artists, while both volumes two and three are from 2020, collecting all sorts of musical ephemera that was looking for a home.

For all that there’s a cavalcade of experimental styles here -from soundscaping to avant-garde beats, art-pop to PC music- the overall feel is one of breezy, wistful circumspection, like you've repaired to the cool shade somewhere,  a perfect contrast to the already blazing temperatures in Australia. I don’t know if it was intentional or simply that all of Spirit Level and friends are completely exhausted at the end of this gargantuan year. In no way slighting the music I’d say the most impassioned thing here is the spiel which Shiel wrote to accompany it. It runs long so I’ll just crib from the conclusion which goes some way toward illustrating the effort he has put into keeping the music alive: “Find your purpose, then look for your people. Once you've found them, do not settle for less than close and meaningful connection. Be dangerous in your ideas - but kind in your actions. Organise and nurture each other, then move boldly forward into the world with empathy and purpose.”  You can read the whole lot on Bandcamp and if you’re anything like me, it’ll fire you up.

It just so happens that Bandcamp are having their last free Friday this week - donating their commission back to artists in an effort to supplement meager salaries, just in time for you to pick up one of the many good compilations, like Kindred Spirits. This may come across as a feature-length advert for Bandcamp, but, hell, this year, as our traditional sources of solace like art and music groan under the strain, we have to look for unexpected goodness and kindnesses, even from capitalism. Perhaps I can frame it a little more traditionally for this time of year: get a little of what you need and give back a little in return.

- Chris Cobcroft.
<iframe style="border: 0; width: 100%; height: 120px;" src="https://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/album=2000411962/size=large/bgcol=f…; seamless><a href="https://spiritlevelco.bandcamp.com/album/kindred-spirits-3">Kindred Spirits 3 by Spirit Level</a></iframe>