Neil Young Goes Directly to Market Online with "Living With War"

Most music fans were surprised enough when they heard that rocker Neil Young had followed his 2005 "Prairie Wind" album just seven months later with an anti-war album titled "Living with War."

Never one to categorize himself as conventional, Young also has managed to launch a fairly active online campaign to spread the Young love and the anti-war fervor that envelopes the album, which was produced and recorded garage-band style in an unusually short three-week span.

Over the weekend, a Living with War blog featured on the album's web site ranked No. 12 among the day's most-cited blogs. And one of the top posts included a link to an affiliate Web site where users can link to the entire album and play it free on their Web sites. The blog also includes a link to Neil's MySpace site, his official Web site and plenty of other resources (concert schedules, tickets, interviews, media mentions, a Showbiz Tonight video on YouTube, etc.)

Easy...and free
It's obvious someone in the Young camp "gets it" when it comes to promoting music in the new-media economy. No longer content to wait for music companies to handle promotions, the artists are taking a hunk of the responsibility themselves and making it available in multiple formats...on disc, online, and in multi-media commentarys.

The payoff: favorable reviews from listeners. Says one blogger about the ability to listen to the album for free online: "Cool." The blogger at MachineGunKeyboard is equally impressed with the free availiability of the music. Another seems somewhat shocked that Young has a blog. Even young music lovers are paying attention to the old rocker's music and message. Adds the Buttermilk and Molasses blogger: "It rocks. It really does."