This happened to me,and to my friends The Pecadiloes and Rachel Stamp. when through various corporate takeovers/sackings/blah the A&R teams at our respective majors, Chrysalis, A&M and Warners were sacked, I wonder if it's always been a 'familiar spot' or is it just in the last ten years. Usually the parent corp will initially try to farm you out to one of their other labels, but you probably already knew where those labels stood from before you signed you deal, so it's often just an administrative time delay. Perhaps the greater point is... Is the best way for every new band to proceed to form their own label, pay for their own recordings and seek to find national and international licencees when the time comes to expand? Should bands treat that traditional dream of signing a 'major deal' and being propelled to fame and fortune with the label doing everything for them as an outdated concept that no longer applies in the world of today?

The one thing that as very definitely changed in the last ten years is the hundredfold advances in cheap high quality DIY recording eqpt. You should be able to make an album yourself. With a lot of the affairs of a band, all a major label adds is several layers of bureaucratic delay in the decision making process, which becomes sluggish. I think they should be looked at, not as fairy godmothers, but in the cold light of day, as rich potential investors.
The fact is, if HIFH produce an album themselves and sell it on the internet/gigs they will be in profit very quickly, unless the recording costs are huge... and after they go into profit will be making a lot of money...even selling CD's at Dischord prices.

Hint hint Sean, another ace band to add to the Dis roster by chance?

that is so silly that it makes me cry like a child of a relativly young age. they are a superb band and their debut album was superb; however good that their sophomore effort will be available to download free of charge....that's a hip hip horray as far as im concerned.

surely theres no way a band like this should be giving music away for free. personally rather see them wait and sign a record deal, rather than put it up for free on the net, everyone leeches it, then they get signed and noones left to buy the record. call my old fashioned and all that..and i just know im in the minority on this, so before anyone starts..

if DIS signed them that would be SO good.

I wasnt too keen on the production on the album, their debut single had the sound i was hoping they'd carry on. the singles all sounded great, just a bit polished. I bought everything theyv done except the album, it wasnt my cup of tea at all.

damm, i thought that the debut album was fantastic.
Its good that they are releasing the album for free but i hope they dont just give up after that. They are a good band and deserve to be signed.

To be honest, I didn't really understand the attraction first time round but I'll definitely give their forthcoming album a go. If they do put even half of it online they'll have my eternal respect a la Kitty Hudson.

Happens all the time. Two other recent example would be THE RISING and NINEDAYS who both had albums recorded and ready to go when they were dropped! hard to understand why a label would do that....and then want to hold onto the recordings and not let them go!
Fortunately due to the internet both of those found their way onto the web, but they really could have been big money earners for the labels concerned. Far bigger sellers than HIFH in fact.

Weird!

IF they have been dropped, that is like the biggest mistake ANY company can ever make, Hell is For Heroes are an absolutely awesome band, and if the second album is half as good as the first one, then we are in for a real treat. HIFH are one of the greatest and most under-rated british bands of this era! ROCK ON!

symposium??

I hope HIFH sign to the Captains of Industry. COI rule. none of that corporate bullshit.

This is a huge shame for HIFH. I'm just glad that I'm going to see them play at the Met Lounge in Peterborough on Thursday. I can't believe that they are playing such a small venue.

Hopefully HIFH will bounce back even stronger and show those f#@*wits at EMI a thing or two.