This is part two of a two part series about free culture music, If you have not already read part 1, you can find it here.
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To conclude the short series about free culture music, Jono Bacon of Severed Fifth has kindly agreed to an interview, giving an insiders view of the movement.
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Q: Please tell us about yourself and how you first got involved with Free Culture music.
I started playing music about 18 years ago when I turned 12. Over the years I joined and set up various bands including T, Neuraxon and Seraphidian. I spent a lot of time writing and playing live with Seraphidian, but outside of Seraphidian I would write my own music and give it away online. This music varied hugely in style – I experimented with different styles of metal, acoustic, and even did a Prodigy-style track. I licensed all of it under a Creative Commons license, and people seemed to enjoy it.
Although this was all fun, it was limited to just me writing and recording music as and when I wanted to, and I never really did anything exciting with the music. Around the middle of 2008 I was writing a metal song one day and had the idea of putting together a full project to write and release some albums under the Creative Commons and Free Culture philosophy, and thus, Severed Fifth was born.
Q: Can you give us a high level overview of the Severed Fifth project.
Severed Fifth has two primary roles. First, it is a music project, and I want us to write awesome music, put on a stunning live performance, and achieve success as a musically interesting band who writes cool music. Secondly, I want Severed Fifth to be a pioneering example of how Free Culture can bring musicans and fans closer together, and unlock a huge range of opportunities for both. So in a nutshell, I will be happy if people love the music and love the freedoms they have to share, remix and otherwise enjoy the music.
Q: The name severed fifth is quite unusual, would you mind explaining its origins and meaning.
It’s funny, everyone has their own take on the name, and I love the fact that the name can be interpreted in so many different ways. Essentially, there is no specific definition of what ‘Severed Fifth’ means, and I am keen to leave it open to everyone to define their own meaning of Severed Fifth. When I came up with the name, the interpretation that kept hopping into my brain was the severing of the American fifth amendment which I think provides a visually and thematically interesting concept.
Q: In 2008 the project released it’s first album “denied by reign”, however it had only limited success. What lessons have you learned from the first album and what strategies do you have to improve the success of the second.
The major reason for the limited spread of the first album is that almost as soon as I released it I was re-locating to the United States, getting married, and I had just signed up to write a book for O’Reilly called The Art Of Community. While I was successful in writing and releasing a Free Culture album, I ran out of time to give the album some promotional justice. I then put the project on ice until I had completed these other things I needed to do and when I was settled in living in the USA.
The primary lesson I learned was that to do justice to Severed Fifth and to optimize it’s chances of success, I need to devote the time to it, and since I re-launched the project I have moved away from various other spare-time projects to give it the time it deserves.
Q: Unlike the traditional record industry, you are monetising the project through a `pay what you want’ scheme. Do you think this could be a viable business model for full-time artists.
This is definitely something of an experiment. I conceived Severed Fifth Fair Pay as a fair way to provide an opportunity for fans to financially support the project. People read the website, listen to the music, watch the videos, and participate on the forum. Fans are also taking Severed Fifth content and using it in their own music or videos, playing it in their cars, sharing it with their friends and otherwise enjoying the content. All of this requires money to invest and produce these things, and I am passionate about Severed Fifth fans having the opportunity to contribute to the project, but only paying (a) what they can afford and (b) what they feel is fair.
As such, everyone is welcome to use Severed Fifth Fair Pay to pay what they feel is fair and affordable, and if they decide to pay $1, that is awesome, if they decide to pay $50 that is awesome too. It is also awesome if they decide to pay nothing at all. Contributions to Severed Fifth go on to help power the Severed Fifth project and buy t-shirts and merchandise to reward awesome Severed Fifth Street Team members, to replace broken equipment in the studio, to invest in cool new products, to rent rehearsal space, put on live shows and tours and other elements that spread Severed Fifth further afield, putting Free Culture music in the hands of fans and setting a great example for the music industry.
Importantly: Severed Fifth will never expect any kind of payment for this content or service; we will always provide an awesome free service with lots of awesome content to rock out to. Severed Fifth Fair Pay just provides a means for fans to help contribute to covering the running costs.
Q: What is the `street team’.
I think there is a huge opportunity for us to build a global community of passionate Severed Fifth fans who can spread the word about the music and the Free Culture nature of the project. This is the Severed Fifth Street Team.
The idea was inspired by some other bands who build street teams, as well as the work done promoting the Ubuntu project through local user groups(LoCo Teams).
To kick this off we have a Street Team Forum where our Street Team is growing. We also have some online documentation explaining how to get involved, fun things to do as part of the Street Team and more.
Importantly, the Street Team is open to everyone and is going to be a critical component to help drive success with Severed Fifth, so if your readers are interested in helping, come and join the forum and get involved!
Q: Do you have any intentions to develop the project beyond a one man band.
Absolutely! In fact I recently started putting the full live band together and we just had Ben Gibbs join on drums and Jim Adams from Defiance join on guitar. We are still looking for a bassist, and then we will be a complete line up and ready to get out there and play some shows and do a tour.
Q: What are your thoughts about the future of Free Culture music, will it
become more widespread or remain relatively unknown, like Open Source Software.
I believe that Free Culture is the future, and I am so passionate about Severed Fifth becoming a great example of how it can really work. We still have a long road to travel, but I believe that those passionate about Free Culture can join us to help Severed Fifth be an example that other bands can follow too.
Q: Is there anything else you would like to say about Severed Fifth.
Mainly thanks for doing the interview with me, and I would just love to
encourage everyone to join the awesome Severed Fifth Community on our forums and help us make this thing rock! 
