DRM-free Tibetan music for sale at Cruxy.com

Nathan Freitas says,

Seeing the launch of the no-DRM BoingBoing Digital Emporium made me think I should probably share with you a new service I've just built called Cruxy. Anyone can join and sell anything digital (song, film, pdf, ringtone, avatar, whatevs) without DRM. It's all free and easy to get going - we just take a very small fee when you sell something.

There's a Tibet connection! The first thing I did was go out and get a couple of Tibetan musician (Techung and Danny of Choksampa), a friendly neighborhood non-profit (Students for a Free Tibet), and a local inji musician from the NYC area, and have them all sign up as Cruxy artists and upload their wares. Here's a blog post about it.

I am hoping to get more of the great musicians out there (especially want the Exile Brothers and Vajara from Lhasa) to get on to Cruxy - if only to get the word out about this new wave of crazy, interesting, diverse music coming from this huge distributed diaspora of exiles. Techung was really excited about the service, which made me feel proud. He said:

"I am so excited about your new website. I will surely want all my music to be on there and I will also encourage other Tibetan artists about your website. Music business in Nepal is totally out of control as most of the albums are booleged right under the artists nose. All my cds are bootlegged and I don't get a penny out of it. They even have ring tones of my music but there is no one to go after. I found latest American movies on DVD avialable everywhere for about .50 cents. I loved that part. Any way it is kind of strange and fun."

Link to a search for "Tibet"-related items on Cruxy, including "Tibetan Banjo - electro-style!" music, Audio tours of the Barkhor pilgrimage circuit, and the sound of debating monks at Drepung monastery. Huh, wow -- you can also buy auspicious Tibetan Buddhist symbols for your mobile phone, and traditional Tibetan ringtones!

Image: Musician AchoDanny with friends, performing for HH Dalai Lama (shot by Nathan Freitas)