Giving away your music sounds like a risky venture, even int his digital age. But it has only opened doors for Planet Joy – a year after its first album, The Radiant Point, it has started to release tracks from its new project, Love Songs For The Loveless. Zalebs chatted to Marthinus Kirsten, Planet Joy’s vocalist and guitarist.

As with your first album, you are releasing Love Songs For The Loveless for free, a track each month. Why this approach?

We decided on this approach to create a bit of anticipation amongst the fans.

And you only get a limited time period to download each song for free, so people will have to keep their eyes open!

How has it been working out for you – giving the music away?

We’re happy with the results so far, we’ve been getting great response to the songs that people have already downloaded.

You released your last album roughly a year ago. Did you have a lot of material left so to jump into a second album or did you start from scratch?

We literally started from scratch with the new album, with a lot of new modern band influences, we decided to do something that will define us more as a unique sounding rock band. We still do have a lot of material left from the previous album that we’re planning to release as B-sides in the future.

How has your year been since that release? What has been the highlight?

I personally think we had a great year! We’ve played at big venues and festivals, so it can only get bigger and better from here on out!

Tamara Dey joined you for two songs on your first album. Are there any such collabs with her or other famous musos on Love songs For The Loveless?

No not yet. But I don’t think that we’ll follow the same approach with this coming album. To me, this is a very personal album and I’d like to keep the recording only between the band members. Even though we really had a blast with Tamara on the previous one.

It is commonly said that the second album is the really hard one. Do you agree?

Most definitely. I’ve never had such a hard time writing and producing songs! I suppose it has a lot to do with me being much harder on myself than with the previous album.

A broad range of artists influence you, which is very evident on The Radiant Point. Can we expect more such shifts between edgy rock, slow ballads and industrial electronic sounds?

The songs I’ve written for ‘Love songs For The Loveless’ will mostly range between solid rock songs with a lot of ambiance and electronic sounds in the mix, also the more industrial electronic driven songs that will keep the mood going throughout the album and then lastly the softer songs.

Are you bringing any new influences to Love Songs For The Loveless?

I’ve been listening to a lot of different artists from a variety of genres. I’m actively trying to broaden my horizons and it feels like my songwriting has come on in leaps and bounds. So you can expect something more universal, a melodic album with rich tones, interesting grooves and a sometimes dark undertow.

You can download the free tracks from Planet Joy’s album as they are released on http://boom.fm/planetjoy/. The first album is also available there for free.

By James Francis