TLC Kickstarter Gives Group ‘Complete Control’ Of Final Album
TLC are using an unconventional method to fund their final album for a group with 65 million records sold worldwide. TLC is funding the album through the crowd-funding website, Kickstarter, to have full creative control and to allow fans to get involved in the process.
Tionne “T-Boz” Watkins and Rozonda “Chilli” Thomas are headed back to the studio for TLC’s fifth album. Except this time, TLC plans to have “complete creative control” over the album by funding it through Kickstarter, according to Chilli’s recent interview with Billboard.
During the interview, Chilli revealed that TLC is currently putting together a studio team of writers and producers. Ne-Yo, Dallas Austin, and other figures from TLC’s past could become part of the recording team. TLC wanted to get personal, so their incentives include a workout session with Chilli, TLC nightlights, and an overnight onesie party with fans. Their Kickstarter campaign follows their history of involving fans, as they did when they printed names inside of their FanMail album artwork.
“But doing it this way, we have complete creative control. The only people we’ll be talking to and asking their opinion is the fans. That’s it. Doing stuff outside of the box is what TLC does.”
Huge thk uuuuu’s 2 all our fans who have already supported! Here is the Kickstarter link if u haven’t seen it : http://t.co/fhdvEHf24N
— Chilli (@officialchilli) January 20, 2015
And is this really the final TLC album?
“If the stars are aligned later and it makes sense to do anther one, we can say, ‘Hey, we decided to make one more.’ But now it feels like the final album. And to add to what we have, the songs have to stand up next to the ones you guys love so much.”
According to the Huffington Post, the Kickstarter campaign plans to raise $150,000 for an in-studio writing session. TLC was inspired to make more music by comments on Twitter and by the feedback they received after the VH1 biopic, CrazySexyCool, was released, which showcased both their successes and failures, such as bankruptcy, as described by the Inquisitr.
“Once the movie came out — our biopic — we had so many fans asking us to do more music. They almost feel like they’re already invested in us. They’ve sent us ideas… and it’s crazy, because we’ve been doing this since our FanMail album — we had names of all of our fans inside of the CD.”
What would Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes think of TLC’s Kickstarter campaign? This will be TLC’s second album without Left Eye since she passed away in a car accident in 2002. Chilli thinks that Left Eye would be supportive of the move.
“She would want us to keep moving on like this. It helps to keep her memory alive, and we always say TLC is meant to be, TLC is forever. We have to keep it going to make that possible.”
Watch the full interview below with TLC’s Chilli and T-Boz as they discuss their Kickstarter campaign with the Huffington Post.
To see more details about the campaign, visit TLC’s Kickstarter page.
[Photo Source: Huffington Post]
