NPR has news on the highly anticipated art project of Danger Mouse, Mark Linkous (aka Sparklehorse) and David Lynch. Apparently, the album, Dark Night of the Soul, may not see the light of day, which would truly suck. With the Justice of the Internet, however, you can hear the whole thing HERE. No, you cannot download it but who cares — it’s perfect work music: contemplative, richly orchestrated and a bit abstract. From NPR:

“Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse wrote the songs on the album. But they got a bunch of other musicians to sing the tracks, like Iggy Pop, James Mercer of The Shins, Vic Chesnutt and Jason Lytle of Grandaddy. And don’t forget Lynch. Danger Mouse says he’d always wanted to work with the director, so he asked the filmmaker to make a book of surreal photos inspired by the music. The images show distorted human figures and scenes of suggested violence, like a gun lying on a table. Lynch also actually sings on the album.”

But the controversy remains nebulous, as neither side will get specific to the beef: “Danger Mouse says he can’t release the album because of an unspecified dispute with EMI Records. EMI’s representatives have acknowledged the dispute, but offered no specifics. They’ve released a statement saying “Danger Mouse is a brilliant, talented artist for whom we have enormous respect. We continue to make every effort to resolve this situation and we are talking to Brian Burton (Danger Mouse) directly. Meanwhile, we need to reserve our rights.” Danger Mouse says he plans to release the book of David Lynch photos, with a blank, recordable CD. The disc will be labeled, “For legal reasons, enclosed CD contains no music. Use it as you will.”

That is fucking rad. Fuck the record labels — have they not gotten the memo that they’re more obsolete in the modern world than Betamax? Way to handle shit — instead of making however much money you’ll make from people who still buy CDs, you’re gonna make zilch cos everyone’s gonna buy the book and download the album. Smart move, EMI…