The grunge band L7 recently ran into trouble this year while fundraising for their first album in over 20 years, Scatter the Rats. Due to a mass amount of encouragement and pleading from fans, L7 thought that now was the right time to come together and put out their seventh studio album and decided to use the fundraising platform Pledge Music for the new album. Pledge Music went bankrupt and the platform is no longer online, leaving L7 in an unfortunate situation. Earlier today, L7 released a statement about the situation and explained the events that took place in detail. Despite Pledge Music going bankrupt, L7 states that they have made the commitment to honor the fans who pre-ordered the album through the platform. The cost of the mailings amounts to around $20,000. The group also thanked fans and their label Blackheart Records for love, support and patience during this difficult time.
Here is L7’s statement on Pledge Music below:
“To give a brief summary for those not familiar with the Pledge Music scam, in a nutshell, the funds that many bands and their supporters raised through the crowdfunding platform were absconded by the company with zero accountability and unreturned legal appeals. Their site is no longer live and they are filing for bankruptcy protection in the U.K. As bad as it is, the band nonetheless has made the financial decision to honor our fans who pre-ordered the album through Pledge Music, and which they have yet to receive. Thanks to Joan Jett and Blackheart Records, L7 was able to manufacture and ship what would have been utterly impossible without their support. Pledge Music has held over twenty thousand dollars in shipping costs alone that we have no access to and will likely never see. However, L7 has made the financial commitment to honor these mailings.”
L7 released Scatter the Rats back in early May of this year. The group has made couple videos for tracks off the album including one for “Stadium West.” Today, L7 also released a music video for “Holding Pattern” and explained, “Although our song “Holding Pattern” is not about this lousy experience with Pledge Music, we believe that we can all relate to its inspiration of being caught in a disheartening loop of stagnation in one way or another.” They went on to say in regards to the Pledge Music situation, “The only time we will speak of this again will be in a courtroom.”
Photo Credit: Mehreen Rizvi
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