There are not too many up sides to insomnia.

One of the few is the better class of radio content generally available in the middle of the night.

Between 2am and 3am on Tuesdays, Radio Five Live’s Up All Night programme features a technology magazine called Pods And Blogs.

Tuesday’s edition came from the SXSW (South by Southwest) “interactive festival” in Austin, Texas and featured an interview with Jonathan Coulton, one of the growing number of independent, unsigned musicians making a living from t’Internet despite – and take a deep breath before you read this, Mr. Record Company Suit – making most of his music available for cost-free and DRM-free download.

Coulton is a talented songwriter, a thoughtful person and deserves every success for demonstrating to the refusniks in the RIAA and its ilk that the digitization of music is not necessarily the end of the world or the end of income generation.

While he’s now largely charging $1 a song, Coulton gives away a lot of his music and it is legally copy- and distribute-able under a Creative Commons licence.  By inviting people to donate if they like his music, Coulton is proving that PEOPLE WILL PAY FOR MUSIC IF IT’S GOOD ENOUGH, something record labels simply cannot or will not grasp.

Kevin Kelly’s blog recently even set out a fucking business plan for these gimps.  Still they prefer to sue schoolchildren, though.

The show contained an excerpt from Coulton’s most popular song, Code Monkey, inspired by his previous job as a software engineer, which had the Minister almost choking with laughter at 2.30am.

Code Monkey get up, get coffee.
Code Monkey go to job,
Have boring meeting with boring manager Rob.
Rob say Code Monkey very diligent
But his output stink;
His code not functional or elegant -
What do Code Monkey think?
Code Monkey think maybe manager oughta write goddamn login page himself.
Code Monkey not say it out loud:
Code Monkey not crazy, just proud.

Here’s an acoustic rendition:

Enjoy Mr. Coulton, his website and his music.

And if you like it, pay for it.

He’s playing Dingwall’s in London a week tonight: tickets available here.