An Interview With Strike Gently

Story by Jacob Fricke 

| Published Apr 27, 2010

‘New Music Updates. New Gossip Updates. 365 Days a Year. Even Columbus Day.’ This is the top image message that greets you when you first navigate over to strikegently.com. Talking heads flap across the screen, a still of Barack Obama stares knowingly down at you and a man pulls at a woman’s clothing with his teeth. Clearly, there’s something a bit different going on here.

Whoever is behind strikegently.com doesn’t like you. SG could be man, woman, or machine; child, adult; or deity. Pick which one you prefer. Also, SG thinks your band sucks.

Strikegently.com is a site that posts music, movies, TV shows and porn. These are all up for download, with no strings attached. You simply click a link and begin your download.
Yes, what the site does is illegal. But is it wrong?

Dailyer Nebraskan: Who are you? How old are you?

Strike Gently: I thought Tommie Frazier was gonna get drafted. I know he was injured but the NFL draft has seven rounds. The Bills could have used him in 1996. I think the natural thing for any failed athlete would be to start a blog. Kasper has Crohn’s [Disease] and he's still alive. If you can breathe, you can talk shit. Unless you are Roger Ebert.

DerN: How many people run the website?

SG: Only one person updates the site. But the community provides the content. I have made my email very public and people have really responded. Honestly, at this point I have just given up following the net. Allow the community to control the content. The community has a lot less registered sex offenders than the net. The community does have more sex offenders than the net. The only thing I control is personality.


DerN: What inspired you to start the site?
SG: Leftovers. To be more specific, Chinese.

People hating me. My parents hating me. Hating everything about the internet. Specifically, the early "original" blogs. They ignored content that was obviously floating around. Here’s ONE SONG to check out, when a Google search would offer the entire album.

DerN: How do you decide what to post on the site?

SG: The hardest thing in the world is being funny. i could easily drive a school bus but the kids still wouldn't like me.


DerN: Why did you recently start linking to porn?

SG: People were more negative about the MySpace bands.

MySpace died. Music died. Movies died. TV died. People like to follow trends but they never admit to it. I do feel extra bad if porn companies lose money from "illegal downloads." These women have serious boyfriends.

Honestly ... I’m a really big fan of Johnny Sins. He has really bad hair but def makes up for it in other spots.


DerN: Where do you get the albums you leak? Inside sources at labels?

SG: Leaks aren't accidents. When I worked at Regal Movies I wasn't allowed to shit on the popcorn, so I didn't shit on the popcorn. Leaks are part of the process to selling 1,000,000,000,000 records or selling 0 records.


DerN: Do you personally upload the movies you link to?

SG: You didn't see me at Avatar with the camera crew. It’s a lot different filming in IMAX theaters.


DerN: Does the website make any money?

SG: Zero. There is no advertising. We aren't Tiger Woods and sponsored by Gatorade.


DerN: Do you honestly expect the people who download from your site to “delete within 24 hours,” as it says on your site?

SG: People are people. People are all the same. They know what’s up. I actually get paid when I babysit and am allowed to eat anything I want out of the fridge.

DerN: How do you avoid legal problems?

SG: I feel terrible. Warner Bros. records $10 million lost on "Never Shout Never," probably another $6 million on "Lights." The record industry isn't fucked. They just sign the wrong artists and more obviously hire the wrong people.

If I would have started a record label instead of a blog I would be so rich. I wanted to sign Justin Bieber, Owl City, Lady Gaga and Ke$ha.

It’s all basic math. [Record Label] Epitaph probably lost a couple million on Set Your Goals and New Found Glory. But they made $10 million on the Offspring in '94.

I'm pretty sure Bob Dylan wasn't a MySpace kid with a bot refreshing his band page every couple seconds. Springsteen is the only person I know that hates free Wi-Fi.

Thanks to the internet, everyone thinks they can give birth to the mainstream artist.

Do you know how rare a rockstar is? I hate U2 more than anything in the world but would love to discover the next one. There will be another one and whoever discovers them ON THE INTERNET will make tons of money.


DerN: Do you have any ethical issues with people downloading music for free?

SG: My office has a water cooler. It’s never gonna put Evian out of business.

Nobody sells records anyway. Everyone is trying to create popular internet properties.


DerN: What is the leak you are most proud of posting?

SG: None. I hate them all. I’m proud of my recycling bin. My first born. He could drop Tyson back in the day.

DerN: Have the bands you link to ever contacted you? What do they think of it?

SG: A bunch of assholes. There is this kid named Craig Owens [former lead singer of Chiodos]. I would love to kill him. Not [that] I don't like him ... hell I don't know him. I want his tattoos on my wall because I need some decoration in this space.

DerN: How many people visit your site daily?

SG: I have 8,000 twitter followers. I wish I had 8. I’m not Justin Bieber. I’m not popular. And I don't care about that. If people don't like me, don't go to my site. I mean ... a lot of people don't like me ... historically. This isn't anything new.


DerN:What are your plans for the future of the site?

SG: Move back to New York. Not because I like it there. Just because time goes by a lot slower.

DerN: Finally, why do you do it?

SG: Be interesting. Life is always good or bad. Life is never interesting. Just because my life sucks doesn’t mean yours has to.