Josh Woodward is an acoustic indie rock singer/songwriter from Ann Arbor, Michigan. A prolific musician, he has released eleven albums in the past decade, but he has chosen to give away all of his music for free. In a world of $18 CDs and lawsuits against file sharing grandmothers, Josh offers more than 200 songs as free downloads from his website.
This gamble has paid off well; he's used file sharing to organically build a worldwide network of fans. After over six-and-a-half million MP3 downloads from his site, he's living proof that the music world is changing. His brand of passionate delivery with vivid stories, clever wordplay and occasional dark humor may not be for everyone, but the Internet has made it possible to find its audience.
His most recent album, "Addressed to the Stars", was released in 2016. The album represents a distillation of the best of what his music has to offer: upbeat folk rockers combined with delicate acoustic pieces. VideoSongs - music videos of the entire production process - were made for many songs. A Kickstarter campaign to fund the album ended up being overfunded by 400%. As with all of Josh's music, it's a one-man operation: written, performed, recorded and released with a do-it-yourself, guerilla mentality.
The Internet is the main source of exposure for Josh's music. With 23,000 subscribers YouTube for the many VideoSongs and acoustic performances, and more than 250,000 videos from other users feature his music, totalling over a billion views. He was also a featured artist for Clear Channel New in Winter 2006, which included extensive online promotion and national radio airplay. He's one of the most downloaded artists on Jamendo, a Creative Commons music site, where he won the award for Best Pop Artist in 2011. Since 2010, "Swansong" has been the featured song in Ubuntu Linux.
Hi-Res Photos: Logo, Headshot, Promo Photo 1, Promo Photo 2, Weird Photo, Older Headshot, Live
