Elbow singer Guy Garvey has spoken out against people who illegally download music despite being able to afford to buy it.
Elbow are now household names. The band's victory in the Mercury Music Prize triggered a word of mouth hype around the band which saw 'The Seldom Seen Kid' become a fixture on the charts.
Eventually selling more than 600,000 copies in the UK, the album is by a long way the most successful of Elbow's career to date. Set to return next year, album sessions are being shrouded in secrecy.
Breaking cover to speak to BBC Radio 1, singer Guy Garvey explained that he couldn't understand those who illegally download music but yet could pay for a copy.
The singer explained that the impact of downloading means that "without the live side nobody's making any money".
"If you genuinely can't afford music then of course you're going to rip it," the singer said. "If you can afford it and you don't pay for it then you're going to hell and you've got your own room. Especially when it's a smaller band. There's no excuse."
Illegal downloading is often viewed as establishing a certain democracy for fans, who have suffered from major labels hiking prices. However in real terms the biggest losers are small, relatively unknown groups.
Continuing, Guy Garvey spoke about the benefits of having a supportive record label. "You come across people who've dropped Elbow all the time. If you throw a rock in London you'll hit one" he explained. "We're lucky to have a paymaster in the current climate. It's not lost on us."
However his focus on the economics of the music industry does not mean that Guy Garvey has lost sight of the recording process. "We've never taken writing and recording records that lightly. I can't remember an album where we weren't concentrated on it for a long time" he said.
"It's not like we're suddenly now thinking more about the numbers than we are about the music."