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Josh Woodward seems to have a career death wish. A prolific indie acoustic-rock songwriter, he has released eight albums in the past six years, 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 over 150 songs as free downloads from his websites, and sells CDs on a name-your-own-price basis.

This gamble has paid off well; he's used file sharing to build a viral, worldwide network of fans. After over two million MP3 downloads from his site, he's living proof that the music world is changing. His brand of energetic and passionate delivery with vivid stories, clever wordplay and dark humor may not be for everyone, but the Internet has made it possible to find its audience.

To date, he's released seven albums. His most recent, "Breadcrumbs", was released in October 2008. Featuring longer songs than usual, its range spans from poppy acoustic songs, to dark jazz- and soul-tinged tracks, to an epic rock dirge closing track. As with all of Josh's music, it's a one-man operation: written, performed, recorded and released with a do-it-yourself, kamikaze mentality.

The Internet is the main source of exposure for Josh's music. Dozens of podcasts play Josh's music each month from countries as varied as Canada, South Africa, Australia, The Netherlands, Sweden, Japan, China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, as well as Adam Curry's "Podshow", broadcast nationally on Sirius Satellite Radio. He was one of the four most popular artists featured on the front page of iLike.com (with 15 million members) for a week in November 2007. 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.

The major record labels cry that file sharing will kill music as we know it. We can only hope that they're right, so that the road can be paved for a new generation of anti-rockstars who are in it for the love of music.

Hi-Res Photos: Headshot, Live