Good Crew, a pop-rock band from Japan, have released the vocal tracks for all the songs from their new album, Nippon Husky, under a CC BY-NC-SA license. While this in itself is great news (we always love to hear about people using licenses!) this is especially noteworthy in that Good Crew are signed to Columbia Music Entertainment in Japan (and got said recording contract through user voting), making this the first major label release in Japan to use CC licenses.

Good Crew will be holding a remix contest using the tracks from now until May 10th (get the tracks here), with Good Crew choosing their two favorite remixes for prize winnings. The Grand Prize winner will receive a Sanyo Xacti with the second place winner (and the Special Humor Award) recieving a $100 Amazon Gift card. From ejovi:

OtoRevo has created a lot of first. OtoRevo and Columbia Music Entertainment were the first label to sign a major artist (Good Crew) exclusively from user voting. Now we have done another first, we are the first major label to release tracks from a major release under Creative Commons.

You can download the mp3 vocal tracks from Good Crew’s album on the OtoRevo website.

We are releasing the vocal tracks for anyone to remix and mashup. The most interesting remixer will win a Xacti camera. Unfortunately the page is in Japanese, but downloading and listening to the tracks is pretty simple. I love Kuroki-san’s voice (lead singer). The name of the album is Nippon Ha:Ski. When you hear her voice you will know why.

Even if you don’t want to remix, download and listen to the tracks. Of course if you like it, you might like the album!