Miranda Barber, a singer-songwriter from London, is not an obvious capitalist – her music, she says, is a cross between Joni Mitchell and Billie Holiday, more hippy chic, perhaps, than pure pinstripe – but the 33-year-old has nonetheless taken a stock market approach to breaking into the music business.

She is one of four acts quoted on Slicethepie, a stock exchange for unsigned acts. The website, launched this year, allows artists to raise £15,000 from fans to record an album, in return for which the backers get shares in the bands. Shares in Miranda Barber and her as-yet unrecorded album cost £1.47, giving her an overall market value of £22,050.

“It’s fascinating, but it’s an alien world to the creative process. I’ve no idea even who backed me,” said Ms Barber, who stumbled on Slicethepie as a place that might raise money to make an otherwise elusive first recording.

Slicethepie was set up by David Courtier-Dutton, who spent three years with Infobank, the shortlived dot-com darling, during the boom years before coming up with the idea to mix music and high finance in one website. It has 25,000 registered users, although with only four unsigned acts being traded. Yesterday’s volume of £524 is, inevitably, small.

“It seemed like a great opportunity,” Mr Courtier-Dutton said. “The music industry is on its knees and there are only one in three albums in Tesco that you want to buy, but there’s far better music out than what you can get off the shelf.”

The website trades off the notion that it is possible to break a band without a record company - more bad news for an industry that has seen Radiohead and Madonna turn their backs on EMI and Warner Music respectively in the last month.

Artists retain their copyright, with Slicethepie taking a distribution fee of £2 per album. It uses the money to buy out shares in bands two years after floating, implying that they must sell more than 7,500 albums for the original investors to turn a profit.

Already one of the listed bands, the indie act Gilkicker, is in talks about a record deal - the “takeover” means that its shares pay out at a 50 per cent premium. They are now suspended. The money motive is used throughout. Reviewers are welcomed, and writers are paid 5p per review, rising to 25p if their “star rating” improves.

Bands and singers that get the best reviews proceed to the next stage, called the Showcase, and about a dozen or more acts then face a popular vote. Those that come through this try to raise the cash: so far five, including the suspended Gilkicker, have.

The idea is to sell albums for £7.90 on iTunes. After the retailer and Slicethepie take their cuts of £3 and £2 respectively, a band receives £2.90.

Mr Courtier-Dutton owns about 60 per cent of the shares in the company behind the site, having raised £800,000 and £600,000 from private individuals on values of £2.5 million and £10 million respectively. Another fundraising begins this week.

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