About six weeks ago, news about a new acoustic duo started spreading through various music blogs. Not only had Kenneth Pattengale and Joey Ryan aka The Milk Carton Kids made their debut album available for free on their website; unlike most other people, they weren't even asking for your email address in return. Today, more than 20.000 people have downloaded the album, and as if that wasn't enough, Prologue has also proven to be one of this year's most beautiful collections of music, easily worth the £10 you'd normally pay for songs this good. In this exclusive interview with one of the best new folk bands in the US, Joey Ryan tells Americana UK all about famous fans, being compared to Simon & Garfunkel and why he's deliberately trying to destroy the music business.

Interview by Soren McGuire