The Counting Crows on Monday released a slew of tracks from its latest album to fans on the popular peer-to-peer file sharing platform BitTorrent.

The band — which introduced the album Underwater Sunshine (Or What We Did On Our Summer Vacation) in June — has shared four new tracks, liner notes, and artwork from the album directly to BitTorrent users. The tracks are now available for free on the site, where fans can also purchase the rest of the album directly.

BitTorrent - which runs the file-sharing tools BitTorrent Mainline and µTorrent — allows users to share music, TV episodes and movies among the community. The company announced in January that it surpassed 150 million active monthly users.

"I don’t know how I didn't think of this earlier — it's the most obvious thing in the world since BitTorrent has such a huge global reach," Counting Crows lead singer Adam Duritz told Mashable in a phone interview. "It's not just about getting music to the people who would buy it anyway — even though that is, of course, very good — the hardest thing to do is make new fans."

Duritz believes that if bands expose new music to the masses for free, there is the opportunity to gain fans that they would otherwise never get.

"The older people get, the less music they buy. But if you are exposed to new music at any age for free, it allows you to grow your fan base. That is the Holy Grail and pot of gold," Duritz said. "I hope a lot of young bands pay attention because you don't have to monetize everything to get your name out there. If you are good, get your music out there and that will be the beginning of your career. "

The tracks in the bundle include “Untitled (Love Song)”, “Like Teenage Gravity”, “Hospital”, and “Meet on the Ledge."

The promotion is part of BitTorrent’s ongoing Artist Spotlight program, which debuted in August 2010. The Counting Crows is also gearing up for its nationwide tour The Outlaw Roadshow, which features a variety of up-and-coming artists. The tour kicks off on June 9 in Asbury Park, New Jersey.

BitTorrent and Duritz will also host a Q&A session with fans on Twitter with fans, scheduled for 4:00 p.m. ET today. Fans can participate by following the hashtag #crowchat and sending tweets directly to @CountingCrows and @BitTorrent.

Image via CountingCrows.com