We don't expect to make any money. We act mainly as a vehicle to help bands promote themselves and get their music out there where people will actually HEAR it. We are not concerned with making money, nor are we hung up on any one format... in fact, we're GIVING our shit away. Seriously, for free (or for a small donation, whatever). The bands sell their hardcopy CDs at shows and on their site (cheap, basically just to cover production costs), and we sell downloads on our label store page. All we ask for is a donation, but people can still download the entire zip for nothing at all. And if the bands wanna press vinyl, or just do CDs, it's fine with us... however they think they can sell their stuff to the public. But in this day and age you have to change with the times or get left behind, so not making (or selling) MP3s online is a mistake as far as we're concerned.

Yeah Andy, I have been battling Rich Eagan and his California Vagrant Records since 1991. They sold their soul to TeeVee Tunes so they could sign folks like the Get Up Kids, Alkiline Trio, MXPX and even Paul Westerberg and Rev Horton Heat to multi-record deals. I have had to deal with lots of confusion (and some real leagal Bullshit) over the years which drained both my engergy and resouces away from the Music I Love and Support here in the Pac NW. Fortunately I have cut my expenses way down to the bone and live for what I do. I had an opportunity to purchase the building my recording studio is located in and that actually kept my expenses down and brought in more income. It was a trade off though for years I couldn't tour or perform live because I was always recording some band for cash. Now the income from the studio (and the fact that I have other engineers working at my studio) have allowed me to put out albums again. I got lucky though. I still need to find folks to purchase what I have in my back catalog so I can get rolling again.

Another issue with being an Indie label is the lifetime of most bands isn't that long. In order to sell enough product by them to break even you have to have folks buy first pressing out right away before the band implodes. I have had so many bands break up right after I press things, that I had to wait almost too long before releasing some products (or not release them at all on CD/Vinyl but CDRs in small runs instead) due to my "wait and see so I won't get burned" skittishness. I know many of you out there have similar experiences like this. All your excess cash gets tied up in "The Next Big Thing" for your label and you worry "Is it gonna happen?" or "Are they gonna break-up" just as I press things up and have 1,000 beer coasters/xmas orniments?

Lemme Know. Post it here!

Your preaching to the converted brother, MP3s?? i'm still a vinyl man meself, as I'm sure most of us on this site are. The first release I put out, I spent months on the sleeve notes, I swear to god I sweated blood over that. I know when it comes down to it, its about the music, always, but I really wanna hold that album and read about it too.

between you and me, I was having a bit of a crisis a few months back and was thinking about giving it up, but I couldn't do it, I think I was just having a bad day, but fact is I just couldn't give it up, its in my blood now, I've been poisoned.

You mentioned in your first post about not getting paid from distros, thats not just me then??, I was beginning to think it was karmic revenge for not paying the gas bill.

By the way that Vagrant records emo bastards thing has to suck a big fat one.

Andy, I consider running a label is like an art project, YOu gotta really devote yourself to it body and soul. I have been living it so long that it is just part of who I am. I picked the name Vagrant Records for a reason (long before that SoCal Emo-schmeemo label) I never expected to make a dime on it. If I break even then I am a success. Back inthe 90's it was like that now it is just rediculous.

I also despise Electronic On-line Distribution of MP3 , because you get no tangible product for what you spend for the music (and I like packaging with liner notes and/or artworks) Places like MySpace and and here are Promotional Tools. I know there are 1000 folks worldwide who want what my label has to offer. I just need to find 'em.

Keep up the good work and stick with it. Most of all Keepa Rockin!

Hi Erik, I'm so broke my dog left me, i'm so broke tramps give me handouts. Seriously though, it can be tough, I've so many bands I'd like to put out but I just ain't got the money, and any distributors I work with want me to spend stupid money on advertising, but hey thems the breaks of running a niche label i reckon

How many of you indie labels are Broke? I know I am! I put out quality product by bands I love and support, but yest NO-ONE seems to be buying quantities that will support these hard working musicians. I found a few stores that would buy stuff from me when I was on the road, but still, things are rough out there.

What have you other label folks gone through? What works for you? Do you actually get Paid by Distributors? Post it here!

No, it was a zine that I did in the late 90s/early 00s. I'll send you a copy if you'd like...

Don't believe I have. Is this a radio show? Tell us more! I'm actually in the middle of compiling a new list to send out promos of a CD I just released on my label...

OK, what are the best fanzines/magazines that are out there to review new (and old) releases? I don't really care if it's print or online at this point, just trying to get a good list to send out promos to...

Thanks!

Guess Im just a bit slow. Only saw the star system because of this post.
Better start rating everything.
I saw that Led Zep the other day. Very sad, time for me to upload more tunes!!

I don't think there's any way that can be done, but I'll try to keep a closer eye on the videos that are uploaded and try to keep that from happening. Shoot me a message and let me know which duplicates you saw and I'll get it taken care of.

I have it set to display the highest rated tracks, so yeah, it probably dropped off cuz more tracks are getting rated higher, which is the original point of this topic.

But, like I said in the original post here, if you see (or hear) something here you don't think fits, police it yourself and tell 'em that stuff doesn't belong. I couldn't agree more!

I think the site is pretty cool. As time goes by we should get more cool vids and songs up. There seems to be a bit of repetition in some of the videos uploaded. Is there any way someone uploading can be automatically told if the video/song is already there?

Last Friday. Perhaps someone came to their senses and took that dreck off. I don't come here to listen to bad arena rock. Do songs fall off the jukebox after a week?

Um, I'd say nothing, haha. I hope you rated it with a single star at least. ;)

But it's weird... When I look at the player, I'm only seeing 20 songs. None of 'em are Led Zeppelin. Where did you go to see that?

I'd like to know what's so Garage-Punk about Led Zeppelin? Just tell me, because there's fucking Led Zeppelin on the jukebox.

I am! Any time you listen to a song or view a video someone's added, be sure and rate it (one to five stars). The higher-rated stuff will appear at the top of the music player and video section. You can even rate photos, too, if you're really bored.

Also, as with any site, occasionally someone will join and post something that's, um, not really appropriate. Let's all police this thing ourselves. If you see someone upload a hip hop song or something you don't think really fits in with what this website is all about, then let them (and me, too, I guess) know about it.

Thanks to all of you for helping to make this new site rockin' and rollin'. The early reports on the site's activity are great! Better than I expected. Be sure and invite your friends. And enemies!

I am always on the hunt for killer rock n' roll bands that I have yet to discover. Most weekends i search record bins or online for some tasty new or used vinyl to spin. So, what records are on heavy rotation on your sound system? Here are my top 3 records for this week. 1) The Points/ Maaster Gaiden split 7" (Big Action Records)

2) The King Khan and BBQ Show "Teabag Party 7" (Crypt) 3) Carbonas/ DieRotzz split 7"(Die Slaughterhaus Records)

OK, so I'm still trying to get to the bottom of this... is the copyright law as it applies to music recordings somehow that different from the copyright law as it applies to films and other published works (i.e. allowing films and [I'm assuming] books to be rented, but not allowing this for music)? I realize WHY rentals for movies works better and yadda yadda yadda, but that still doesn't mean it wouldn't work at all for renting music... that is unless the law is written in such a way as to totally make that unlawful to do so.

I wasn't talking about absolutes here. Of course there are a few people who will watch a lot of movies over an over again and we all have a couple of movies that we like to watch again and again. But thats not the norm. Most people will only watch a movie once.

Bill sent me this link. It HAS been done before!

I dunno about that. There are some movies that I'll watch multiple times. Hell, I remember one weekend a friend of mine and I watched "Strange Brew" and "Slapshot" about a dozen times each.

This has been thought of before. But they were shut down pretty quickly because it's illegal to rent out music recordings. Besides people would just be ripping everything to their harddrives anyway. The reason rentals work so well for movies and not music is because people use them differently. Movies are most often watched once and music is listened to over and over again. So it's much more economical to own music (because it's used over and over) than it is to own a movie which typically only gets used once.

If you add your show or event of interest to Upcoming.org, you can then send it to our GaragePunk.com - Canada group there so it appears in the event list at the top of this group. Here's a step-by-step on how to do this: 1) Go to www.upcoming.org and log in (if you have a Yahoo ID, just use this, otherwise you'll have to create one). 2) Next, click the "Groups" tab (there, not here) and search for the "GaragePunk.com - Canada" group and join it. 3) After you've logged in and joined the group, click on "Add New Event" and then type in all of the details, including any links to band/venue sites, images, etc. Then click the "PREVIEW" button at the bottom. 4) On the next screen, make sure all of the info is correct, then down on the right side you'll see "Groups" and under that, "Send to group?" Click that, and a menu will appear showing the groups you belong to. Select "GaragePunk.com - Canada" and that will add it to this group. (If you don't see this group listed there, that means you didn't join the group first... read #2 above again.) You're all done! Just repeat the above steps for any other events you'd like to add.

Yeah, I thought I still had the URL at the time I wrote that.