Dave, I barely come here anymore, so forgive my delayed response. In answer to your first question, "how long have you have your label for?";
Since 1989! There was another label from California that came along in 1990/91 and started using our name! Long story short (as it is an EPIC story) We tried to fight them, but it became a money losing stalemate. I still have to deal with their Bullshit! PITA! We are still slugging it out (kinda) just for SPITE!! Fuggem!!
In answer to your second question, "What kind of music do you release?";
My criteria for putting out music is as follow (so all you band who are reading this PAY ATTENTION!!) I gotta see ya play; I gotta like yer music; we gotta GET ALONG (both Personally & Musically) You gotta be MOTIVATED to Play and Tour (a lot) and most importantly you gotta have INTEGRITY and wanna stick to it in the Hard Times (like now!). A ltta band don't know what they want in the Long Run. They have no PLAN. Unfortunately, this is a Business and without a Business Plan your band is doomed to failure in the long run. I come off like an ASSHOLE sounding like this, BUT it is the TRUTH! Anyone who has put out a record and had a band break up on them AFTER they have put things out (and spent lots of $$!) KNOWS what I am saying.
So to answer your question, I put out the MUSIC I LIKE by bands I know and TRUST will NOT screw me over and they sell enough for me to recover what I put into it. Sometimes it is Pop, sometimes it is Noise, Sometimes it is Jazz, sometimes it is Spoken Word, sometimes it is Punk, etc... Does that make sense?
Lately I have been doing my own music (as Howlin' Houndog!) Kinda a Beefheart/Sam the Sham/Tom Waits/Velvet Underground/Big Band Blues thing. It has been working out finacially for shows and product to a degree. It is still HARD though.
I also run a recording studio in Seattle Washington (another HARD Business to be in right now!) Being creative is NEVER EASY!!
THANKS for the Kind Words of Encouragement! Sometimes we all lose sight of WHY wh are doing this stuff!
Dave said:
If you don't mind me asking Erik, how long have you have your label for?
It took my label many years before we started breaking even, and eventually having enough profit to barely survive off of.
Nowdays, all indie labels are broke. Three out the five biggest independent(punk) distributors shut down all within 3 months. There are a bunch of distro's and smaller distributors still out there. We are fortunate to have great distribution both in the U.S and overseas, but it took a lot of money a lot of releases and many years to get to that point.
I could go on for hours about the complete suck of running a label (remember Lumberjack Mordam? We were victim to that whole mess) within 3 months, we lost around 25,000 bucks, which is a ton of money for a small label. I almost threw in the towel as well, but decided to perservere. Everyone is having a hard time right now, so your deffinitely not alone.
As much as it kind of sucks to have to do it, you have to try to pick up large national act's that are already doing really well. Once you get a few larger bands on your roster, it gives a boost to the smaller bands and releases.
What kind of music do you release?
