From Bill VanLoo Sent Mon, Sep 28th 1998, 16:45
From Bill VanLoo Sent Mon, Sep 28th 1998, 16:45
> so, should i write to some record labels? should i attn: it to anyone? does
> anyone know the addresses of warp, skam, clear, mo wax, planet mu (are they
> still around?), rephlex, etc...? (anyone idmish is great, these are just the
> ones off the top of my head early in the morning.) the radio show is fun, and
> i do have enough stuff to last a while, but some new music would be very cool..
Good luck. Getting electronic music serviced to you is a very difficult process
at times. In my experience from being a small radio station's RPM director for
several years, this is what it takes:
1) time, and lots of it. time to call labels, time to put together your charts
(very important from the label's perspective), time to listen to the records you
receive so you can give an accurate review/opinion to the label rep you speak
with, etc.
2) patience. you'll probably encounter companies that say they'll send you
stuff, and then don't. keep on 'em. eventually they'll come around, hopefully,
sometimes for the reason of just getting you off their backs.
3) persistence. see above.
Basically, there seem to to be 2 camps in terms of labels - those who want to
push stuff on you (usually not very good records) and those you have to seek out
& beg material from (usually the good stuff). Labels I had success with:
astralwerks (www.astralwerks.com)
elektra (dunno if they still do warp stuff at all, but they had aphex & bjork)
plus8 (now m_nus) (www.m-nus.com)
green galactic promotions (www.greengalactic.com)
Labels that you probably won't get stuff from are most of the small labels you
mentioned above, unfortunately. They just don't have the resources to be able to
service you with stuff. Be persistent and make sure the labels know you're
sincerely interested, though, and you might get lucky.
Other things that help: writing reviews of stuff, even if it's only on IDM (it
shows you care), getting labels involved in on-air promotion (giving away their
product or focusing a show specifically on one label), lots of others. Talk to
your station's other music directors about reporting to CMJ or Gavin, whichever
your station reports their charts to. Even if you don't report charts to anyone,
e-mailing or faxing charts out to labels helps, too.
Good Luck!
Bill / dj marathon
--
Sigma6 Interactive Media / http://www.sigma6.com
dj marathon: "fibre" up now @ http://www.flatplastic.com/