diary of a record label

This is where I recount my tales of confusion, excitement and woe as I try and figure out how to release records. Who knows what might happen? Certainly not me.

TEST PRESSINGS!

I got completely overexcited by the arrival of the test pressings, undoing the many wrappings feverishly and running to play them on my stereo with just a little trepidation in case things weren't right. But it all looks and sounds great so I am very happy. I was particularly impressed that they had stamped them from A1 through to A4 rather than just do each record as A1 and A2. They've really been great about the 2x7" concept.

So I emailed them back yesterday to say GO GO GO and apparently I am getting all the records in TWO WEEKS TIME! This is excellent news as it will give me up to a week to put the records together before the launch gig.

So so so so many things still to organise before then...

posted by marceline on Monday, June 28, 2004

The records are finally in production!

Got an email from GZ today acknowledging receipt of my cash money and telling me to expect my test pressings next Wednesday. I am now officially excited.

posted by marceline on Thursday, June 17, 2004

BOXES!

I now have 330 boxes in my house, in our BOX ROOM, amusingly enough. I got home this evening to discover two enormous boxes full of BOXES sitting in the hall. You might be surprised at how much room 330 boxes takes up. I certainly was. They look great though so hurray!

I also finally managed to pay GZ for the records today after much (more) traumas. Having finally got the extra £38 transferred into my account, I then attempted to make a payment to GZ. Except no sort code so I emailed GZ for it. And then discovered I'm not allowed to make payments from a savings account so I had to transfer it all to my current account and then immediately pay it all to GZ. Madness!

I now await the test pressings!

posted by marceline on Thursday, June 10, 2004

LAUNCH GIG

Is finally go!

ÜTER
SUNNYVALE NOISE SUB-ELEMENT
HEX

Sunday 18th July
Stereo, Kelvinhaugh Street, Glasgow

Providing all goes well, the record will be available for purchase at this gig and all will be wonderful and fun. I have an exciting concept for the gig posters!

Otherwise things are a little bit in limbo. I've just been organising the printing for the inserts and troublezine and also the order for the BOXES so I hope to have them complete soon. But mainly I am checking my bank account daily waiting for the extra £40 to clear so I can pay GZ and get the record production underway. I couldn't sleep last night for trying to figure out contingency plans for what to do if the records aren't ready in time. More usefully, I came up with some good ideas for other things (including the poster concept) which I even remembered to write in my notebook on the bus to work this morning.

I also just bought an exciting new iBook yesterday so now I can update the rest of the website again. I now realise that this site doesn't work properly for macs and there's a nice gap in the design. I shall pretend this was intentional, ahem...

posted by marceline on Monday, June 07, 2004

two steps forward, one step back...

So! The masters are now with GZ who emailed me immediately on receipt and then a week later with my final invoice. Woo! It took me a short time to realise they had billed me for 350 of each record instead of 320 so I checked with them and this is apparently the +/- 10% thing. I thought this meant you weren't guaranteed to get exactly 320 but on second thoughts that was a stupid thing to think. +/- 1% maybe, duh. So I now have a significantly more expensive bill than expected. Or budgeted for. I have now been doing some financial trickery with my accounts to get an extra £38 so I can pay this bill. So far so good(ish). This leaves the problem of me now having zero money in my record label budget and still no boxes or inserts. Eek! I fear more serious financial trickery may be called for involving credit cards. Argh.

On the bright side, I now have an extra 30 records. I wonder what to do with them since everything is organised for 300 records + 20 promo copies.

In other news I have been looking at CARRIER BAGS so as to annoy anyone trying to get out of buying a record at the launch gig with the "I don't have a bag" excuse. I was hoping for printed bags but they are mega expensive, then clear bags but no-one makes them small enough and so finally to boring plain white I think. Oh well. I might manage coloured.

I am also now getting THE FEAR about GZ doing something mental like pressing the tracks on the wrong sides or me having sent them something ridiculous for the label artwork by mistake. Ah, irrational worrying, it's the best.

posted by marceline on Thursday, June 03, 2004