avalanche records

Archive for August, 2011

Sales outside the UK do now seem to be going through OK again so do please let us know if you have any problems. Thanks Kevin

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Author Ian Rankin chooses the music he can’t live without in a special literary themed edition of the show. Find out which band he wishes he’d been in and the best new act he’s discovered this year.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b013xqwh

Includes plays for Star Wheel Press and Edinburgh School for the Deaf.

There seems to be no middle ground for in-stores. They are either very well attended ie Gordon Ballboy, Kid Canaveral, Withered Hand / Rachel Sermanni and of course the standing in the doorway rammed attendance there was for Frightened Rabbit or there is at best a few family and close friends or at worst nobody at all. We are talking good bands many of whom have sold healthy numbers of CDs but it seems until they hit a critical level in the public conscience people can’t be bothered to see them for free. We plan on having more bigger names playing in the shop and I would like to support smaller bands too but that support needs to come from the public also.

A problem for the shop is that bands now all have a launch for just about everything they release and whether they simply drop off their release to the shop or indeed ask to play an in-store to help promote it it makes no difference as all the sales will be concentrated at the launch. In “the old days” bands would ask to play in a shop to launch their release and the last hugely successful example of this was the Idlewild in-store on the day of their album launch.

Just as I was mulling all this over who should get in touch but Gargleblast Records looking for an in-store for Martin John Henry best known to me at least for having been the singer with De Rosa. With no planned launch in Edinburgh this was a perfect opportunity to have the album launch in the shop. Martin will be playing with his full band on Friday 7th October @ 4pm and customers will have the chance to buy the new album “The Other Half of Everything” ahead of the official release date of the following Monday.

As a reward to those who make it to the smaller as well as the bigger in-stores we will be creating what is essentially a loyalty card so those that attend these smaller in-stores will be guaranteed entry and a good view for the big in-stores we have planned. We have just had confirmation that Black Friday (November 25th) an extension of Record Store Day in the States will be taking place in the UK also this year and we will as with RSD be planning some high profile in-stores to coincide. Much more news to follow.

Hello there!

Cancel The Astronauts here, with the second ever CTA mailing list email. We hope it finds you well and eager/patient/bored enough to read about the kind of stuff we are getting up to.

Okay! First, our new single, Seven Vices, is now available to pre-order. Hurray! It’s our first ever single, which is quite exciting. You know, for us. It’s got two full-band b-sides on — ‘cos we’re old school like that — and some marvellous artwork by our favourite ever Estonian, Ulla Saar. You can grab it at our Bandcamp page, right here.

The official release date ain’t ’til the 12th of September, but if you pre-order the in-real-life, have-it-hold-it-hug-it version, you shall be rewarded with an immediate! download of the all the tracks immediately.

Interestingly, modern types who prefer to pre-order the download only version of the single will find that they too are rewarded with an immediate! download of all the tracks immediately. Not sure how that works. The world works in funny ways, so it does. Specifically the part of it that’s Bandcamp, it seems. Still though, we didn’t want anyone to feel left out just because they care about the environment/own coasters. That’s how nice we are. Go! Listen! Buy! We hope you like it.

Also, rumour has it that there are limited numbers of ‘yer actual copies available Right Now! from splendid independent music shops Avalanche (Edinburgh) and Love Music (Glasgow) if you go in and sort of ask for one. Actually, I’m certain that’s true. I’m going to upgrade that to, like, a fact. Yes. There you go: it’s a fact. You may bank atop it. Support your local music shop!

A perfect example of getting the balance right between online sales and shops.  

Interesting article about Scottish labels after the fire including

Craig Hargrave, label manager of Rock Action Records – run by the acclaimed band Mogwai – said: “About 20,000 units of our catalogue were destroyed. This includes CD albums, LPs, seven-inchers, box sets – accounting for virtually every release we have done since 1996. For a label of our size, this is a massive amount of stock.”

This from an Australian retail analyst

http://www.smartcompany.com.au/retail-trends/20110829-online-price-versus-offline-experience.html

With apologies to Martin Niemöller…

First they came for the record shops… and I didn’t mind, because I got a better price and more choice, with greater convenience.

Then they came for the video stores… and I didn’t mind, because I got a better price and more choice, with greater convenience.

Then they came for the bookstores… and I didn’t mind, because I got a better price and more choice, with greater convenience.

What will be next? And will you care about it?

Not being intellectual enough to get the quote I had to Wikipedia it

“First they came…” is a famous statement attributed to pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984) about the inactivity of German intellectuals following the Nazi rise to power and the purging of their chosen targets, group after group. The text of the quotation is usually presented roughly as follows:

First they came for the communists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a Jew.

Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

Just saying !

We have just received more copies of the very limited clear vinyl and of course we still have the limited embossed CD.

We also still have a few of the seven inch singles left on blue or white vinyl.