Record companies that neither eat nor let eat: how a classic record is lost to time
I Could Live in Hope, one of the most revered albums by US band Low, which recently lost drummer and singer Mimi Parker, is hard to find. “The beauty of this album is amazing,” wrote an Italian fan on Twitter. After the praise, Alan Sparhovk responded that Universal Music “isn’t giving them back the rights” even though they already “asked for it”.
“The advance was small,” he notes of the money the band received when they brought the album to the label as a royalty advance. “We made three and a half records with them, which they don’t want to give us back after more than 25 years. They give licenses to bad companies to re-release and we don’t see anything,” he explained in a tweet. “At the same time, we couldn’t play live anymore and touring was our only source of income,” he adds, referring to Parker’s death.
Damon Wareham, of Galaxie 500 and Damon & Naomi, a musician who is very vocal about copyright and abuse by record companies and streaming platforms, has come forward to defend Low’s cause. “They should at least be paid for streaming their work, for all streams of their work, regardless of what contracts they have. Platforms should pay something directly to musicians,” he wrote. Tim Burgess (The Charlatans) also recalled that “Universal Music Group’s 2021 revenue was over $10 billion” and that “Low can’t tour, so his income only comes from his recorded music. It’s not fair. Everyone. “
I Could Live in Hope is the debut album that Low released in 1994 that catapulted his career and gathered around him a growing group of appreciators of his slow and intense music. The album was released by Vernon Yard Recordings, a label belonging to the Virgin group. At that time, Caroline, an independent distributor in Spain, brought the record to stores. In 2012, Universal Music Group bought Capitol, which at the same time bought EMI and which in turn bought Virgin, drawing one of the lines of the process of concentration of the record market until it was left with only three big names. .
Hence, a revealing album signed by a group from Duluth, Minnesota, to a ostensibly independent label backed by a powerful multinational such as Virgin, ended up in the macro-vaults of Universal.
When Sparhawk talks about “licensing the reissues of Fear Companies,” he’s specifically referring to Plain Records, who reissued it in 2011 (double vinyl), 2012 (released), and again in 2022 (double vinyl). On audiophile (sound quality expert) forums, Plain Records reissues (owned by Runt Distribution Group) are known for their poor quality and flat sound, so it is recommended to stay away from them and find the original recordings, which is quite difficult. this case. Vernon Yard Recordings released the album on disc and cassette in the United States in 1994 and did not re-release it except for digital, streaming platforms until 2006. Virgin’s UK label, Quigley Records, released it for the UK as well. Released in 1994. Another release to appear is a pirated cassette, unofficial, by Chilean label Alacalma, which will only release tapes in 2020.
In a 2019 interview with The Quietus, Kramer, the record’s producer, recounted how he discovered the band and contacted the label. At the time, the producer, who was recognized for his work with the band Galaxy 500 with a special, noisy but atmospheric sound, was making dozens of tapes a day. Some he dismissed just because of the band’s name or the first ten seconds. The demo that Low sent with the disputed record, I Could Live in Hope, arrived in a battered envelope with no return address. He was shocked when he played the device. I have never heard anything like it. “At about midnight I put the tape in my boombox and put my headphones on, which blasted in slow motion for the next thirty minutes. I was silently freaking out. I barely slept,” he said in an interview.
The package came from Duluth, Minnesota, so Kramer called a local radio station and asked if they knew of any Lows. On the other end of the line they said of course they had, that they were right there and playing the day before. A few days later, the three band members traveled to New Jersey to record the album with Kramer.
The producer had his own label, the prestigious Shimmy-Disc. When it was over, he was convinced that Lowe was in for a much more successful career than he could have left at his label without a dollar for promotion. And he wasn’t wrong: “Low deserved better, they were the best band in the world.” He brought the fully mixed and produced record to the office of a friend who had just been hired as a talent scout at the Virgin Vernon Yard Recordings sub-label. “The speakers seemed to glow, like they were on fire. The temperature and dimensions of the room seemed to shift and fluctuate. It was a bit like starting an acid trip. No joke,” he recalled. At the end of the first song (Words), the executive stopped the tape and asked if anyone had heard it. Kramer said no, and two more songs were played.
The talent scout got up again, stopped the tape and said, “Please don’t play this for anyone else. I’m going to sign this band. Do I have your word that no one else will hear it. Before I talk to them? ?”. Two weeks later, the sign A contract was signed that Alan Sparhawk now deeply regrets, and which Kramer described in the aforementioned interview as “lawyers doing their dark arts.”
In their singularity, Low were drawn within a certain sad current, intensity and sadness or exploitation of sadness, where Codeine, Red House Painters, Mazzy Star, Slowdive (and later Mojave 3), Galaxie 500 (and later Damon & Naomi), Cowboy Junkies, Portishead , the less industrial Swans or the more recent Joy Division. A look at over 140 listener comments on the Rateyourmusic website (3.87 out of 5) helps us understand the passion this record evokes: “Chilling…that’s what I felt when I first heard this record”; “I am wrapped in a web of sadness from which I cannot get out, and which, despite everything, tells me that I can live with hope. That there is always hope”; “I had a mental breakdown listening to this album and it was both painful and beautiful”; “Few bands in the ’90s were as inventive and original as Low”; “It’s a haunting, emotionally draining, near-destructive yet hopeful experience that elegantly envelops you in a mystical haze without boring or boring you”; “Sometimes a whisper speaks louder than a shout,” are some of them.
Lowe released two other records, in consecutive years, on Vernon Yard Recordings (Long Division and The Curtains Hits the Cast); The “half” that Sparhawk refers to refers to the four-song EP Finally… (1996), for which he claims they received no advance. “They only had it because we were still under contract with them,” he says. They later moved on to various labels until they landed on Sub Pop in 2004, where they remain to this day. Few bands can be said to have had a musical classification label created for them, but Low, for whom the term slowcore was coined. In total, they have released 13 studio albums without any signs of decline during their career, with great moments like Double Negative, their 2018 album, or their latest work, from 2021, Hey What.
“The system will collapse: Here Universal has an opportunity to adapt and be useful for the future, or turn to dust, clinging to its silver linings,” Alan Sparhawk wrote in a message Friday.
Source: El Diario
Leave a Reply