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Can you tell us why you guys felt the need to start Shifty Disco? It seems to be a couple of friends teaming up to release a record or am I wrong?
"It started after a few of us got together to release a compilation of Oxford bands in
1996. The CD (called OXCD and featuring bands such as Dustball, Candyskins, The Egg, Heavenly,
The Bigger The God, The Mystics and Thurman) was a bit of a success and so we decided to take
it further. Richard already ran a label, Mac was a local promoter, Ronan was the editor of the
local music paper and I was the manager of a couple of locally based bands. The team worked well
and so we hatched the idea of setting up a CD Singles Club to help give bands that first step on
the road to mega-stardom."
Hold on, how did you get the name Shifty Disco?
"Ah, well. Mac came up with the idea of calling it Shifty Discs. The music paper was called
Nightshift (hence the Shift part of the name) and one of Mac's favourite labels was Shimmy Discs.
I thought that we should have the letter "O" in the name somewhere so that we could drop an "x"
inside it on the logo just to subtlely emphasise the Oxford connection (the postal code for
Oxfordshire is "OX"). And so Shifty Discs became Shifty Disco. Half and hour and three packets
of Letraset later, Mac had designed the logo. Not a bad day's work, really."
Releasing the first record, was it a nightmare or a lot of fun?
"Between us we had had a fair bit of experience of releasing records and thankfully we
managed to avoid most of the potential problems. It took a while before we had the concept of
the packaging and the logistics of the whole Singles Club sorted. Plenty of Merlot was drunk and
we emerged with what we felt was a pretty good set of ideas and most of them still form the basis
of the Singles Club. One 2-track CD single every month in a label sleeve with a hole cut in the
middle to mimic the old 7" label single sleeves. 1000 pressed and numbered, 500 go to the shops
and 500 go to the Subscribers who pay for a year's subcription. It was the World's first Singles
Club to be run on CD and not 7" (an important factor we felt because we didn't want to just sell
records to 30-something saddoes like ourselves) and the first club to offer the subscribers the
same numbered single each month."
Is it still the same people running the label? Have other people joined in the meantime?
"We are now much expanded (and not just our waist lines). It began with just the four of us
but now we have a press person, a radio person, a web person, a production person and a designer
(but sadly not someone to make the tea)."
A day in the life of a band is easy to picture. But how does a regular day for the Shifty Disco-clan look like?
"Often Mac is working of an evening either promoting a show at his venue, The Point, in
Oxford or out in his A&R capacity catching a gig by one of the bands who have sent through a
promising demo. Mac also spends time tour managing and mixing the live sound for any touring
Shifty bands - indeed he is in Bordeaux as I write with Elf Power. Ronan is the same, either
reviewing a band for his paper or sharing the A&R role with Mac. Hence a day in the office
usually starts around Midday for them. They wade through the demo tapes, track down the
interesting bands and then hook up with the ones that take their fancy. Ronan also writes
the press releases and biographies for all the Shifty releases. I'm usually in at 9:30 catching
up with the post, fielding the general email enquiries and then setting about whatever is in
my schedule for the day, a mixture of planning, marketing schedules, bookeeping and cashflow
planning (a tricky task at the best of times) and dealing with all our overseas labels with
regards to planning promotion and tours and making sure that they have plenty of stock of our
hot new releases. Tina (the world's number one press person) and Emily (our radio plugging genius)
are usually in not long after 10 am to deal with that morning's emails and post before either
heading off around the country to spread the Shifty word or sitting in the office convincing
the media via phone and email of the worth of every Shifty platter. Andy is our webmaster and
also runs our associated webshop
www.oxfordmusic.net . He also maintains the Shifty
Media Resources site which has online versions of band photos, logos, record cover scans, press
releases, biographies and tour dates. Andy also administers a lot of the necessary paperwork and
keeps an eye on contracts and other legal stuff. Justin is usually in about 10am unless he's
rehearsing with his band Six Ray Sun and he looks after all the fan mail that comes in for the
bands. He also books the tours and sorts out all the manufacturing for all the releases. He's
the man that controls the deadlines. Ash is a freelance webdesigner based in our office and he's
usually there til about 4am and so we rarely see him in the daylight hours. Richard has a separate
office on the other side of Oxford where he runs a recording and rehearsal studio. He's usually
in the Shifty office a couple of days a week and he deals with the negotiations with bands and
labels that we license albums from. He generally steers the mighty Shifty ship from his vantage
point of being slightly detached from the day-to-day running. Then we settle down around 6pm with
a nice bottle of red and generally feel pleased with oursleves!"
Are there any contemporary labels that you feel a kinship with?
"Chemikal Underground, Fierce Panda, Invicta Hi-Fi, Sony."
When you look at small labels like Poptones, you tend to think they aren't really setting out to conquer the world. It seems more about finding a niche. What is Shifty Disco's goal?
"Poptones is not a small label! They raised 25 million pounds of City investment before they
had even signed a band. And have you noticed that it isn't called Poptones anymore, you have to
refer to it as "Alan McGee's Poptones". Poptones is like an instant indie label - just add water.
They have signed up loads of bands on £10,000 deals - more than any non-funded indie could afford
but nothing compared to what major labels pay. Hence they are mopping up all the bands with an
independent attitude who are glad of the chance of a bit of cash to help fund their existence. A
very clever move on Alan's part but with such an instant roster of bands you can't help suspect
that it's a bit like putting a chip on every square of the roulette table.
Shifty Disco's goal is to be recognised as a home of quality and to prove that you don't have
to look like Toploader to be successful (How on earth did that happen eh? And the Stereophonics?
Oh, and Travis and Coldplay - HELP)."
What is Shifty Disco's motto? If you have one that is!
"It's not about fiscal planning and schedules based around market forces. It's about
discovering something shiny and new out of nowhere and doing our damnedest to make sure the
world sits up and listens..."
Some of the bands on the label are Elf Power, Jackdrag and Nought. Do you think there is an element that unites these bands? Is there a Shifty Disco "sound"?
"There definitely is some common ground between some of the bands but I don't think you
could find a pigeonhole which would comfortably hold both Nought and Beulah. The Singles Club
also allows us to be wilfully diverse when we want to be!"
On what basis do you sign new bands? In the beginning it seemed more about promoting local bands (from Oxford).
"On the basis of our ears. we started with Oxford bands because that was within our wingspan.
Now we fly all over the world. Our current single is form Japan (Astro B), our last was from San
Francisco (For Stars) and our next is from Oxford (Six Ray Sun). We seem to have become a reliable
outlet for Europe for a number of American bands (Beulah, Elf Power, Jack Drag and our new New York
stars AM60) but that was never our intention, it just kinda happened that way."
I noticed you encouraged people to send demos. What do you expect to find on the tapes? Can a
Nu Metal Hip Hop crossover Heavy Folk band send their tapes to you?
"They probably already have. Tapes are a good way to get to hear a snapshot of a band. Most
of our Singles Club releases come from demos that have been sent in and often that is the starting
point for a flowering relationship that results in album(s) - eg. Nought, Dustball, Unbelievable
Truth, Beulah, Elf Power, Jack Drag, Pluto Monkey."
Ever had any funny/weird/crap demos sent to you? Of course you have! So what is the one that stuck out the most?
"Spunkle's Lube Tune. It arrived on cassette. We phoned him up from the pub and asked him
if we could release it. He said yes and we asked him for the master tape and he told us that we
had it. The cassette that he'd sent in was the only copy.
Crappest one was from a Portuguese guy called Fidel who assured us that he would have two Top
10 singles in the next 6 months. The band was good but his singing was appalling. He obviously
didn't realise this and the third track on the tape was performed a capella - you can even hear
him stifle a sneeze in the middle of it. Truly wonderful.
Best wind up was when Ronan sent in a tape of obscure Steve Albini stuff under the name of Nexus
6. We all fell for it and ended up calling the contact name and number on the bottom of the letter
because we were so impressed - Ronald M at 794736 - only to hear the voice at the other end say
"MacDonald's, how can I help you?"."
One of the best records releases so far this year, is Elf Power's 'A Dream In Sound'. When you first heard it, did you immediately realize it would be a (critical) success?
"When we first heard it we just loved it. Did we realise that it would be a success? well
only if the world shared our impeccable music taste. And this is our mission."
NME said Whispering Bob's single was the worst single ever released. Did Whispering Bob
foresee this when it pleaded "Don't bring me down"? How is Bob doing by the way?
"This single was reviewed by a sad bastard from Swindon. Swindon is a town 40 miles from
Oxford and the two places share a less than friendly rivalry. However the 'Bob are doing fine.
They've chaged their name to Goldrush and have been getting really good reviews and quite a bit
of Radio 1 play. Also the single sold out very quickly."
Just kidding about ole Bobster. Can you tell us more about the Singles
Vinyl versus CD. What side does Shifty Disco take?
"Personally, at home - vinyl. Mainly because I have so much of the stuff. I've always been
a singles fan and I've felt that the CD format has never really dealt with the single thing very
well. That's partly because their is no natural A-side and B-side. We've tried to take all the best
elements of the 7" single of times gone by and incorporate them with the contemporary format of
the CD. We want 14 year olds to buy our releases and not just the 30+ kids like ourselves. CD it
has gotta be."
If it comes to cover-art, I think vinyl is the best format. How important is cover-art for you?
"All art is important. You start with a canvas and make of it what you will. There is
plenty that can be done with the CD artwork and it just requires imagination and originality."
MP3s, email, online magazines... Does the internet has a big influence on Shifty Disco? What's the worst and best thing about internet?
"A big, big influence. Our website has been integral since day one and the internet has
allowed us to compete on an almost equal level with labels much bigger than ourselves. Most
decisions at an indie label are a result of necessity and yet they can often bloom into an
original idea. Two years ago we began our Media Resources Website becuase we couldn't afford
to make print copies of band photos for every release. We figured that if we could get magazines
etc. To go directly to our Resources site and get the stuff that they needed then it would save
us (and them) a lot of money and time. It worked. In fact it worked so well that EMI have just
launched a site doing the very same thing - interestingly enough they claim to be the first label
to do such a site!
Worst thing about the internet? Probably the continuing globalisation of the English language
into the 2000 words in the average American's vocabularly. Handy for us Brits who are not
reknowned for our ability to speak other languages but still it feels like the English language
will eventually lose its depth and beauty as a result."
What advice would you give to people wanting to start up a label of their own?
"Plan at least for the first year. Don't just limp from one release to the next."
Any future releases we should look forward to?
"Remember the name AM60, "Just A Dream" is a big Summer Smash, if we get it right."
Famous last words:
"Hopefully it was "Gabba Gabba Hey".
Johnny, Joey, Dee Dee - good times."
» Visit Shifty Disco's website
http://www.kindamuzik.net/label/709/shifty-disco/747/
Meer op KindaMuzik: http://www.kindamuzik.net/artiest/709
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