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NOV 17, 2008 | 9:30 AM | Jed Davis
Ree-seshin Blues.
The other day I got some bad news from a friend of mine who designs typefaces. He checks his font sales religiously, and for years rarely went a day without at least one order. But, he told me, the day the stock market kamikazed, business stopped - instantly. And it's been silent ever since. Other friends with online stores have told me similar stories.
Eschatone receives sales figures from its distributors at the end of each month, so no word yet on results at retail, but I can tell you that after a very encouraging launch, the proprietary eschatone.com online store has only received two orders since the crash (both for Brian Dewan CDs). Things screeched to a startling and scary halt.
The company has virtually no overhead, so it's not like we're in any trouble, but releasing product into this environment is an empty gesture. Our priority since the summer has been Michael Bassett's Soft Verges, which is a fuckin sonic masterpiece of the highest order. But right now, promoting the record the way we want to would be like yelling into a hole in the ground - it is simply not going to stimulate sales. No slight to the record at all; sad fact is that nobody is spending money on anything not absolutely essential.
Similarly, putting out my own stuff seems like a waste of time until things improve, regardless of how much I've got stockpiled. Promoting a record is the most expensive part of a plan that ends with strangers who might be touched by the music having a chance to interact with it as its creator intended*. My music comes in a physical package of my conception and is meant to be consumed in hi-fi with all the trimmings (the same could be said for all Eschatone releases, which is why we have the roster of artists we do). That is just not gonna happen right now - people will grab for free MP3s all day, sure, but that's half the story at a fraction of the fidelity. When I listen to the finals of "The Bowery Electric" and Shoot The Piano Player on MySpace, I kinda want to throw up. These are exquisite-sounding recordings being squeezed out the nasty ass of that fucking Flash player, with a tiny little jpeg where the album sleeve should be.
Common sense says Eschatone should stay in a holding pattern right now. I'm impatient and a bit frustrated - particularly regarding Michael's record, which I feel so strongly about, I'd go door-to-door for it - but when things are better, we'll still be around and ready to go. I have a feeling that's more than we'll be able to say for much of the remaining "music business".
*That's the Eschatone model**, anyway - the average label's plan ends with them turning a profit, preferably an enormous one, which is why most of them don't last very long.
**Not to be confused with my own model, which ends with me giving copies to the same ten friends who have been listening to my shit since 1991, then driving around to it in a car until I get tired of it and want to make something else. Anything beyond that is, in my opinion, me being way too generous to the human race by giving it an opportunity to enjoy my hard-won music that it frankly doesn't deserve.
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