amanset european tour journal
06/09 LOPPEN SNAP!! |
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We played at the Loppen in Christiania, the storied squatters' village in Copenhagen. It's got a certain charm, I must admit. The people were really nice. The vibe was a little bit Renaissance Fair, a little bit Amsterdam back alley choke mugging, and a little bit Juarez, Mexico. Also performing at Loppen that night was Diefenbach, a band from Denmark who just signed to the UK label, Wall of Sound. [A quick aside...Over the years, I have made a number of bad decisions that have kept our little band from ever finding a larger audience and being successful in whatever terms you may chose to define success. But no single decision crippled us more than agreeing to our "arrangement" with Wall of Sound / We Love You. Journal space is too limited to adequately relate how this label has ruined our band and humiliated me personally. I'll have to save that rant for another time. Plus...without seeing me pause and tear up a lot...it's just not the same. But suffice it to say if you're ever in the UK and you're considering buying one of our records, and you flip it over and see the Wall of Sound / We Love You logo on the back, please do the band a favor and buy the Tigerstyle import instead. Another pound in their pocket will only strengthen their stranglehold on us and make this joke of a relationship less funny. Send me the receipt and i'll pay the difference. If there's never another Analog Set record...I'm sorry...It's because Wall of Sound pursued their contractual "right" to release it, and with my last shread of pride I snapped the fucking master over my knee. The experience has been miserable.] So when Deifenbach's manager told me how excited the band was to begin work on their first Wall of Sound record, it was difficult for me to restrain myself. I wanted to run down all the empty promises. The unreturned e-mails. The video they made for us without our consent. The conference calls they ghosted me on. But you can't come right out of the gate talking shit like that. No matter how much you want to. It isn't right. And Deifenbach's situation is totally different from ours. So when he asked me what i thought about the label, this is how it began... "We [Deifenbach] chose Wall of Sound because they're keen on artist development, they have good distribution, and they're a well respected label in the territories we're primarily concerning ourselves with. What's been your experience with them?" [these are all important things to consider, by the way] "Can you still get out of the deal?" "Well...no...the band starts recording on friday...why?" "Then it doesn't matter...really. But when you talk to Mark Jones, maybe ask him to return one of my e-mails someday." I didn't need to mention that those e-mails had so long ago been nice, then carefully worded...then stern...and then plain mean. Now they're just broken... To: Mark Jones (mark@wallofsound.uk.com) "I don't know what awful shit we ever did to you to make you treat us like this, but I hope I figure it out so I can do it ten times over. Gimme my fucking records back." on the ipod: "Secondhand Smoke" The Breaks |
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