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TIME AND AGAIN | PRESSURE FLIP RTI | CHARGER
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What a show this was! The first in the new millenium and one of the worst shows we've played in a long time! We sat around for nearly 8 hours until it was our turn to close this show and needless to say, we were exhausted. A lot was riding on this; the first show of what was supposed to be our long awaited relationship with Liquid Magazine. Instead it was plaqued with resentment and misunderstandings. Between feeling out of place and uncomfortable (not to mention the tension) it was really a bit much to bear. I personally have grown sick of the entire bastardized hardcore/rap-metal scene and was full of disdain. Not a single band really caught my attention except for SPACE AND NOISE (who dared to jam hard while others where soloing all over the place or bouncing around as if in a DR. DRE video). The rest were mediocre at best aside from a few of the old school death metal acts. If not for Gabe & LOVE MUFFIN, I think I would have lost my mind. Shoutz to Aaron & IN4RED.
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At any rate, hours before we took the stage, I came across the backstage area of the PNA Club to get a 3 prong adapter for Gabe's amp when Nixon called me over to talk to this guy he was talking to. His name will go unmentioned here, but suffice to say, him and Nixon actually had gone to school together and he was now working for this record "label". He handed me a contractual booklet he kept referring to as the label's "agreement" and pretty much wanted us to sign right then and there. Since I was in no particular hurry to sign my life away (and not to mention we were all growing weary of this show), I pocketed the "agreement", gave him our email, and went on my merry way. Before leaving though, he made sure to keep telling me how interested he was in our band and how much he dug our website. Nevertheless, no matter how interested he seemed, neither him nor his boss could stay another hour or so to actually see us play. And why should they? They already heard our Real Audio and MP3 files...
As the night progressed, we saw the label's contract everywhere. Even a band that didn't play that night got an offer! (Not to say LOVE MUFFIN isn't worthy of a record deal -- Hell, they blew away most of the bands that played that night. But to just arbitrarily throw contracts around to people you've never heard before really says a lot about the integrity of the label.) That following week I really had to do my homework. I read and reread every line and tried my best to make heads and tales out of their ridiculously over-worded contract. [When I get the actual "agreement" booklet back from Bob or Nixon, I'll be sure to put some scans of it on here.] By the time I was done I had amassed several questions I couldn't wait to ask in person. In the 6 days between that PNA show and our scheduled meeting with the label, I exchanged several emails with the Artist Affairs Executive who originally gave me the contract. Here now, for the first time ever, is a look into the LARVAMIND mailbox: |
What the "K" man didn't know was that I was one up on him. He didn't know I knew he was from our hometown and that he was familiar with our surroundings. So, in an effort to see how much of himself he would reveal, I played dumbed and asked some fairly open questions. Irreguardless, we were still prepared to take him to the Frass Factory (which, was about as closed to the public and hidden away as the Batcave). 
Hi there!Currently our weekly schedule is a bit rough. Nixon (our bass player you met) and myself work at Ameriwood [in Dowagiac] on 3rd shift. This means we sleep during the day & have really short nights coz we have to be at work no later than 10:30pm and sometimes even earlier. We've read the "agreement" booklet and are still discussing a few things amongst ourselves. Because of our steady work/rehearsal schedule we're looking at Friday evening as our earliest possible free day for us to get together with you. Thursday would normally be fine but Nixon's got a dentist's appointment to tend to that was made weeks ago (and we'd rather not make any band decisions til we're all together). I'm sure you understand. Anyway, if you'd like, we could get together Friday or Saturday anytime between 5pm and whenever. Please let us know. If you wanna meet up in Dowagiac we could take you to our "bat cave" and show you our homemade studio and let you sample some of our recordings. Are you familiar with our little turd of a town? I believe you mentioned the Wounded Minnow. We could always meet there, talk some things over and then head out to our place. Let me know what you think,
Ah, enter the "booking agreement"! This is where things get interesting. Like promised, we met "K" down at the Minnow in Dowagiac and he seemed really pressed for time. In fact, the whole meeting [that we spent the previous week in preparation for] seemed like it was hurried. As it turns out, he was selling the idea that if we hooked up with the label we could play a really big show coming up with G LETHAL 9 and HED PE. Really, we couldn't care less who we could be playing shows with. We were looking at the big picture. In retrospect, I think he was expecting us to forgo everything and sign on the dotted line right then and there (again). But instead, we nailed him with a barrage of concerns we gathered from the initial record contract. Of the dozens of questions we tossed at him, nothing went answered. I even pointed out discrepencies in the contract and he seemed generally confused. At one point I even made him read the damn thing to see if he could decipher it and he seem at a lost. Then he pointed out that the "agreement" wasn't exclusive (even though it was written that way). Which, of course, brings us to an interesting point: If we were expected to sign something on the spot that was contrary to the agreement we were bound by, then whose to say there aren't other things that have already been changed or would be changed along the way?? Then he proceeded to tell us his story of another band we've played with, TRIPLE F. He pretty much gave us a sob story about how he went through all the hoops and in the end the guys in TRIPLE F shot him down. "It was the first time I've ever been turned down," he said. So what? Does this mean if we decide that Maniac Records isn't for us then we're just like TRIPLE F? It seemed like he was trying to get at us at any angle. At one point he even told us how he's going to immediately "shop" G LETHAL 9 to Roadrunner Records. Shop? Pimp? It's all the same; buzzwords sharks have thrown at us for 2 years now to try to get out attention. |
Still, we tried to save face and offer this guy the opportunity to come into our studio and listen to our demos. And the more we tried to explain to him that we were unwilling to make people actually pay for songs we've provided for free online for several months (if not over a year by now) the more he chose not to listen. Why would we want to sell anyone material we are no longer comfortable with? If nothing else, we want our new found relationships with any press, booking agency or label (Maniac Records or otherwise) to help us move forward, not backwards. Yet there wasn't enough time for that. Not enough time for us. After days of preparation, the representative for the label [and the man with his own booking "company"] decided he'd better go and make it to his even more important meeting reguarding the HED PE show. In a way, it seemed as though it were a cop out. But before leaving he promised further contact within the week and the chance for us to meet him and the CEO of Maniac Records to finally get the answers to all of the questions and concerns we shared.
Well, this about clinched it for us. No matter how many times we tried to get this guy to hear our music (and no matter how many times we had to remind him we had songs online) they just couldn't seem to get the idea. And that's kinda ironic since Maniac Records is actually putting itself off as an online record company like the infamous mp3.com! Furthermore, it seems we weren't the only ones with some concerns as the need for a big "group" meeting with all the bands became necessary. Still, there was one glaring discrepancy: how could he say that only GL9 and ourselves were offered an "agreement"? Did they really think we didn't know anybody at this show or would talk to other bands? In the end, putting a meeting in the middle of the week (when most people work) and in the evening at a town so far a way was a bit to rediculous for us. It's supposed to be the job of the agencies to bend over backwards for the bands but instead it felt like we were being bent over a barrel. And for someone so committed "to put this little shit-town on the map", he never emailed us again. Guess they lost interest in us in dealing with all the bigger bands. [snicker] Still, this episode didn't really affect us much. We brushed off this whole incident and filed it away with the other lousy industry sharks we've delt with. And with this following polite and understated note:
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And for the record, before I end this little essay with a smile, anyone can start a "record label" or "booking agency". It requires very little, if any, financial backing. At one point when we recorded the Milk Heavy LP, the agent that was hounding us at the time urged us to get business licences and to appoint each other as "CEOs" of Larvamind.
LM, INC? And if you're curious as to why GL9 is prone to such attention from this particular label, it may very well be because this supposed "booking company" this Artist Affairs Executive [their words, not mine] was affiliated with is partnered with their bass player.
Dishonest? No. Perhaps when LARVAMIND takes a few weeks off before hitting the road next time I'll hook up with Gabe from LOVE MUFFIN and we'll both start different record labels. Then we'll sign each other's band and ride the publicity train all the way to the bank... God, if it were only that easy... |