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J. Randall is a lyricist and vocalist for Agoraphobic Nosebleed. He might be more famous for the stuff he says on the Internet. What was once merely a vehicle for his opinions on everything from Russians to Scion has become a promotional platform for his new label: Grindcore Karaoke.
With six releases within the span of a month, the label, which offers all its content for free (so far), has grabbed the attention of bloggers big and small. It helps that the first release, Wadge’s Grindcore Lu’au, is an amazing party-grind album. It also doesn’t hurt that every release after that has fallen into the spectrum of “worth listening to” to “awesome”.
In a time in which labels are losing money, MySpace has fallen by the wayside, and touring has become prohibitively expensive, Grindcore Karaoke presents a different way to promote small bands. I asked J. Randall about the role of labels today, the Internet as a promotional tool, and his plans for the new label.
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In your e-mail, you said, “I’m all Passion of the Christ about what I’m trying to do here”. What would you say it is you’re trying to do?
A little history: Scott [Hull, of Pig Destroyer and Agoraphobic Nosebleed] and I had the Drum Machinegun comp on Relapse, and Hull’s been doing This Comp Kills Fascists. With the comps we were doing, we were trying to support what we came up through. We came from that run of 7 banger labels like Bovine, and we see that kind of micro-label in crisis at the moment. And you look at the micro-labels, and you see that’s where certain genres get a foothold and go from being completely obscure to the next big thing. But with the smaller labels tanking, a lot of these small bands are gonna run into a wall of nothing. At least with the Kill Fascists comps, some of these bands kind of got a foothold. These are bands the average person didn’t know about a year ago.
Weekend Nachos got bigger, for sure.
Yeah! So, with me doing this free label thing at the moment: I was rolling out a lot of pretty negative shit last year, and some of it was borderline contempt for how people don’t try to help out the guys that are up-and-coming. So I was kind of like, “Well, I’ve been giving this shit the shaft for so long, I gotta put my money where my mouth is and support some shit that’s cool, that most people don’t know about”. Like Wadge. He’s had record after record out and has been doing it for years. Then people come in and download that shit, and he may as well not have even existed the day before that shit dropped. It’s crazy. It was just buried in obscurity, but just make something free…
And what an album to open a label on!
That’s probably my favorite grindcore anything of all time.
What’s your process for finding bands to put on Grindcore Karaoke?
I hunt shit down. All the time, I’m kind of like a musical channel-surfer. I find a lot of these bands and just start talking to them. A lot of it I find for the comps Scott and I have been putting together for Relapse, which gets me in the mode to do that. There’s tons of incredible shit I think people just don’t know fucking exists.
Like Robocop.
I’ve listened to Robocop for a little while. I’ve always been sort of disappointed with the New England area. We’ve got our classic bands, but it’s hard. You see all this great shit coming out of California for the last 13-14 years – Stapled Shut, Lack of Interest. So anybody that’s doing anything in New England that’s on the level, I’m into it.
“Maine is the Bastard”! I hope he does that shirt. I’m stoked about that. That shit’s fucking genius.
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Are you planning on charging anything for any of the albums?
Honestly, when I approach somebody, I tell them that it’s a free release label. If a person wants to roll the dice and try it, make a little off of it, I’ll definitely support them on that. If they want to do a promotional run, then charge five bucks, fine. We’re talking about different ways to make some [money] while keeping the releases on the free side. Might start selling some shirts right alongside the downloads. Shit that you can’t rip off of Rapidshare (laughs). You’re competing with expenses in this day and age that just weren’t there back then. It’s definitely not the industry to be in to make a buck these days.
Bandcamp only allows you to have a certain number of free downloads before you have to pay for it right?
That’s true. I pay out of pocket. I’m a couple hundred bucks in, man, but I’m about doing this. I’m not loaded, but if I was trying to do a 7″ for one of these bands, I’d be out the same kind of money. This way, I can get out six bands doing it for the passion of fucking doing it. Any of these small labels, they’re making it on the side, hobby-style, and just making enough to make the next one. I could have blown my whole nut doing one 7″, but I have six records out.
So what do you see the role of labels being in the future?
I think they’re gonna be more like A&R firms. The Internet is in every way an attention-contest, so you’re gonna probably end up paying a label to help promote your band. It’s kind of fucked up, for a label to be taking your record and selling it digitally and taking a cut, but then again, you’re competing with everybody on the Internet, so maybe having Relapse or Prosthetic in your corner isn’t so bad.
So in your mind, labels are just promotional vehicles.
I think that’s their greatest value. I love Relapse, the people who work there. I can’t say enough nice things about that label, because they do juice your shit. They get behind you and put that shit fucking everywhere. And that’s what counts. They have the staff for it. I think they’re probably the largest indie label in the States due to staff size alone. It’s an international organization.
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Let’s talk about promotion. You get a lot of stuff out just by using Twitter alone. In your MetalSucks interview, you said you thought only about 1% of people who use Twitter use it to its full potential. What do you see that potential being?
Basically with Twitter, you’re sharing these little micro-thoughts. You have the opportunity to rub your brain against whoever the fuck is following you. It’s a platform! You write something that’s worthy of people’s interest, and they share it, and it becomes a larger part of what you’re doing.
A lot of bands, they’re pretty one-dimensional. Their lyrics, the ideas are almost an afterthought. The fucking riff rules right now. No one’s saying fucking anything anymore. No one’s hanging their dick out and really going for it.
I always make a point in the releases to have the booklet. I’m very adamant about that. It’s like, “How do you share your ideas?” That’s a whole other dimension of what makes a band great. If you don’t got it there, you’re gonna rock somebody’s ass for 10 minutes, and then they’re on to the next thing. But if you’ve got some substance there, some ideas, then you’ve got people like the Bastard Noise, where it’s not just, “We’re gonna pummel you with this fucking sound”, but it’s got all this bizarre, fucking sardonic humor. That’s why they’re a fucking iconic band. It’s something bigger than just music.
People don’t want to go there. That end of it ain’t good for a lot of bands. I love both hardcore and hip-hop. Hip-hop, it’s beats, but it’s lyrics, too. But with hardcore, you can get away with not sharing a fucking idea. I just don’t understand the idea that if you have the opportunity to let people know what you’re about, why you’d dodge that. It’s like I said in that MetalSucks interview. If you had Rollins, Ian McKaye, any of these dudes that are passionate about their fucking lyrics – these dudes just wanted to get their words out. If they had the sort of platform where they could get people to read their shit when they were hungry, you better believe they’d be taking advantage of it.
Moving forward, what are your goals for Grindcore Karaoke?
Basically try to put out as much stuff as I can and help make whatever’s next happen. Labels can’t afford to take 10 grand and roll the dice on some obscure thing. If that’s the final word, then bands stop at Internet obscurity. A lot these people, I’m talking to them about doing the free releases, and some of them are at the point where they don’t want to try anything anymore. They’ve just fucking had it. They recorded all this shit, they don’t get any feedback on it except for by three friends of theirs, so what’s the point? And that sucks. At this point, I’m just gonna keep doing what I’m doing.
I tell you what, if Relapse came to me tomorrow and said, “Hey, we think your little program there has some merit”, I would hand the entire thing to them, because I know that would be the best thing for these bands. I would point these bands in that direction. I don’t even give a fuck that my name is attached. I know if Relapse had this, it would be all the better for all these bands. I would hand it to them with a fucking bow on it and keep finding more bands. We’re seriously at a point where all this shit is going to evaporate, and that’s gonna be it. I’m just trying to grab people’s ears. It’s the attention contest versus attention deficit disorder. That’s what the Internet is right now. That’s why I’m releasing so much shit. I want to be sure people keep coming back, and they’re excited. I’m trying to make an onslaught of stuff.
Well, as easy as it is and as cheap as the technology is, can you see other people going your route and making small labels to release obscure music?
Yeah, I mean, I don’t want to say I’m trying to “lead by example”. I don’t see myself as leading anything, but I’m definitely trying something as an experiment. Hopefully more people will be using Bandcamp and figuring out how to promote this shit and get heard. If you go on Bandcamp and search for grindcore, there are so many people releasing their bands for “name-your-price”, a dollar, free. I can’t say enough good things about the entire service. The people on there sound good, and it’s as easy as putting it on my iPod, hitting scramble, and getting blasted. Most people are downloading music these days, and there’s not much differentiating between the people who do it themselves and the people who have labels behind them. It all comes down to promotion, so if you can figure out a way to promote yourself, you’re just as legit as all the bands with label support.
[With Agoraphobic Nosebleed] I don’t play shows, but I’ll go on the computer and run my fucking mouth, and we sell good. We sell real good. I don’t want people to forget about my ass for a second. If I ain’t getting feedback or we aren’t selling, I’ll go online and start pissing on fuckin’ everybody. I’ll start fights just to get people talking about my fucking band again (laughs).
That’s very Massachusetts of you. “Let’s start a fight”.
Yeah, but it’s a pussy fight because it’s online.
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I dismissed the Robocop record initially. That was a serious mistake. It’s now my second favorite release on the label, J., after the Wadge record.
You’re doing an amazing service for heavy music and for generating interest in what I consider some truly under-the-radar bands. While the physical formats aren’t dead, I feel that they’re on life support. Artists like these and others not-yet-discovered need as much support & promotion as folks like you are able and willing to give them.
Keep up the great work and I’ll keep downloading and buy a shirt or two.
Really interesting. I’m definitely a fan of what he’s doing with the label.
Excellent interview!
I don’t know how putting out as many releases as possible will alleviate the problem of Internet-enabled short attention spans. The more releases there, the less people will pay attention to any individual one.
That said, Grindcore Karaoke is an interesting idea, if not necessarily as a label. It seems to be almost more like a PR company.
Cosmo, I understand where you are coming from. I don’t think it helps to alleviate the problem of short attention spans, but I also don’t think it necessarily makes it worse. Honestly, I’ve been downloading from GK. to see what the other bands are, and I’ve been listening to certain releases more than others. At this point most things can be downloaded really easily anyway, so I typically plunge in, and download a lot of music. If something strikes me, I will stick with it. I think most people are getting to that point, so i don’t see this as making problems worse.
I see the idea of a label shifting over time, but I agree that this doesn’t fit the current understanding of a label. It’s not really a PR company in the sense that J is not charging us anything to put our stuff out. It’s a weird hybrid, and I’m not sure how to describe it myself…
For anyone who’s interesting in buying a (5$) copy of Robocop’s physical album, our demo, or other stuff I’ve done, you can purchase it at namelikehismaster.com I’m not sure how people feel about buying something they can get for free, but I’ve been creating the robocop c.d.s and designs myself, so they should be pretty cool and unique.
karaoke, i love it badly, i was crazy of it for 10 tens.
@InvisibleOranges … labels have always been primarily PR companies. Most artists can come up with the money to record an acceptable sounding album (especially now), but the amount of money and time it takes to promote to even a mid-level band degree is much more significant.
I think the biggest service a label serves is connecting a band with other artists on the label. Take Profound Lore… a lot of progressive, uniques sounds that would likely fade into obscurity if they weren’t collected under one label. You like one band on the label and you’re sure to like a few more. The best labels build scene for you, while the worst just have a revolving door of artists milking a trend.
Yeah, look at Earache. They USED to have a built reputation and ’sound’. Now I just see them as milking whatever’s popular: deathcore and thrash revival most notably.
It is a sad state of affairs the state of the scene not musically , but in structure and systemic issues. However it is brilliant to see that Randall has embraced the challenge and overcome it with much innovation and simplicity. Like aforementioned many people only go skin deep into the music, giving it a few listens, however there are some of us still, who look beyond the pages of download links, and engage in discussion and debate on our releases.
An important shift that I don’t think has been addressed but has existed for a while, and gains ever more momentum, is the power of Blog’s in the realm of the industry. With so many releases to be found on the internet, people are looking for someone to spoon feed them which releases to pay attention to, although being part of the Grindcore blogging community, I generally think that a fair selection of us, don’t like this approach and bend it to our own, being an attempt to create discussion and analysis on releases.
That last lines wins the whole interview.
I also want to say I’m pumped he picked up Marion Barry. I heard them on Last.FM and was stoked to see them signed. Black Power Violence. Genius.
it definitely functions a bit like pr, but i think it’s more like trying to solve the gatekeeper issue of “too much stuff, not enough ears”.
much like a trusted critic or blog acts as a selector for readers, free + celebrity name recognition is a powerful differential. it functions less like a label and more of a tastemaker/showcase role.
If you had Rollins, Ian McKaye, any of these dudes that are passionate about their fucking lyrics – these dudes just wanted to get their words out. If they had the sort of platform where they could get people to read their shit when they were hungry, you better believe they’d be taking advantage of it.
word up!
We’ve been giving shit away for free for 3 years to no avail. Maybe we just blow haha. Kudos to J and all these underground bands putting in the effort for a world that doesn’t even listen to music anymore. If you don’t have a shiny watch or a two foot cock, you will not get noticed. I’ma be getting that shaft surgery soon. Shoving sweaty grindcore balls on all chins of the mainstream! Great interview! Keep up the great work!
I remember reading the Sean Yseult interview a little while back and she said something to the effect of “it’s so much easier to be in a band these days, all you have to do is record your music and put it online for everyone to see.” And I remember being struck by how backwards her perception was, that having infinite competition and an uncaring, overloaded public is somehow easier than going the traditional route.
At the moment, the ‘free giveaway’ is the only path for an unsigned band (besides praying some label/hand-of-god will pluck you from the haystack), and it has some promise… but now that everyone’s doing the free thing, it’s already lost its novelty, therefore, most of its worth. It’s getting to the point where even free mp3’s are a burden, and I don’t know how you come back from that. Hopefully it’s all cyclical and we’re near some kind of breaking point, but who knows what form that will take, if any.
dhex has the right idea. Technically, Grindcore Karaoke isn’t putting out much that wouldn’t be available otherwise (maybe WADGE?). You can see the process on J’s twitter account, it’s entirely transparent. One day he sees a band he likes, tweets about it, and a couple weeks later he releases them on his label. Such was the case with Chulo.
Yes, the internet is FILLED with content, just as a library is FILLED with books. But you don’t go into a library and just start looking at the books. You go into a library with an idea of what you want, or a mental list of authors you like, or knowledge of certain books you may or may not check out. The same is true of the internet: you don’t just start mindlessly browsing, you usually frequent a few arbiters of taste (Invisible Oranges being one of them).
So while the internet is filled with content, filtering mechanisms are also on the rise, which helps channel information to the people it would appeal to. GK is simply one conduit for music we’d otherwise miss.
If you look at it now, filters actually compete a lot more than raw content does. GK is one more filter.
Recommended reading: The Long Tail
Ryan Page – I agree with your “the market will separate out the wheat from the chaff” theory. As others point out above, that includes not only “tastemakers” (what an awful word) but people’s own personal filters.
Wash Jones – That reminds me of how a commenter here once said that it’s so easy to find good new music now, in contrast to the old days where one had to hunt to find music. I disagreed and said that with today’s glut of information, one still has to hunt to find music.
It’s true that free MP3s have lost their novelty, especially as streaming rises in popularity. I think that with so many filters out there, however, that good unsigned bands can’t *not* get noticed. There are just too many people on the lookout for them. The final arbiter is always quality. If you are good, you will rise to the top.
Will Hubbell – I was just reading yesterday about how “Web 3.0″ will be about user customization, so as to deal with the problem of filters reaching the same glut that information has.
interesting! Where’d you read that?
Will Hubbell – Try, e.g.,
http://blog.gravity.com/2010/11/17/the-future-will-be-personalized/
or just a basic Google search for “Web 3.0″.
awesome. Thanks dude!
This man is a forward thinking fucking hero. I’m not even a huge grind fan I dig Pig Destroyer and ANB, some power violence but nothing on the label has really spoke to me sonically BUT I still check it almost everyday cause its such an interesting idea, its fresh as fuckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk. His ideas on metal being broke are so true aswell. Props to J.R
This reminds me Mortville Records just bit the dust after 15 years with a final noise/grind/hardcore release called Small Doses, 99 tracks about 30 seconds a piece with bands like Wadge, Jet Jaguar n bands like that that J.Randall works with, it’s a really fucking good comp with a good booklet that has 4 commentaries on the death of a truly indie noise/grind label, someone at IO should check it out, I used to buy weird ass noise tapes from them all the time, and even weirder shit like Burping Turdz Musick, and Wheelchair Full of Old Men, man fucking Sockeye is awesome, you guys should really hear Barf On A Globe! I see this type of music as a DIY mailorder tape n trade thing of the past, since it went digital I just don’t give a fuck about downloading any noise grind, I’d rather spend $40 on an out of print Massacra CD.
hey some of that old shit i’m talking about is still around, yaaay http://www.100zerorecords.com/
Frozen Corpse Stuffed with Dope is one of my favorite grindcore albums of all time. The vocals are so over the top!
Great interview, btw. As a musician, I aways enjoy reading about new developments on the business side. As a music fan, I would certainly plunk down cash for T-shirt for a band that I like.
For anyone interested in the Maine Is the Bastard shirt that Jay mentioned you can pick it up here: http://namelikehismaster.bigcartel.com/product/maine-is-the-bastard-shirt
ps for those who care about this sort of thing, we did ask eric wood’s permission first… thanks all.
Ah, Ryan beat me to it. I was going to promote the Maine Is The Bastard shirt as well (for a little story of how it came to be check out: http://www.lukephysioc.com/blog/maine-is-the-bastard/ )
Instead, I would like to say that it was really cool doing something where so many excellent individuals were involved and that Grindcore Karaoke has put out some of the best releases I have heard this year.
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Randall, although your catalogue with ANb is and always will be attractive to me, I think you’ve kinda turned into a web based sell out. No ones buying your shirts or pushing your digi-grind boners. Stick with Lyrics and Vocals man, and u look like a skate poser now. Shutup about relapse and push Hydrahead from going Under. I bought your PCP Torpedo double disc dude, Ive been down with you guys for a long time, but less talk about TWITTER and more grind please.