Longplay love v2.0

What a great Rock album. Lungfish, hailing from Baltimore, are coming up with their longplayer "Feral Hymns" on Dischord, which made a big exception from their basic idea to focus only on the Washington D.C. area when it comes to releasing music. So what it is that makes "Feral Hymns" that special to break the concept? Basicly it's proper high quality music which even can convince a pure electronic egghead like me. Operating in its 17th year of existence - sic! - the Lungfish delivers what I'd refer to as Campfire Rock in the most positive of all meanings. There's a very basic instrumentation - drumset, electric/bass guitar and vox -, there's mostly downtempo songs and instrumentals so its proper music to chill out to and there's a melancholic feel throughout the whole album, similar to my mood when sitting near to a campfire at night, talking god, the universe or philosophy... . Nice one. Guess this'll be one of my favorite non-electronic albums in autumn 2005. But wait - looking out of the window and strolling round town these days it already feels like autumn in Hamburg so it's gonna be one of my favs until the end of the year.

Just for trainspotters interest: my last years non-electronic favorite has been Charalambides "Unknown Spin" on Chicago's Kranky-imprint.

But back to the dancefloor again. I mentioned Leipzig's Moon Harbour in my last post a few days ago. They are celebrating their 5th anniversary next month with a compilation named "FIVE - 5 years of Moon Harbour" which will be out as 8 track double vinyl album or 14 track CD. I received a preview-CDr of that forthcoming vinyl version which features Luna City express, Martin Landsky, Gamat 3000, Audio Werner and others delivering sparkling functional MinimalHouse tunes of the highest quality. Pole position for Luna City Express and their tune "Venus"!

Question. Most labels are complaining that vinyl sales are going down these days and I know that shipping vinyl for promotion is expensive. But what's the point in sending out CDr- or mp3-promos to DJ's? In my point of view it doesn't make sense at all, coze if the customers and future customers - it's the kidz I'm talking here - do see DJ's spinning CDr, mp3 or Final Scratch only how can they be convinced to buy vinyl?
There should be an alliance of people that stand up for the traditional physical formats which are vinyl discs and dubplates as they still do run things and - who can deny this? - good sales rates are one of the or even most important parts in the food chain of music industry no matter if deepest underground or major company level, having effect on everyone involved in the scene - producers, DJ's, clubs, promoters, label employees and punters - in one way or another. Anyone up for this? Feel free to get in touch...

I read an interview with a UK-based top Drum'n'Bass-DJ recently which seems to share this point of view and still spends a thousand quid on dubplates per month just to promote the same kind of thought. Forgot about the name but I want to give a shout out to him anyway. Respect for being concerned about what's happening in real life, man.
Don't get me wrong as I'm not trying to front any of those mp3-on-demand systems here as I honestly think that they can add value to a labels cash flow as well, especially when taking care of sold out tunes or delivering music to homelisteners which do not necessarily buy records or even own a set of turntables.
Talking digital distribution here - there are plans to make sold out back-catalogue of my label Intrauterin Recordings available again soon, so watch out for news on that.