Look dude, I understand that the music industry sucks. I understand that what used to sell a 10,000 units now might sell 500 and the market for what used to be an even tinier niche is downright non-existent. I understand that the House Music corner of the recording industry is now somewhere around little old ladies selling arts and crafts on the side of the road in terms of purchasing power. Hell, while I understand the reasons why people share music, I'll even tell the people doing it to fuck right off because I see its effect every day on this thing that I love, the people that inspire me, even if it doesn't affect me personally.
Nevertheless I continue to believe that those (for some) good ole days ain't never comin' back, the genie isn't gonna be put back in the bottle and the best that most people can hope for is simply for things not to get even worse.
Bummed you out yet? Probably. So here's an example of something that does work. Mark de Clive-Lowe is a guy I write about a lot. Largely, it's because this one guy - he doesn't have a huge team behind him that I'm aware of - has broken down a lot of doors simply by putting himself out there.
A mothballed production that seems unlikely to be released? Sure, he could start "MashiTunes, Inc.", drop it on Beatport and make - what, a couple hundred dollars? Instead, he pushes it out the door, lots of people play it, people like me link to it and before you know it the guy is at the center of your online universe.
Back catalog release that's out of print and doesn't seem like it's heading for re-issue anytime soon? Again, he could squeeze a couple of kopeks out of it if he really wanted to, but instead Mashi drops it on sendspace and it goes viral.
You check back because you don't know what might pop up next. It's a brilliant marketing strategy and it's worked for him, as that monster line of links above should illustrate.
Note two things about this:
One: These are quality recordings. This isn't some sort of DJ tool or edit that wasn't good enough to ship. These are things that people can and do play.
Two: He's not sending these to his DJ buddies (and he's got a lot of those) and asking them to play it. That's the old way. He puts it up where anyone - a bedroom DJ, a superstar Ibiza shlockmeister or someone who's not a DJ at all - can get it. Sometimes you might have to surrender your email address but that's a small price to pay for getting, say, an unreleased Bembe Segue track, as he did a few months ago.
How's that working out for him? I'd say that Mark de Clive-Lowe has one of the most loyal followings in the business, in genres (Nu-Soul and Deep House) that don't get a lot of pub from the mainstream.
So this is today's offering from Mashi: the Better Days/Chocolate Sundae split originally released on People Records (UK):
That these are big, meaty wav files, not low quality MP3s. Grab them here or from MdCL's facebook page or blog.
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