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Moshe · 02.22.2007, 07:53 AM

http://www.austinsound.net/?q=MooreInt2-7-07

Interview: Thurston Moore

Features
Contributed by Austin in Austin
Thurston Moore is one of the most influential musical figures of our time and really needs no introduction. With Sonic Youth, his solo work and his constant search and support of new artists through his Ecstatic Peace label, Moore continues to explore and challenge the boundaries of music on any number of levels. Moore will be playing South by Southwest for an Ecstatic Peace showcase, and although the lineup hasn't officially been announced, Ecstatic Peace artists that should be in town include MV + EE, Tall Firs, Black Helicopters and Sunburned. Austin in Austin recently spoke to Moore about Ecstatic Peace and his attempts to "explode the whole notion of what a record label is."

Austin in Austin: As detailed in the book Our Band Could Be Your Life, Sonic Youth and yourself in particular, were so instrumental in bringing attention to these young indie rock bands and essentially creating the Seattle boom. How would you relate what you did during that time with what you’re doing now through Ecstatic Peace!?
Thurston Moore: I’ve had Ecstatic Peace since 1982 or something. For me, it was never a label where I was trying to support or generate any kind of scene. It was basically just my desire to document music that I thought was interesting that wasn’t getting documented. Usually when I do a record by a band, I hardly ever do a follow-up record with the band because they usually get picked up by other labels. For me, that’s the success of it anyways – creating some sort of profile for a band that gets other people interested. It doesn’t happen all of the time, but generally I like to kind of move on to something else. Right now we’ve become more professional now that we’re going through Universal. I have to have contracts with bands, giving me the option of having 2-3 record deals for these bands which is kind of weird. I think the band looks at that and is like ‘great, we’re going to do two or three records.’ Well, not necessarily, you never know. This is all kind of new for us to do it in this fashion.
AIA: Ecstatic Peace seems to take on so many projects, especially in the last year that it’s difficult to even keep up with how much it’s done.
TM: Well, yeah. The commitment to different records takes place on different levels. For some records, I’ve had the master tapes for the last five or six years, that sort of thing. The record label to me was something that I did as a vanity label.
AIA: Even so, if you’ve been running Ecstatic Peace since 1982, why is just now beginning to make a name for itself in terms of national noteriety?
TM: Because I did a deal with a major label to utilize their distribution as an independent. I was getting a lot of music sent to me that really warrented some kind of place in the sort of retail scene of independent rock. Stuff that’s not so challenging as most of the stuff I like to normally deal with, just great rock ‘n’ roll records like Black Helicopter’s new record, Awesome Color’s record, those records I thought could really work in that sort of situation. I wanted to sort of start building some capitol to start investing and promoting these bands a bit further instead of me just handing it out to whoever. I’ve never really done much press beside putting a little ad in the back of Wire Magazine or something like that. It’s a fine line. I want the label to be a successful forum for bands like that, and hopefully it can be something that leads the label into other ventures.
I’m into exploding the whole notion of what a record label is. Especially now, today with digital media and ability to do things on the internet with visual media. I’m really interested in pursuing more of that and doing some more book publishing. I want to get more of a literary leg up, so to speak. But it’s all in due time. I’ve always taken baby steps in my approach to the label and now, after meeting with all of these corporations and people in the record industry to see if anyone would want to invest in Ecstatic Peace- basically investing in me ‘cause they know me from Sonic Youth which has enough of a profile for them to warrant getting involved- that was kind of a big deal.
AIA: How does that deal work? Do you have to reach an agreement as to which bands are going to be released on or through Universal?
TM: Basically there’s three levels. With Be Your Own Pet it was essentially a joint venture with Universal, where the record goes through the Universal distribution system. Bands like Awesome Color and Black Helicopter, we sort of signed them to a pretty modest deal. We put their records exclusively through Fontana Distribution which is a distribution outfit spearheaded by Universal that’s a concentration of independent labels distributed through them. It’s a pretty active distribution network. And then for a lot of the records that we do, that we’ve done, which is music that really doesn’t stand a chance of selling more than a couple of thousand copies at the most, some of the more experimental stuff, the more noisy stuff. Anything that we do under 1,500 copies we either sell ourselves or sell to smaller distributors.
I’m able to release records on any level and that’s really exciting for me. I’ve always tried to put out records that were contemporary in the sense that, in my opinion, they were what was interesting happening primarily in the underground. Even Be Your Own Pet, with all of the hype and buzz they got in the press, I still sort of saw them as this band that was just bustling around in the Nashville underground. They were playing a decidedly more challenging faction of garage rock where they were being informed by things that were outside the steer of the typical garage rock genre. Things that were much more avant-garde. But I never really thought about them as some big time band that I should try and put out on Ecstatic Peace. I thought that it would be a great thing to be a part of now that I had this new relationship with Universal. It really made sense to me - plus I really liked them. I couldn’t have put their record out any other way because they kind of demanded and commanded more attention that I was able to offer.
What I’m trying to do with Ecstatic Peace is blur the distinction between a band like Be Your Own Pet and more experimental music like Dead Machines, Wolf Eyes, or Hair Police. These bands that are sort of more radical, underground experimental noise bands and stuff like that or even quieter, somber music. We’re putting out a record by Matt Valentine and Erika Elder, MV + EE with the Bummer Road, which is a really amazing record when it comes out because for me it’s the most significant release in terms of what people are looking at as this new freak-folk genre or whatever. Matt Valentine is kind of a flashpoint for that scene and in a way that’s not really known that much in the media. It seems like the media has really latched on to the most identifiable proponents of it. So I’m really excited to put this record out.

02.22.2007, 07:53 AM	#1
Moshe Super Moderator Join Date: Mar 2006 Posts: 5,934	http://www.austinsound.net/?q=MooreInt2-7-07 Interview: Thurston Moore Features Contributed by Austin in Austin Thurston Moore is one of the most influential musical figures of our time and really needs no introduction. With Sonic Youth, his solo work and his constant search and support of new artists through his Ecstatic Peace label, Moore continues to explore and challenge the boundaries of music on any number of levels. Moore will be playing South by Southwest for an Ecstatic Peace showcase, and although the lineup hasn't officially been announced, Ecstatic Peace artists that should be in town include MV + EE, Tall Firs, Black Helicopters and Sunburned. Austin in Austin recently spoke to Moore about Ecstatic Peace and his attempts to "explode the whole notion of what a record label is." Austin in Austin: As detailed in the book Our Band Could Be Your Life, Sonic Youth and yourself in particular, were so instrumental in bringing attention to these young indie rock bands and essentially creating the Seattle boom. How would you relate what you did during that time with what you’re doing now through Ecstatic Peace!? Thurston Moore: I’ve had Ecstatic Peace since 1982 or something. For me, it was never a label where I was trying to support or generate any kind of scene. It was basically just my desire to document music that I thought was interesting that wasn’t getting documented. Usually when I do a record by a band, I hardly ever do a follow-up record with the band because they usually get picked up by other labels. For me, that’s the success of it anyways – creating some sort of profile for a band that gets other people interested. It doesn’t happen all of the time, but generally I like to kind of move on to something else. Right now we’ve become more professional now that we’re going through Universal. I have to have contracts with bands, giving me the option of having 2-3 record deals for these bands which is kind of weird. I think the band looks at that and is like ‘great, we’re going to do two or three records.’ Well, not necessarily, you never know. This is all kind of new for us to do it in this fashion. AIA: Ecstatic Peace seems to take on so many projects, especially in the last year that it’s difficult to even keep up with how much it’s done. TM: Well, yeah. The commitment to different records takes place on different levels. For some records, I’ve had the master tapes for the last five or six years, that sort of thing. The record label to me was something that I did as a vanity label. AIA: Even so, if you’ve been running Ecstatic Peace since 1982, why is just now beginning to make a name for itself in terms of national noteriety? TM: Because I did a deal with a major label to utilize their distribution as an independent. I was getting a lot of music sent to me that really warrented some kind of place in the sort of retail scene of independent rock. Stuff that’s not so challenging as most of the stuff I like to normally deal with, just great rock ‘n’ roll records like Black Helicopter’s new record, Awesome Color’s record, those records I thought could really work in that sort of situation. I wanted to sort of start building some capitol to start investing and promoting these bands a bit further instead of me just handing it out to whoever. I’ve never really done much press beside putting a little ad in the back of Wire Magazine or something like that. It’s a fine line. I want the label to be a successful forum for bands like that, and hopefully it can be something that leads the label into other ventures. I’m into exploding the whole notion of what a record label is. Especially now, today with digital media and ability to do things on the internet with visual media. I’m really interested in pursuing more of that and doing some more book publishing. I want to get more of a literary leg up, so to speak. But it’s all in due time. I’ve always taken baby steps in my approach to the label and now, after meeting with all of these corporations and people in the record industry to see if anyone would want to invest in Ecstatic Peace- basically investing in me ‘cause they know me from Sonic Youth which has enough of a profile for them to warrant getting involved- that was kind of a big deal. AIA: How does that deal work? Do you have to reach an agreement as to which bands are going to be released on or through Universal? TM: Basically there’s three levels. With Be Your Own Pet it was essentially a joint venture with Universal, where the record goes through the Universal distribution system. Bands like Awesome Color and Black Helicopter, we sort of signed them to a pretty modest deal. We put their records exclusively through Fontana Distribution which is a distribution outfit spearheaded by Universal that’s a concentration of independent labels distributed through them. It’s a pretty active distribution network. And then for a lot of the records that we do, that we’ve done, which is music that really doesn’t stand a chance of selling more than a couple of thousand copies at the most, some of the more experimental stuff, the more noisy stuff. Anything that we do under 1,500 copies we either sell ourselves or sell to smaller distributors. I’m able to release records on any level and that’s really exciting for me. I’ve always tried to put out records that were contemporary in the sense that, in my opinion, they were what was interesting happening primarily in the underground. Even Be Your Own Pet, with all of the hype and buzz they got in the press, I still sort of saw them as this band that was just bustling around in the Nashville underground. They were playing a decidedly more challenging faction of garage rock where they were being informed by things that were outside the steer of the typical garage rock genre. Things that were much more avant-garde. But I never really thought about them as some big time band that I should try and put out on Ecstatic Peace. I thought that it would be a great thing to be a part of now that I had this new relationship with Universal. It really made sense to me - plus I really liked them. I couldn’t have put their record out any other way because they kind of demanded and commanded more attention that I was able to offer. What I’m trying to do with Ecstatic Peace is blur the distinction between a band like Be Your Own Pet and more experimental music like Dead Machines, Wolf Eyes, or Hair Police. These bands that are sort of more radical, underground experimental noise bands and stuff like that or even quieter, somber music. We’re putting out a record by Matt Valentine and Erika Elder, MV + EE with the Bummer Road, which is a really amazing record when it comes out because for me it’s the most significant release in terms of what people are looking at as this new freak-folk genre or whatever. Matt Valentine is kind of a flashpoint for that scene and in a way that’s not really known that much in the media. It seems like the media has really latched on to the most identifiable proponents of it. So I’m really excited to put this record out.
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