Igloo :: Can you give me a brief history of how the label started, its mission, goals and target audience?
Thorsten Sideb0ard :: The label was started by two of us, myself and a friend Joseph Hurt. We
were both living in San Francisco at the time and we had a weekly DJ club going, where we played a mix of electronic, shoegaze and indie-rock/pop. We had often spoke about how great it would be to start a label, and somehow we just sort of fell into it from the momentum of the club night.
The mission and goals? Well, at the time we just felt we knew a bunch of people doing great music which wasn’t getting enough exposure, and we wanted to do something about it. As for target audience, we didn’t think in terms like that, we just sort of figured well there’s us and a bunch of our friends who like good music, so there must be more and more people out there who like the same music, so really the target audience was basically for ourselves, figuring if we like something, there’s always someone else who must like similar things.
Igloo :: Tell me a little more about how you started the label, the first release (Tired of Standing Still) and organizing such a compilation.
Thorsten Sideb0ard :: It was just really organic how it came about – we had been for a bicycle
ride up Potrero Hill in San Francisco, and we were sitting enjoying some strawberries and smoking out. Joseph started talking about starting a label, and at that time we just suddenly thought, well why just talk
about it, let’s do something. We weren’t thinking ahead, we just thought about what we needed to do to release a compilation. It all seemed straight forward, we had enough friends doing music, get a track from
each of them, and then have a CD pressed up.
Word starting going round town that we were doing a compilation, and pretty soon we had friends of friends emailing and asking if they could be involved also; so pretty soon we had 27 tracks of quality indie-rock and experimental electronica. We decided to split the compilation into two discs. We had solo projects from all the members of Tarentel, a track from Wobbly, Broker/Dealer, Xiu Xiu, Boxleitner, Jim Yoshi Pileup, and a bunch of lesser known but equally amazing artists.
Igloo :: Are you and Joseph still running the label, or are you doing it solo?
Thorsten Sideb0ard :: It’s still both of us running the label. I run the day-to-day stuff myself, but Joe still has plenty of input.
Igloo :: Introducing a wide-range of music to a worldwide audience isn’t easy –distribution, production, promotion et al can be difficult to attain; how do you manage all the artists, their releases, and the day-to-day activities of Highpoint Lowlife?
Thorsten Sideb0ard :: It’s a juggling act! You work on each part of the puzzle separately
however, and you find good people to work with. Having those kind of relationships where you trust the other is really good, you don’t have to deal with the same problems over and over for each new project. For Distribution we use Cargo UK, who have been great and really supportive from the beginning, even back when we were selling tiny amounts each month. We use Shawn Hatfield/Twerk for all our mastering, and every artist has been really pleased with the results. I have a friend who handles all our UK promotion, and I tend to do all the online and foreign promotion myself.
Each of our artists on the label are hard working themselves, which is highly appreciated. None of them are waiting around for the label to do all the work, they’re always out booking shows, and doing their own
promotion in whatever way they can, and we’re always throwing ideas back and forth between us.
Igloo :: How did you come up with the name of the label?
Thorsten Sideb0ard :: That was actually quite hard! We basically sat brainstorming all day one
Saturday and went through so many different names but just couldn’t find one that seemed to fit and with which we were happy. In the end, we found inspiration in a comic book sitting on my bedroom floor -Ed Brubaker’s A Complete Lowlife. The contrast of Highpoint and Lowlife seemed to fit well. Neither me nor Joe are exactly from the classiest backgrounds, so it’s quite easy to see yourself as lowlife, but us striving to push forward with creating the label was definitely a highpoint.
Igloo :: What inspires you to keep the label running with the number of labels closing shop?
Thorsten Sideb0ard :: With a lot of other labels closing shop, it seems more important than ever to maintain an alternative platform for artists to release their work. I guess I
also like the challenge of going against the grain, putting in the hard work even though you know it’s such an uphill struggle. With the music industry in the middle of a such a massive watershed, with so many changes in distribution and consumption of music, it’s hard to see which way things are moving, but
one thing is for sure – there’s more great music out there than ever before, and more people listening and discovering new artists and sounds. It’s disheartening when you see other labels closing up, and I feel the same financial effects which have driven their decisions, but i strongly feel it’s just a case of riding out the changes and being flexible enough to move with them. That’s not as simple as it sounds though, as it does mean taking a lot of financial blows, which is hard to maintain.
Igloo :: How do you feel about the infinite amount of net-labels releasing digital/MP3 titles?
Thorsten Sideb0ard :: Net-labels have been a great addition to the world of electronic music, but
I’ve always felt that they play a different role to traditional labels, and never been direct competition. With their low cost of entry and very little overhead, it’s much easier for net-labels to take chances and release music by unknown artists, but I’ve not yet (with emphasis on yet!) seen any net-labels with income revenues that can pay artists, so for musicians it’s still not a viable alternative to physical releases. At the same time, it’s a great way to get more music out there to an audience, as traditional labels work a lot more slowly and simply can’t afford to put out as many releases as they would like
to. Net-labels and traditional ones seem to have quite a symbiotic relationship, and more often than not, a lot of traditional labels also have sub-net-labels or are at least offering a lot of free downloads also.
Igloo :: Is there much research placed in establishing the “sound” you want the label to follow or do you base the strength of the imprint on the individual genre of each artist?
Thorsten Sideb0ard :: No, there’s no research into a sound for the label – it’s literally just what sounds great to us, and what we get excited about.
Igloo :: Any closing comments, shouts, mentions or notices you’d like to give Igloomag readers and the HPLL audience?
Thorsten Sideb0ard :: Thanks to everyone who has supported us or enjoyed the music of our
artists so far, and for anyone just hearing of us and interested in checking out what
we’re doing, I’d recommend our download page over at highpointlowlife.com/downloads.php where you can download tracks from each release and also where there a whole load of exclusive free releases to
download.
For more info about Highpoint Lowlife Records, visit their website here.
