(07.27.08) Taylor Deupree is the founder of the 12k music label. 12k is an independent boutique label that showcases artists who specialize in experimental electronic music. To date, 12k has released over 50 CDs since the label’s inception in 1997 and 40 CDs on 12k’s sub-label, LINE. Due to the caliber of music Taylor offers 12k has become one of the most respected experimental electronic labels in the world. Each album from 12k is a special and made even more unique by Taylor’s insistence that he only releases 1000 copies of each CD.
I think that 12k puts out some of the most beautiful electronic music I’ve ever heard. Since most of the albums on 12k are quiet things I’ve come to enjoy how the sounds of the environment I’m in when I listen to 12k releases become part of the music while the music colors my perceptions of the environment I’m in. It’s a sublime experience.
Igloo :: You founded 12k in 1997 and the label focuses on experimental electronic music with such artists as Tetsu Inoue, Ghislain Poirier and Richard Chartier. You’ve been involved with the electronic music scene as early as 1993 with Prototype 909 and Human Mesh Dance. What lead to your decision to launch 12k Records?
Taylor Deupree :: It was in ’95 or ’96. I had a deal with Silent Records and they basically just never did anything. It took months and months and probably close to a year. I had a finished album and Silent just wasn’t doing anything so I said “Screw this, I’m gonna start my own label.” I didn’t really have a plan, at first. It was basically just to get this album out that I had waiting around and used my experience at working at Instinct, which I did for a number of years. Sort of learned how to run a label and how not to run a label. I had no idea what was going to happen but I’m really glad I did it because 12k has really been the center of life for just about 12 years now.
Igloo :: You brought up something very interesting about how not to run a label. Can you give us a few examples?
Taylor Deupree :: In my experience a lot of the bigger labels will cater to the least common denominator. They don’t think their audience is intelligent so they treat them that way and they market that way. That was a big thing for me, was to assume that my audience was intelligent and loved music and make the audience find the label as opposed to advertising and pummeling people with hype. I wanted to do it quietly. I wanted people that when they discovered the label I wanted them to feel they actually had discovered something special and basically treat the customers with respect. You know, assuming that they know as much or more than you do. That’s still they way I run the label and it’s really worked for everybody, for me and the listeners, I think.
Igloo :: When you started 12k you didn’t have any plans beyond releasing your own album. How did 12k metamorphosise into the label that it is now?
Taylor Deupree :: I knew I wanted a label that wasn’t just going to be a one-off kind of release so at first I was just going to concentrate on my own stuff and releases with close friends. The first few releases are me and people I worked with at Instinct like Savvas (Ysatis) or my buddy, Dietrict, who is in Prototype 909. Just stuff with friends and mine.
After a couple of releases the idea for the sound was to do something that was really hyper synthetic sounding. Not quite techno and not quite ambient music. Somewhere in between. It all came together in ’99 when I released this compilation called .aiff, which ended up being a huge turning point for the label because it really sort of brought together this sense of minimalism which I had been really interested in non-musical ways, sort of in art and architecture, and .aiff was really synthetic sounds and really minimal compositions and arrangements. It all came together then and I knew the future of the label basically from that point on. It changed a lot over the years but a lot of the core concepts are still there.
Igloo :: How would you say it’s changed over the years?
Taylor Deupree :: Well, I like to make the sound change. The sound has definitely shifted every couple of years, it kind of changes to something to new to keep it interesting for myself and the listeners. Now it’s much more organic. Not at all what I imagined what it would be 10 years ago. I never thought I’d be releasing stuff that’s made with nothing but guitars or stuff that’s got vocals and structures to it. There’s been a few key releases over the years that has really shifted the direction of the label. I’m going to keep doing that, keeping listeners on their toes, give them something new but at the same time keep it 12k. That’s sort of the challenge for me, I think.
Igloo :: 12k has released over 40 CDs since its inception. Most of the music on 12k is minimal and ambient. Most songs follow the standard verse/chorus structure and if it’s a good song you recognize it by catchy hooks and lyrics. But as I said, ambient and minimal music rarely has any of that and often is great if it has an emotional impact or has some sort of movement or idea that captures a listener’s imagination. Given the nebulous qualities of ambient and minimal music, what do you think makes for a compelling song?
Taylor Deupree :: It is really hard because there’s fine line between something that is boring and goes nowhere and something that really moves you. All I can speak for is myself, of course. When I look for music for the label it’s music that I like. I hope other people like it. Sometimes they do and sometimes they don’t. At least lately the music I’ve been releasing for me has been definitely emotional. Usually, in a quieter and calmer sense. I’m looking also for something different. I’m trying to find music that I haven’t released before yet still sounds like I could have released or something that takes the label to another direction. It’s really hard to put a finger on and a lot of it changes from day-to-day. I may listen to a demo one day and given where I’m listening to it or what kind of mood I’m in will sound completely different if I listen to it the next day. I don’t know, I think it is so nebulous, so nebulous and personal that it’s really hard to put a finger on, but there definitely has to be a sense of emotion. Not just cold, meaningless electronics. There’s got to be a sense of production value and skill when it comes to sound design. It’s so easy these days to make computer music and it’s getting harder and harder to make it well and you can really tell when people do it well and when people don’t know what they’re doing. It’s really a matter of finding the people who are passionate about it and really know what they are doing, I think.
Igloo :: I read an interview with you that you only release 500 CDs released on 12k and once they’re gone you don’t do re-issues of those CDs. Has that changed since that interview due to the rise of popularity of MP3s?
Taylor Deupree :: Yeah, that’s definitely changed. Now I typically start with a thousand and nothing is strictly limited any more. I put a rule on myself that the first 10 CDs will be re-issued. You can get them as MP3s but the CDs will not be re-issued. But after that I will re-issue if I really need to and I just recently re-issued the twelfth 12k CD, which was Shuttle358‘s Frame, which came almost nine years ago, just due to the popularity of that release. Nothing is strictly limited although I do have a limited series that I’ve done eight releases on, and that’s sort of like a side series and those are indeed limited but the main 12k CDs aren’t strictly limited anymore. That may start to change because MP3 are finally to effecting the sales of this more niche market of music. Two years ago, when MP3s were first rising in popularity I don’t think they effect it at all, I think they were more effecting the pop markets of music. But now I think you do see and I can see 12k for the time being going into more specialized releases: specialized releases, special packages, limited numbers for the people who really care about the sound quality and the packaging and leave the digital download to the people who just want to hear the music on their iPod. I think that may end up being the result of this, at least for the time being.
Igloo :: How do you feel about the fact that with an MP3 you can have an infinite amount of copies whereas with CDs it’s something finite.
Taylor Deupree :: The 500 CDs was initially because my apartment simply wasn’t big enough to hold much more than that and it was also to create something that was a little more special and a little sought after to create a little bit of buzz around the label and just to try create a sense that once people discovered it that they were getting something unique. And they are because a lot of those earlier CDs are very much sought after and I get a lot of requests to re-issue them but I won’t do it and I get email from people who are very proud to own the first few 12k CDs. That’s the nice thing about doing limited runs. As far as MP3s go, I love MP3s myself. Listen to MP3s all the time. I rarely leave the house without my iPod. I think the convenience of having my entire library in my pocket is amazing. No doubt about it. I listen to more music now then I ever have but I miss the packaging, I miss the sound quality. The sound quality can be overcome because it’s purely a matter of bandwidth. When people are willing to download high-res files and store them on their hard drives we can have the sound quality again but the packaging is something that will be lost if we don’t keep it up and try and push the packaging into more special types of editions.
Igloo :: Did you do anything special to celebrate 12k’s 10 year anniversary?
Taylor Deupree :: I wanted to and never did. Mainly I’m waiting on the 12 year anniversary, which is next year. You have 12 years of 12k. It’s maybe a bit more interesting than 10 years. I’ve got a few things planned for next years and I hope they pan out. The only thing I did for the 10 year anniversary which never went on record but the release a girl named from Moskitoo, which was early in the year last year, was very much a poppy kind of release that sounded like it should been on the Happy label. And that was a very big question for me was which label I was going to release it on. As part of 12k’s 10 year anniversary made the decision to stop the Happy label and simply release whatever I want on 12k. Sort of to expand to other territories without having to rely on a second label. I want 12k to be whatever I want release, whether it’s something that sounds more poppy or is made of different kinds instruments or not. I want to have less rules on myself. Soon we’ll see the official end of Happy and see it folded within into 12k’s sound.
Igloo :: Give us a little bit of background on the Happy sub-label.
Taylor Deupree :: In my frequent trips to Japan I discovered all this great music that was over there that you just couldn’t get anywhere in America. The idea was to start a label to promote that stuff outside of Japan. Because I already had 12k I wanted Happy to be different. I mean besides being Japanese and being a little more poppy, I wanted it to be lot less electronic. Indy rock kind of stuff. But it just didn’t work out. The demos I was getting, the releases I was doing were very much electronic. After a couple of years I asked myself “Why can’t this be 12k?” I also saw that my original idea just didn’t work out. That’s why I decided to stop it and I have no problem releasing it on 12k. I don’t need another label to do that and I certainly don’t need another label that sounds like 12k because there’s already two. To be able to streamline and cut down on my workload is an idea that didn’t quite pan out they way I intended it to but will stay alive in a sort of a different form.
Igloo :: The other sub-label on 12k is LINE. Is that something you’re also planning to fold into 12k. If not, what makes LINE distinct from 12k because I can’t tell the difference between the two?
Taylor Deupree :: Yeah, there isn’t much sonic difference. The main difference is that LINE is Richard Chartier’s label. He does all the A&R, he comes up with the releases, comes up with the concepts, does the design and I pay for it and distribute it and market it. Of course I have some say and we talk about stuff and talk about releases but it’s really his label. In the past we’ve tried to set distinctions. We’ve tried to make LINE this and 12k this. You can try do for that for a little bit but after a while it just starts to breaks apart and then you have to come up with some new reasons to have the labels to be different and finally I think we just gave up. It’s simply his label and my label so they can really be whatever we want them to be without having to worry about the other is, that’s the distinction at this point. The label’s not going to be folded into 12k. It’s his label. It’s a separate entity.
Igloo :: You also collaborated with Iara Lee‘s Synthetic Pleasures project. How did that project come about and how did you contribute to Synthetic Pleasures?
Taylor Deupree :: Iara found me as a freelance graphic designer in New York and that’s how we met. She was looking for a designer for her film and it looked interesting to me so I accepted the job. We became great friends. When i first met her she was working on the film so I can’t say exactly how the film came out. I was basically hired after most of the production was done to do design for the CD covers and the marketing and the ads the and posters and stuff like that. That’s how the relationship formed. I ended up working for her for a number of years, helping her form her label (Caipirinha Productions) and her other films and stuff like that. It was very cool, a very cool time.
Igloo :: You have a son who I believe is either five, maybe six years old. My dad exposed me to a lot of fantastic music when I was growing up. What does your son think of the music that he hears on 12k?
Taylor Deupree :: He’s five. Unfortunately right now he’s not terribly interested in music at all. He just wants to play with cars. I try to bring him down in the studio and he’s heard me working on music. When he’s in the studio he’s more interested in the blinking lights, watching VU meters move and stuff like that and he’s not terribly interested in sound yet but I very much hope that will change as he gets older. I’m not trying to push anything on him at this point. The idea for me is just to sort of raise him to be aware of noise and be aware of sounds around him, whether their outside or music. I try and play music as much as possible around house and maybe like you to be raised in a musical environment and hope that one day it will effect him, as opposed to sitting him down and making him listen to something. Just more being aware of sounds is more of what I’m trying to do.
Igloo :: Recently I’ve begun asking artists who create soundscapes what some of their favorite sounds. Jack Dangers, for example, said he loves the sound of walking through snow or the sound of cotton and wool rubbing together. Do you have a favorite sound?
Taylor Deupree :: Yeah, I do, I think. I have a couple of favorite sounds. One is the sound of cicadas in the summer. That sort of incredibly dense swelling sound of the cicadas in the trees. That to me is probably one of my favorite sound. Another one is the sound of tree frogs. I don’t know if you’re familiar with. Again, kind of a dense wall of chirping that we get here in the Northeast right in the beginning of spring and throughout the summer. Those are probably tow of my favorite sounds. Very natural sounds but really make me pretty happy every time I hear them and I never get sick of them.
For more information about 12k, visit their website at www.12k.com.
