This week sees the release of WW 2.0, a follow up to 2011’s WW 1.0 compilation, an album that showcased their freshest artists and most diverse sounds.
The album has a pleasing cohesiveness even as it celebrates the diversity of WW’s output. It’s great to hear something so unfettered by genre that still feels like a tightly curated listen.
You can check out this promo from Guy Wampa on Soundcloud:
Or why not just jump right in and buy the whole damn thing?
iTunes: apple.co/1Fp16dI
Juno Download: bit.ly/1GKXiBX
Physical : bit.ly/1GKX1z1
Label heads and curators of the album Guy Wampa and Jo Wills (aka Old Man Diode – some more exciting news from him coming soon, watch this space) look some time out of a hectic week to tell me a bit more about WW Records, the album and some new artists we should get to know.
N: How and why did WW Records get started?
JW: Guy and I had been writing and playing together for years, starting off in a DnB band when we were at music college, we kept setting up and upgrading various home studios to record the music we were writing, at some point we started doing commercial writing to help pay for the studio, that eventually brought in enough money to set up the WW studio in Dalston
GW: By that point we were writing a whole heap of repertoire for other people that wasn’t necessarily going to get published and we wanted a vehicle for us to be able to publish and distribute our own work as well of some of the stuff we were involved with that wasn’t going to get put out through other outlets. We launched WW Records in 2010.
JW: Right from the beginning there was something about eclecticism, because we’ve always been involved in really diverse music making, whether its on our own projects or working as producers with loads of different people and we wanted to try have that in there from the get go. So the first two records we put out are totally different from each other, one being I guess a thrash disco record the other being a kind of moody distorted bass opera thing, and we immediately hit a stumbling block there, it was a really hard thing to sell when we were trying to get partners, distributors and press to work with and the response we get back is “whats your niche, do you do punk records or bass music? so having to define what the niche is has been quite a process for us because we refuse for that niche to be a genre.
GW: Yeah, that’s a big reason why WW Records was started – for us to curate this eclectic range of music that influences Jo and I as writers and producers and now label managers, and those first two records where kinda how we got started.
Deathray Trebuchay’s the Idiot and
Sion’s Roam – Sion was Jo and myself, that was the DnB project we ran and became a name for various writing projects we undertook as a duo within the electronic music field. Both of those records were projects we were producing, composing/co-writing for other people artists so, DRT, I played drums, we recorded the album in our studio. We didn’t have WW Records in place when we started producing that album and all through the process the intent from the artist was to release through another label. Throughout that time Jo and I were very keen to be able to represent the music that we were working on, it was becoming clear to us that the deathray record had a lot of our ethos as well as our time and energy put in to producing it. Along side that we were making the soundtrack for ROAM which was a commission for contemporary piece by the Tom Dale Company. That production was going on tour, there was a great point of sale and a great audience and the score that we’d written, along with Shackleton felt like it had a great integrity and would stand up on its own as a record so, with both those albums in the making, that gave us the platform to step up and set up WW Records, to release the projects we were working on in the studio. So it came very much from a non business point of view, it became a functional way of us looking after and retaining some control of the music we were making as producers.
N: We’ve talked a lot about the diversity of sound on the label – from last year’s piano release Sakura to dancefloor cuts from Itoa to Sam Mumford’s Wicker Man weird folkishness it seems like anything goes. How do you find artists and then go on to curate your releases?
GW: Well, finding artists, I guess that ties in with some of the earlier answers, these are things that have just happened with people we’ve been working with and who have influenced us. We’ve worked a lot as co-producers or sidemen and facilitators for other artists, along that pathway you meet a lot of people and some of those people become dear friends and artistic collaborators.
Jo and I have been working together for just over 15 years and that relationship is based on a very deep trust and musical understanding, we’ve tried to keep the WW Records ethos tied into that so, the artists are either people we’ve performed with or worked with or met over the years and they’re people that we feel have a similar approach to music making and art, probably defined by open mindedness and an eagerness for experimentation and originality.
JW: There’s something that’s come out of our shared musical experience and what we as collaborators are influenced by. We both listen to a really broad spectrum of music and both of our musical lives have involved so much diversity. Then within all these different styles/genres or whatever there are these through threads that run through it to us, or to anyone who has an open minded approach to music. It ends up all having a very strong common theme, something about experimenting and connecting sound to some sort of human experience, I think that runs through all of the records. Its not that we put out anything we’ve been involved with or anything that comes our way at all, there’s far more music that doesn’t make it onto the label, but all the music we do put out is bound by borderless threads.
There’s also a strong part of our aesthetic that is influenced but electronic music and dance culture, not that we necessarily put out dance records but there’s a shared awareness and an openess to the possibilities of sound that comes with electronic music. If you take an artist like Sam Mumford, definitely yes scatter is a weird folkish record but Sam is really heavily influenced by venetian snares, aphex twin, Drum and Bass etc. and all of that is in him when he’s writing, but also like, Dylan and Joan Armatrading and its that fusion that makes the record amazing.
GW: When we curate the records, we’ve been fairly bold by not tying are selves to anything, like not being a dance label thats tied to the singles tradition or an indie label that puts out EPs and albums or whatever. We don’t pay to much attention to those traditional industry structures, we deal with the music we have and put it out in whatever way we think is best. Its very much about how the record sounds and what the artist has coming up. Sometimes we go to artists with a specific request for a single or and ep or something in mind but most of the time we just put the call out that we’re developing a certain angle or theme for the next few releases, ask what music an artist has or is working on or “would you like to write something for this?”. Then whatever comes back through the dropbox we review it and see how we can package it together. So with WW2.0 we were trying to state our artistic intent as co-founders of the label, to put it out there that we are not a label that releases one genre of music or that is functioning within the bigger record industry, its functioning on what we believe be our artistic input to the worlds music should be, and that’s eclectic and diverse.
JW: We realised very early on that a lot of the existing structures of the music industry are really aggravating to work with if you want to be flexible and be involved with lots of different music so we’ve kind of had to forge our own way with it. At times that has felt like we’re not succeeding but actually its really liberating to know that now, when a record comes along that we like we can grab it and think “yeah great, whats the approach, whats the angle for us, what should we do around it” and that varies massively from doing a Royce Rolls record, which is more straight up dance music and so we can work through those existing channels versus something like Sakura where we’re crossing right over into the classical world and there’s another archetype labels use to promote music in that sphere that so then we’re looking at doing salon performances at Steinway hall and trying to connect that scene back to our more conventional dance music roots.
GW: Yeah, so its very intentional that we put out
Sakura, a classical piano piece out along side the reworking by Old Man Diode, putting a new spin on an existing classical format, having two different interpretations of one piece on one record, its just that one of our interpretations draws on sound system culture and the other on the Salon Piano tradition.
In terms of where WW records is going, that relationship between Llewellyn and Aisa and the embedding of classical music – which is very much part of Jo and I’s heritage – in our work, tying a composer and performer together with one of our electronic artists on a series of releases. We’re working on a new suite of Preludes which will all have electronic re-workings. Really exploring how we can fuse those two world is on the agenda for us at the moment.
JW: There’s something really exiting for us in operating on the fringes of scenes and the cross-over points between different things. Its where a lot of the most interesting art happens
GW: Thats where we become creatively involved with projects that we represent. We’re an artist led label, both Jo and Myself, Old Man Diode and Guy Wampa and also Chiel Busscher who writes under the name Mondryaan. The three of us handle all the administration and management of the label but we’re also all practicing artists so, there is that involvement. We’re putting out our own music through this imprint but Jo and I as curators, we definitely have a creative involvement in terms of how we pair up collaborators and commission new works. I work with Sam Mumford as a drummer and producer, we recorded Scatter in the WW studio, we do all the solo piano recordings ourselves etc. so there’s kind of an element of old school label production in there, but we don’t get involved with the creative composition of someone we’ve commissioned specifically, unless we’re co-writers, when a commission comes in we feel its our responsibility to give our artists the space to work.
N: As a label you concentrate mainly on digital rather than physical releases – do you think physical releases have lost their relevance in the current industry?
GW: Well, the first two releases we did where primarily vinyl as they had a sale point on gigs, so the digital side actually came second, we used to work with AWAL digitally, now we’ve got fantastic relationship with label works who handle all our online stuff, we’re in talks with people to help us get more of our catalogue out on physical formats. And thats part of our challenge as a label, there’s obviously a massive industry wide focus on the digital sector now but for us our love and passion is vinyl, we still buy and collect it and play it out as DJs and where we can we put out physical releases, financially its not always possible to do but that’s part of our plan as a label.
JW: As we’re approaching each record we have to look at weather the physical route is the right route for that particular record on a project by project basis. So for Sakura, we made a bunch of CD’s for sale in Japan as there’s a market for it there and Aisa is playing out there so there’s a clear sale point, it would probably be foolish to do do a short format vinyl release of that record in the UK but knowing there’s a niche in Japan makes it a viable option for us so, yes we’re primarily digital at the moment but if you go on the website you’ll find some bits of vinyl, some cd’s etc, it all depends on the release.
N: Is it becoming more of a struggle to make music feel important? How do you keep pushing past that increasingly common process of stream / forget?
JW: That’s a very pertinent question, I think maybe there’s even a reaction against that happening now, I don’t know…. There’s definitely a thing in our society of people getting click happy, just passing through, never listening to whole tracks, everything is a quick fix, a little bite and then its gone and I don’t think that that fits well with the music that we create and curate. Everything that we’re involved with, they’re all labours of love, they take a long time to make and a lot of care and attention goes into making them. But I feel like there’s some sort of shift happening now, maybe its just the world I live in I don’ t know but a lot of people really want to have that relationship with music, to really care, to be truly moved by something that’s very well crafted. I think it comes back to where we sit within the record label industry or whatever, we’re just not part of that scene, the quick click, pop fad, trending social media driven thing. We’re just trying to make music that we care about, that is music that we listen to. So there are definitely problems with getting noticed and getting through the noise of social media and everyone being a producer and all of that, definitely. But the way through it for us is to stick to our guns, keep making sure that we put out really well put together, interesting, innovative music that has an emotional connection to people and is inspiring. Then our job is to focus on that and find the best way to position that and make it and the artist marketable sure, but its not really viable for us to fully join the fray, we just have to work outside it.
GW: Yeah, maybe the question isn’t for us, its one we should ask the audiences, I think its a cultural obligation of the consumer market that it starts to answer that question. Whether they feel its something that’s important or weather the current situation of your music just being owed for your piece of fame can or should change. As a label we can only do as much as our audience will allow on a value level so, as Jo says, we just have to continue creating an output that is inspiring and brings people back for more. Of course, we are representative with all the online content, mixes, social media etc. and we have a responsibility to our artists to support their music in that way but its not our be all and end all. We won’t try to be a fad, that’s up to the audience.
N: What advice would you give someone looking to start their own label?
GW: Keep it small and be meaningful, be ready to be flexible.
N: What’s next for WW?
GW: Old Man Diode and Rick Holland’s Morning Gate Ft. Beth Rowley is our next release which will be WW0026, that’ll be out on April the 13th. (
NB: hold tight for more on that on the blog!) We’ve got an EP from dutch artist,
Rene Van Munster, the dub of that track is on WW2.0 and a new suite of preludes from Llewellyn and Aisa coming out in July, that’ll be along side some live performances and a whole load of other cool and exciting events.
JW: There’s more music form Sam Mumford in the pipelines and we’re looking at running a competition for composers to work with contemporary pianist Eliza McCarthy, we’ll be pairing the winners up with WW electronic artists, that’s a longer term project but we’re interested in seeing what happens when we push the boundaries of those art forms a bit, see what comes out of the mash.
N: So finally, take us through your Listen to This list
Sam Mumford
We’ve mentioned Sam a bit above, he’s a phenomenal musician. His Scatter EP is still one of my favourite things on the label.
Guy Wampa
Label boss man, has worked on so many different projects and every so often puts his own offering into the ring. This is a great collab with Stateless’s Justin Percival. Its all about the drop!
Rene van Munster
Rene has some great releases under his belt, often with a more straight up dance approach then that record we’re working with him on
Llywellyn Ap Myrddin
Llewellyn is an amazing all round musician, we’ve worked with him on a bunch of different projects, he’s written an Opera, recently wrote a sonata for youtube and was the driving force behind our first release, Deathray Trebuchay’s the Idiot
His Palm 2 project is dope as well, well worth checking out, some crazy synth rave mayhem
Mondryaan
Dutch man Chiel Busscher, he works with us managing things at WW HQ, Mondryaan is this nuts project he’s working on, working with a traditional Portuguese vocalist, Teresa Campos. He’s working on the live show for this at the moment, Bass, Viola, Kit, Ewi and voice.
Neoterika 