Mike McCready's Music For Film. Vinyl Films Records 10" Clear Box Set.

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Vinyl Films Records

To all, regarding the Vinyl Films 10” box:

Back in 2003 we started a tiny vinyl-only record label called Vinyl Films Records. Out debut release was a 10” from Mark Kozelek, he of Red House Painters and soon-to-be Sun Kil Moon fame. He had recorded a song called “Duk Koo Kim” that blew our minds and we wanted to be the ones to birth it into the world, so the 10” series (and the label) was born.

As we emailed to prospective artists back in 2003:

"The idea behind the series is to create a limited edition release on vinyl. In this day and age of digital madness and file-swapping and mp3 downloads, we love the idea of creating a truly analog experience for the diehard fan. Each EP has about 8-10 minutes per side, and has material exclusive to the series. We want to create something that is available only as a limited edition piece of vinyl. With each release, we will press:

• 1000 copies on numbered, black vinyl for distribution in the U.S.
• 1000 copies on colored vinyl for distribution in Europe
• 500 copies on clear vinyl that will be held back for inclusion in a boxed set at the end of the run of the 10” series"

At the time vinyl wasn’t quite as popular as it is now — we were actually nervous about pressing up 2500 copies of a 10”. Luckily the artists we chose to work with had fan bases that loved vinyl like us, and we sold out of each release as they came out — not right away, but eventually. We felt a little more comfortable that we wouldn’t lose our shirts on the series, and the future box. We were more than a little nervous about selling the same record with a different color to the same fan base, not being sure that there were enough vinyl freaks like us out there who love collectible stuff.

After the Kozelek 10” we released Low’s Murderer, their first recording as a two-piece (Alan and Mimi), and the label and the box was off and running. Three years later came Mono’s Memorie dal Futuro (we were busy making Elizabethtown between the two releases), and then… nothing. We released a semi-steady stream of records that we were and are very proud of, including the first official release of the 'Harold and Maude' soundtrack, Eddie Vedder’s brilliant soundtrack to the Sean Penn film 'Into the Wild,' and a slew of Mark Kozelek-related albums, among others. The 10” series had stalled, simply because we had other priorities at the time.

In 2012 we began work on jump-starting the 10” series again, with music from the great Matthew Cooper (as eluvium), another Kozelek 10" (this time under the guise of Sun Kil Moon for Third and Seneca), and then Mike McCready was kind enough to allow us to collect his score work from 'Pearl Jam Twenty' and 'We Bought A Zoo' for the Music for Film EP. Each was released with a colored vinyl version, a black vinyl version, and the obligatory 500 copies on clear vinyl for the future boxed set. And finally, the future was now. We felt we had enough releases in the series to warrant the box.

A slipcase was designed and manufactured, a poster was printed for inclusion in the box, and we hand-numbered and assembled 492 boxes. Why only 492? Sadly we lost a box of the Mike McCready clear vinyl on its way from our pressing plant, a box that somehow mysteriously found its way to eBay from a reseller (some of you may be familiar with that eBay posting — heck, some of you may have purchased one from them). And then, as we were un-shrink-wrapping the 10”s to put the in the slipcases, we discovered that a box of Mark Kozelek’s Duk Koo Kim that was supposed to have 55 clear vinyl records actually had 7 clear and 48 blue vinyl. Ugh. 492 becomes 444.

With all of our releases, we keep a small stack for our archive, and a bigger stack to give to friends, family, people who worked on releases, etc… We usually have 300 of each record for this purpose (what can I say, we’re blessed to have lots of friends). Obviously we couldn’t do this with the box, so we made the decision to release 350 boxes to independent retail stores only. The remaining 94 went to the bands, our archive and to friends and family.

The plan was to release the box a week before Record Store Day, to avoid getting lost in the shuffle, and as a small act of defiance against what RSD has become. We weren’t wild about the idea of the box being one of over 500 releases on one day. Craziness. And then the inevitable happened, as it does with just about every vinyl project — we hit a snag. Actually on the box we had quite a few, but this one was so close to delivery. This one was in the form of misplaced stickers (don’t ask). So our week-before-RSD release became early May. Which caused tons of confusion and some anger as well with record stores and fans alike. And for that I am truly sorry.

From our humble beginnings in 2003 to now, vinyl has had quite the resurgence, as you are well aware. And the 350 copies we had of that pie-in-the-sky boxed set we began working on all those years ago were nowhere near enough to satisfy the demand. And for that I will not apologize. When we started the series there was no telling what artists were to be a part of it, much less how popular they would be (or become) with vinyl fans. When we started the series we were nervous about the number we chose to press, hoping we wouldn’t be sitting on hundreds of unsold records. We were lucky that was never the case, but in 2003 there was no way to tell.

But now the argument becomes: why don’t you press more? Do a second pressing of 3000/4000/5000 copies to help satisfy the demand! Which we could do. But for now (and probably forever) we won’t. For a few reasons. One is we have too much great stuff on our current and future plate that we’re thrilled to birth and we wouldn’t want to push anything back for the sake of a repress. And two (and for us, most important), we go back to the first line in that email to artists back in 2003: "The idea behind the series is to create a limited edition release on vinyl. In this day and age of digital madness and file-swapping and mp3 downloads, we love the idea of creating a truly analog experience for the diehard fan.”

Simple as that. We have to honor the label we were back in 2003. We don’t release a lot of records. And we don’t do huge pressings either. We aren’t like most labels. Many would call us a “vanity” label, and it’s hard to argue with that. But we’ve spent twelve glorious years putting out records we are very proud of — quality music, quality vinyl, quality packaging. It’s important to us. Call us crazy, but the last thing we would call that is vain.

We understand and empathize with those frustrated fans who can’t get their hands on a particular release. We get it — at the core we are fans too. That’s why we do this. We put out records we want to see out there in the world. The one thing we’ll probably never truly have a handle on is how to accurately predict the demand for a record. Lately we have begun upping our pressing size to more accurately meet the interest of fans. But it’s still an imperfect science at best. And at our core, we like releasing quality, limited edition records for the die hard vinyl fan.