I recently spoke with Keith Latinen, co-owner of the extremely awesome label, Count Your Lucky Stars. The Alternative Tone loves Count Your Lucky Stars Records. So should you.
For the record, who
are the people behind Count Your Lucky Stars Records? And what are their roles?
My name is Keith, and I run the record label with my wife,
Cathy. I run most of the day to day
activities, from packing orders to making sure everything is getting where it
needs to be going to calling/e-mailing bands and companies, etc. Cathy also packs a million orders every week,
and when I’m gone on tour and she can’t go, she has to run the whole show. We both wear many hats, we both do a little
of everything.
What's the history
behind CYLS?
We started it as a vehicle to put out records for our band,
Empire! Empire! (I Was a Lonely Estate) and decided that we had too many
talented friends not to help out. The
whole thing grew every organically. I
never expected it to get as big as it has, and if you had told me I would be
doing it 6 years later, I don’t think I would have believed it. The bands we signed in the beginning were the
bands we were meeting on tour and in the trenches with, so to speak. We all began to play more shows and tour
together and it just started to take off.
Who's on the current
CYLS roster?
We just put an updated list of the active bands on our
website. Some are still with us, some
are not. It’s a rather large list, but
here is essentially the list of those actively on our label: Annabel,
Ape Up!, Brave Bird, Certain People I Know, Dowsing, Driving On City Sidewalks,
Empire! Empire! (I Was a Lonely Estate), Football, etc., Hightide Hotel, Innards,
Joie De Vivre, Lindsay Minton, Mountains for Clouds, Parker, Perfect Future, The
Reptilian, Two Knights, and Youth Pictures of Florence Henderson.
How's 2012 been for you guys?
2012 has been our busiest year, by far. We have not had a moment of downtime; every
month has had at least one release. It’s
been a bit stressful and it’s been a lot of work, but it has all been worth
it. We’ve been through a lot of changes;
we had to hire a PR company because we didn’t have the time to handle press on
our own anymore, we started doing college radio campaigns, and we’ve just been
pushing it as hard as we can.
The Alternative Tone
covers the most of the CYLS' bands, it only takes a quick glance at one your
samplers to see how many fantastic young bands you're working with. What's it
like working with many of the bands responsible for the current emo
resurrection?
It feels really good! We
are extremely proud parents, if you will.
It’s hard to believe that so much has changed since we started the label
and started playing out as a band. I
remember always being the oddball band that never fit in on bills, and now we
are part of an entire community that has so many members and has so much
support. It’s unreal, and we are very
grateful for it.
How do you decide what
bands to sign? Do they have to have a certain sound? Or is there other deciding
factors?
I think it’s a very natural thing for people to want to
pigeonhole certain bands to certain labels, but we have a diverse roster and we
are proud of it. They don’t have to have
any certain sound- we don’t ever pass on a band because we are afraid they
won’t fit in with our current roster. We
just have to love them. It certainly
helps if they tour a lot and if they are good people, but in the end the reason
I sign a band is always because I can’t imagine not signing them.
What records would you
consider as essential CYLS releases?
This question always feels like asking a parent to choose a
favorite kid, there is no record I could not answer this with. Nevertheless, I’ll give it a go:
CYLS 012- Empire! Empire!
(I Was a Lonely Estate) What It Takes
to Move Forward. I feel guilty
choosing this one, being that it is my band and all, but this album really
helped launch Count Your Lucky Stars into a new level. It was our first vinyl full length (2xLP,
even), made a lot of year-end lists/got some nice reviews, sold well, and
overall just boosted our profile. Out of
all of our out of print records, this one gets the most requests to be
repressed.
CYLS 030- Annabel,
Empire! Empire!, Joie De Vivre, and the Reptilian 4-way split. These are the
four bands I consider the core group of bands that we built our label on. They were the ones that took the chance on us
and I love all these guys to death.
Every band is still active and still making waves.
CYLS 037– Certain People
I Know Certain People I Know- Any
project fronted by Bob Nanna and containing members of Braid and Hey Mercedes
is something I know that I will instantly love.
Working with CPIK on this album was such a privilege, and the album
itself is stellar. Fingers crossed there
is more where this came from.
What has been your
proudest moment as a record label?
I’m not sure we have just one.
I think getting to 50 releases is going to be one of them, something which
we will accomplish later this year. Besides
that, I think it has to be seeing our bands gain momentum and acclaim and seeing
our releases being shipped and talked about literally all over the world. Or when people tell us we are their favorite
label and that anytime we put out a new release, they immediately embrace
it. One of our fans even got the Count
Your Lucky Stars stars logo tattooed on his arm, how crazy is that?! We sent him a fat ol’ care package once we
found out about it.
How do you guys keep
up with modern technology? It's a common thought that it's more difficult for a
record label in the Internet age, what with illegal downloading and
whatnot, how do you guys use it to your advantage?
I think if you don’t keep up, you lose out on so many ways to
promote yourself and your bands. Out of
necessity, then? As far as the whole
illegal downloading issue goes, there was a period where bands and/or labels
tried to fight it, but it was just too big to overcome and it wasn’t going
away. It didn’t work, and it wasn’t
really the appropriate response. We
always make sure we have a product we can get to the consumer as soon as they
hear the music. You can stream/purchase
almost every release we have ever put at our bandcamp at http://countyourluckystars.bandcamp.com,
or iTunes, Amazon, Spotify, etc. We also
set up streams to launch an album at the same time as our pre-orders so people
can hear what they are buying and act on it when they hear it.
As far as the taking advantage of illegal side of downloading,
we know it has helped get us new fans, and it’s a major bonus when those fans
come out to shows of our bands or buy their albums from us after downloading it. Word of mouth is gold in the music business,
so even if someone doesn’t buy it but tells their friends about it, it
helps. Every bit helps. But rest assured, if there weren’t people who
actually bought the music, we couldn’t keep doing this. So those people who actually buy it help us
much more. Thank you especially to those
people!
What advice would you
have for anyone starting out with a record label today?
Start small, do it out of love.
Start with one band you believe in, and let it grow naturally. Don’t expect to quit your day job. Expect to lose money. Realize some bands you work with will leave
you for greener pastures, or that there are some bands you won’t want to work again,
regardless of how good they are- don’t lose sleep over it. Be good to your bands, treat them like
family. Be prompt and honest with your
customers. Send out packages in a timely
manner. Don’t take pre-orders too early.
Don’t view other labels as competition, work with them. Have fun!
If CYLS was a soft
drink, which soft drink would it be?
What kind of pop would we be?
Salty tears in a can? Haha, no-
maybe a draft root beer. Why? Because we love root beer, duh!
Thanks very much for
doing this interview! Any final
words?
Thanks
so much for asking us to do this and all of your support!
Comments
Post a Comment