Key Production: CD, DVD, Vinyl manufacture and packaging.

After a blissful weekend of listening to live music by the sea, it’s back to business as usual for Key. But before we start tackling the work that’s piled up in our absence, we thought we’d quickly share a few things we learned over the weekend. So, in no particular order, here we go:

1. Brighton is the ideal setting for a festival.
Sun, sea, fish & chips, small enough to walk from one side of the centre to the other in ten minutes, cool shops, loads of venues, no toilet queues, close to London… the list goes on!

2. People love Brighton rock.
We took some sticks of rock to the festival and they vanished within a matter of hours!

3. If you’re going the DIY route, you should definitely use Key Production to manufacture your releases.
As recommended by Republic Of Music owner Mark McQuillan during the ‘DIY Artists – Getting Started’ panel. You heard him!

4. All music festivals should have conventions.
Providing relief for ringing ears, and offering valuable insights into the industry, the convention panels were a huge draw and success. Our favourites were ‘Running A Label’, ‘What Would You Do With… Radio 1?’ and ‘Record Of The Day present Track To The Future’.

5. Watching NZCA/Lines play a show in a dark basement is more fun than sunbathing on the beach.
We managed to catch the guys’ set at The Queens Hotel during the first spot of perfect weather. Initially gloomy about missing the sunshine, we soon forgot the sun even existed as we were transported to a futuristic world.

6. Ben Kweller is still writing superb rock & roll songs.
Playing some brilliantly rocky, catchy songs from his new album ‘Go Fly A Kite’, Ben was one of our highlights of the festival.

7. HAIM is our new favourite band.
They rocked.

And there you have it, folks: a truly epic festival reduced to seven bullet points for your reading pleasure. Our other highlights included Grimes, Mystery Jets, Bwani Junction, Seward and Half Moon Run. We heartily recommend you attend next year’s festival, it’s pretty darn special.

Have you listened to our Great Escape playlist yet? It has a load of bands we’ve worked with: Key Production Presents: The Great Escape 2012

We are now, incredibly, one third of the way to Christmas, and you’re probably all in desperate need of an escape (sorry, I couldn’t help it). Well, you’re in luck – it will soon be time for The Great Escape festival, which of course means: the seaside, ice cream, sticks of Brighton rock, possibly a spot of sunbathing (but probably not) and a whole bunch of awkward mingling with industry types while watching loads of sensational new bands. If for some outrageous reason you’ve never heard of The Great Escape, listen up:

The Great Escape takes place in Brighton, runs from the 10^th ‘til the 12^th of May, and is now in its 7^th year. It’s internationally regarded as the leading event for showcasing new music, with over 300 bands playing in 30 venues over 3 days. Add to that mix some impromptu street gigs, countless club nights, label parties and industry showcases, and you’ve got yourself one unmissable festival!

To get you in the mood for this wondrous event, we have made a playlist featuring all the bands we’ve worked with that’ll be playing this year, including Alabama Shakes, Mystery Jets, Willis Earl Beal, Alt-J, Howler and more. Listen to it here!

If you enjoy it and find yourself hungering for more, check out our previous playlists:
Key Production presents: Happy Birthday BBC 6 Music!
Key Production presents: Record Store Day 2012

If you’re reading all of this with tears streaming down your face because you’re unable to attend this year’s Great Escape, don’t worry – Key Production will be running around Brighton for you! All you have to do is follow @keyproduction for up-to-the-minute breaking news, and watch this space for a more detailed review in the bleary-eyed days following the festival weekend.

It’s all over. Record Store Day has come and gone. You spent the weekend hedonistically gorging yourself on limited edition vinyl, and the guilt is beginning to set in. You’re probably reading this sprawled out on a pile of empty record sleeves, depressing bank statements and Record Store Day beer bottles.

The good news is that somewhere buried in that pile should be a matching 7” single and CD: Reptar’s brilliant Oblange Fizz, Y’all EP and the catchy Stuck In My Id – both proudly manufactured by Key Production.

This punky synth-pop band from Athens, Georgia are currently making pretty huge waves, and for good reason; the band’s reputation for riotous, must-see live shows led to Reptar becoming the most talked about band of 2011’s South By Southwest (SXSW).

Released by Lucky Number and limited to just 300 copies worldwide, this special vinyl/CD package was only available to buy in-store on April 21^st. However, if you missed Record Store Day, fear not – the last few copies are available to buy here. Be warned, at the time of writing, there were only 21 copies remaining. Snap one up before it’s too late!

As if all of this wasn’t enough, on May 1^st the band will release its debut full-length, 12-track album entitled Body Faucet, also manufactured by us. Follow @keyproduction for all the latest news.

You should also check out these links:
Reptar’s website
Reptar on Facebook
Reptar on Twitter
The mighty Lucky Number

By now, you must have heard the joyous news that the 5^th annual Record Store Day is arriving this Saturday (21^st April)!

For those who haven’t heard of Record Store Day before, its official website will be able to elaborate: “Record Store Day came into being in 2007 when over 700 independent stores in the USA came together to celebrate their unique culture. The UK followed suit and 2012 will see the fourth celebration of the UK’s unique independent sector. This is the one day that all of the independently owned record stores come together with artists to celebrate the art of music.”

“Special vinyl and CD releases and various promotional products are made exclusively for the day and hundreds of artists across the globe make special appearances and performances. Festivities include performances, meet & greets with artists, DJ’s, in store quizzes and many other events.”

In honour of this rather special occasion, we made a special playlist for you, which features some of the artists we’ve been manufacturing CDs, vinyl and awesome packaging for over the last 12 months.

So just click here, and start getting excited for all the treats coming soon to a record store near you. We hope you enjoy it!

For more info on RSD 2012, visit the official UK website.

For those unaware, Invada Records is a rather ace independent label (co-founded by Portishead member Geoff Barrow) that has steadily built itself a reputation for showcasing the finest in non genre-specific experimental music. Invada have two stunning forthcoming releases, and we’re proud to say we manufactured both!

Drive:

The internet is buzzing with excitement at the news that the original soundtrack to Drive will be released May 21st on vinyl. Featuring original music by Cliff Martinez, and songs by the likes of Desire, Chromatics, and College & Electric Youth, the soundtrack has become something of an instant cult classic. When the official soundtrack to Nicolas Winding Refn’s hit 2011 film Drive first came out, it raced to the top of the iTunes album charts, hitting No. 4 within a week and peaking at No. 35 on the Billboard Top 200. Available for pre-order now, the soundtrack will be released in three stunning editions: black 180g heavyweight vinyl, pink vinyl and picture disc. Each one is pressed over two discs (that’s four sides) and all come in a deluxe gatefold sleeve, which contains images from the motion picture.

DROKK:

Due for release on May 1st, DROKK: Music Inspired by Mega-City One was written in a six month period between Geoff Barrow’s Portishead world tour and Ben Salisbury’s various composing jobs for the BBC. DROKK is Barrow and Salisbury’s personal, outsiders’ interpretation of the fictional city that 2000AD’s Judge Dredd calls home. The majority of tracks were created exclusively on the Oberheim 2 Voice Synthesizer (a 1975 classic keyboard), which means that even for electronica, the music is often purposefully stark, reminiscent of a classic Vangelis or John Carpenter soundtrack.

To listen to ‘Justice One’ from DROKK, click on this.
To pre-order Drive OST on vinyl, step this way.

Behold! On Monday, ace indie rock group The Wedding Present released their much-anticipated eighth album Valentina. We did a six panel softpack for them, printed on reverse board to give an elegant matt finish, with two stylish crescent pockets on the inside. The album comes four years after the band’s previous record, El Ray, and has been receiving fantastic reviews from some very influential music websites, such as Drowned In Sound, Music OMH and The Line Of Best Fit.

The band will also be releasing a special companion piece for Record Store Day, so watch this space…

Valentina is out now on Scopitones – what are you waiting for?

As you probably already know, it was BBC Radio 6 Music’s tenth birthday on Sunday 11^th March, and all of this week they are celebrating the occasion with a series of exclusive radio events and programs, culminating in a spectacular night of live music at London’s Southbank Centre on Friday 16^th March.

In honour of this momentous event, and to say thank you for all the help BBC 6 has given to the independent labels we’ve worked with over the years, we have put together a playlist of some of the artists BBC 6 and Key Production have in common, featuring SBTRKT, Alt-J, Hooray For Earth, Beth Jeans Houghton, Howler, Frank Turner, Alabama Shakes, The White Stripes, David Lynch, Friends, The Cure, Bon Iver, Radiohead, Amon Tobin and loads more.

So Happy Birthday BBC 6 Music, we hope you like the tunes! Everyone here at Key Production wishes you an incredibly successful, prosperous and rewarding next ten years.

To listen to our playlist, click here.
For the Southbank Centre show, look here.
To find out more about special BBC 6 programming this week, go here.

This one is pretty darn special – we manufactured a triangular 7” picture disc, double A-side single for Infectious and the boys in Alt-J.

You see, the band actually wanted to name themselves the shape of a triangle – as in the actual symbol itself, without any words - but didn’t want everyone to assume they were called “Triangle”. So they opted for the keyboard shortcut on a Mac instead. Clever!

Hence this fantastic, quirky record. It’s truly a wonder to behold, with a hypnotic, retro image of a mountain rising out of the ocean.

And it works too, which is always a bonus!

So if you consider yourself to have good taste in music, or you take pride in the idiosyncrasies of your record collection, go and grab yourself one of these angular beauties.

For more info on Alt-J, including current tour dates:

www.facebook.com/altJ.band

soundcloud.com/alt-j

www.altjband.com

www.infectiousmusicuk.com

At long last – NZCA/LINES is set to release his eponymous debut on the 27^th February, and we couldn’t be more excited. Michael Lovett (the man behind the moniker) has created something truly avant-garde: suspended in the shadowy chasm between guitar pop and minimalist R&B, the self-titled album is crammed full of science fiction references, haunting imagery and unforgettable melodies. To reflect the unique themes and atmosphere of NZCA/LINES’ music, Key Production created a six panel softpack, printed on reverse board to produce a luxurious, yet understated, matt effect. We feel that this style of packaging beautifully complements Non-Format’s stunning art deco design, and the end result harks back to an endearingly retro vision of the future.

Read an excellent review of the album here.

For more information, go to:
nzca-lines.com
lorecordings.tumblr.com

We’ve been extremely hard at work on a very special project over the last few months here at Key. A number of times during its production, we’ve wanted to run outside, climb to the top of the highest building and declare it to the world. Now, finally, the manufacturing is all complete, and we are proud to be able to announce the imminent arrival of the super-deluxe edition of David Lynch‘s critically acclaimed album, Crazy Clown Time released by Sunday Best Recordings.

But first, some background: last year, David Lynch unveiled his debut LP, Crazy Clown Time, his first, fully-fledged foray into music. Recorded over a period of several months at his own studio near Mulholland Drive with engineer Dean Hurley, it was a majestic, yet powerfully idiosyncratic vision of “modern blues” that could only have germinated from the unique mind of Lynch himself, accompanied with lush, dark, off-kilter imagery.

We are particularly excited about this project for many reasons: as well as containing a CD version of the 14 track album, the super-deluxe edition also includes a version on heavyweight double 12″ vinyl, along with exclusive artwork by David Lynch and a twenty four page lyrics book. As if that wasn’t enough, the whole thing is beautifully packaged in a red leatherette covered book and a rigid black suedelle slipcase for maximum tactile effect, designed by renowned graphic artist Vaughan Oliver at v23.

In Oliver’s own words: ‘I was aiming for a sexy, kitsch quality with the black suede slipcase and red foil-blocked type. The book that slides out enhances this concept with a red leatherette finish and silver clothed spine whilst adding an “art book” touch with the “tipped in” image of the red die set into a debossed square centred on the book cover. The overall effect exudes, sex, sleaze and “roulette wheel” ambience.’

The super-deluxe edition of Crazy Clown Time will be released on 23rd January 2012. It is currently available to pre-order here, from the Sunday Best webstore and also from www.davidlynch.com. But you better act quickly – it’s strictly limited to just one thousand individually numbered copies worldwide!