“Ok fucker, you know what…”
For Basic Moves’ 10th (and last?) release, Scam Planet representative DJ.Booth lays down the soundtrack for a solar sailing trip through his personal space-funk mirage: the perfect scenery to take a moment to look back and reflect on the story written so far.
The release date was scheduled a few weeks ago, but it was inconceivable for us to let a record go out into the world without some words of context that can be picked up, read, thought about, lost, torn up and thrown around. So even though it has been a source of delay more than once, this approach to format without compromise has always been one of the key elements of the BM saga.
Beyond just delay, the process of releasing music on a physical format has an inherent slowness, where each step requires specific knowledge, creating fruitful exchanges between everyone involved along the way. From the artist , the person doing the mixdown, the mastering engineer, the pressing plant, to the designer and the printer who print the sleeve, and finally the distributor , this process allows for a crystallisation of time, place and people into a story; a message in a bottle thrown out to future listeners. This story is then presented as a physical object designed to be played, handled, collected, discussed, forgotten, rediscovered, passed on. At the same time and contrary to the digital format, vinyl has an undeniably elitist dimension to it and is both ecologically and economically questionable. It is heavy, takes up space, gathers dust, suffers from wear & tear, etc. On the surface, sometimes it seems like the only moment this format can eventually shine is when it’s sitting on a turntable, with the diamond stylus in the groove…
Recently, a playful clash with another Dj/label boss and the emotionally charged acquisition of a large stock of rare jazz records from a collector’s widow reminded us that this is everything but true. Vinyl shines as part of the fabric of our very real-life music scenes, in the eyes of a collector, or as an archival tool for specific personalities, eras, and areas. During a series of late-night video calls between Driss and ourselves however, it became clear that from the perspective of artists and label owners, discussions about tangible vs. digital and the importance of format are often guided by a much more practical question: how does it relate to the possibility of a (financially) stable career as an artist?
Any leads towards an answer for this question are very much appreciated and can be sent to
contact@basicmoves.be