Bed bugs, Brexit and goodbyes: 20 years of indie, as told by Fortuna Pop! – The Guardian

I think indie pop is dying off in a way. It had a resurgence about 10 years ago with [London club nights] Twee As Fuck and White Heat. The demographic was right at that time 20 years since 1986. That was when I had the Pains of Being Pure at Heart [on the label] and it felt like indie was having a real moment. Since then people have lost interest a little bit, but in the last few years Ive seen the rise of the DIY punk indie instead, the world that Martha and Joanna Gruesome are part of. Its a more healthy scene because its more inclusive and politically aware.

I started the label in 1995. I was 25, and my brother and his friends were in a band so I chipped in a bit of money to buy a reel-to-reel 8-track recorder from a chef from an east Midlands hotel where one of our friends worked as a dishwasher. Once they recorded it, I decided Id put it out. I had no idea what I was doing. I looked in the back of Melody Maker and found an advert for a company called Key Production, so phoned them up from a phone box and said: I want to make a record. How can I do it? They helped out but I still didnt understand about distribution. I thought John Peel would play it and we would get on Top of the Pops. A year later I still have about 1,000 of their records underneath my bed. I thought: theres something Ive missed here.

I think there will always be a place for someone to provide the curatorial aspect of running a label. But I think its more difficult for small labels to survive. Im really worried about Brexit and what that will do to the industry. A lot of the small labels make their records in the Czech Republic at one of the biggest private manufacturers in the world. If the pound loses 25% then that makes all vinyl records 25% more expensive. If you add customs fees on top of that to bring them into the country, that will harm a lot of small labels who put out records.

The relationship you have with a band runs deeper than just the business. I had to take Kip from the Pains of Being Pure at Heart to the doctors because he had a severe case of bed bugs from being on tour. We had to burn all of his clothes and buy him new ones. Over the years Ive had lots of bands staying in my flat. It can get a bit much.

Im incredibly stubborn. I work really hard. I had real ambitions that a lot of people I know didnt. When I started out, a lot of indie labels idea of publicity was to send a 7-inch to John Peel and that was it. But right from the start I was making lists of press and radio people and would do everything myself.

The Beatles were four blokes, and that used to be the classic template for a band. All the bands I was growing up with the Smiths, Depeche Mode, Jesus and Mary Chain were all white blokes. Then it became a laughable to be a bloke band. It now feels like its had its day. Fortuna Pop! signed a lot of women because I was a fan of Sarah records and their policy of celebrating female bands it was just obvious that you should be releasing records by women. Women are half of the population.

Ive worked with a lot of bands who are very politically clued in, and sometimes I wished they werent when they turned down a Gap advert! But at the same time I really love that they do that. Its brilliant. A band like Martha, who are very politically aware theyre careful about who we give previews to. They have certain understanding of what websites represent and who they are funded by. My press officer might suggest a review from a big website and theyll say no, not that one.

I dont work with idiots. If youre in a band and youre playing music and going on tour youre probably going to take drugs and get drunk but I chose not to work with anyone who was going to smash up a hotel room. That would be a horrible thing to me! Im not saying theyre angels, but I feel like the people I worked with were generally well behaved.

If you get on the right Spotify playlist, it could pay for your album. My friend Ian who runs How Does It Feel to Be Loved has a band call Haiku Salut they were on a Spotify playlist and it made them a load of money. Its different from just sending a record to NME. Theres no longer one source that has that single power those magazine had. Thats possibly a good thing, but I feel sorry for a lot of music writers who are expected to provide content for free.

There are things I would have done differently. After I had a bit of press and success, I got contacted by a lawyer. He wrote me a letter about things you should think about doing if you start a label. I was like: Oh, hes just after my money! Ill ignore it. I found it a few weeks ago and thought: Damn, thats really good advice. He told me to sign bands to a publishing contract as well as a recording contract. You would own the songs as well as the recordings, so even after youve stopped selling the recordings, you can continue to earn money from those songs: if someone did a re-press, they would have to pay you the money for the songs.

If I was going to start again I would rather manage bands. The actual making of the product and putting in the shops is really tiresome, and you get the same kick out of running a label as you do management: you see someone playing the upstairs room of a pub with a ukelele, and three years later theyre playing to 2,000 people at End of the Road, and you think, I did that!

I thought I was going to stop when I got to 100 records. It felt like a nice round number to end things on. But FP83 was the Pains of Being Pure at Heart and that ended up being the pinnacle of madness. I went a little crazy around that point. So when I knew I was getting up to 200 records, at 20 years, I thought it was a good time to stop. There are many ways of measuring success and from a point of view of meeting interesting people, doing crazy things, and the music that I put out, it was a success. From a financial point of view and my life not a success. Im sure Malcolm McLaren and Tony Wilson had similar thoughts on a much bigger scale.

There was an outpouring of emotion I wasnt expecting when I announced that Fortuna Pop! was closing. Im not sure what will happen to the artists who are on the labels. Some might go to other labels. Some might stop. Allo Darlin have. Their farewell shows sold out the Scala in five hours. We could have sold out the Roundhouse! There were a lot of people who wanted to say goodbye. It was an amazing weekend. And thats what I want these Fortuna Pop! shows to be a good way to say goodbye. Sometimes, something isnt finished until its finished.

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Bed bugs, Brexit and goodbyes: 20 years of indie, as told by Fortuna Pop! - The Guardian