Spaceland's first-ever bill featured Beck, who these days still shows up as the 'Secret Special Guest' more often than not at shows that advertise such an attraction. The unassuming residential building, with the random faux-Tudor façade, intergalactic-prom stage curtains, and smoking lounge in the back where you can hang out in between sets and play pool while eavesdropping on your neighbors' conversations reflected off the satellite dishes mounted on the ceiling, has also had its ears tuned to the ground well enough over the years to have played host to early-career shows from the likes of Elliott Smith, Possum Dixon, Weezer and Jurassic 5. More recently, Spaceland has scored such coups as the first-ever Arcade Fire show in town, and the first set from a reunited Dinosaur Jr.

Spaceland

Having been in the crowd at scores of shows at Spaceland and the Echo, another venue a bit further up Sunset Boulevard in Echo Park that's owned and booked by the same folks, as well as bigger shows Spaceland has had a hand in -- like Arthur magazine's Arthurfest and the Sunset Junction Street Fair -- I was intrigued to learn of the launch of Spaceland Recordings.

The live recordings label joint venture between Spaceland's 46-year-old founder Mitchell Frank, and KamranV., an ambitious 27-year-old who left an executive post at Universal Music Mobile, was created with the noble goal of documenting the potentially-historic early shows of the Next Big Thing(s) who play Spaceland's stable of venues, while generating some working capital for cash-strapped indie bands to boot.

Califone at Spaceland

I recently stopped into the Ex-Plex, a new Spaceland-owned venue attached to the Echo that's just finished a major overhaul renovation, to check out the new space, and hear more about the new label from Kamran, Mitchell and Brady Lahr -- former employee #30 at Liquid Audio and current president of Kufala Recordings, another live show label that is manufacturing Spaceland Recordings CDs on-demand, packaging them in recycled chipboard sleeves and distributing both their CDs and downloads internationally. I would also get to survey the recording operation in action during a show featuring Atlanta's Snowden and Malajube, a quartet of French-speaking (and singing) dudes from Montreal.

DMW:
So what made you decide to leave the major label side of the business for indie-er pastures, after starting out there as an intern, working up to head of production in new media at Interscope Geffen A&M, and eventually heading up marketing for Universal Music Mobile?

KamranV:
I learned all I could learn, ended up an executive with an expense account and an office with a balcony, but it got to the point where the business was very transactional. Sometimes, the music gets lost in the business…but, there are still people there that are passionate, a lot of very smart people at the major labels.

KamranV

For me, musically, my passion has always been indie rock. I've lived here since '97, managed bands, like the Nervous Return, recorded bands and produced records, and always had aspirations to run a label. What Spaceland has, this energy, this vibe or whatever it is, for me is so unique and meaningful and important that I want to share it with other people. I'm from Oklahoma, and didn't get to go to shows growing up. There was the Flaming Lips, occasionally other good bands, but you couldn't go see a show every night. I wish that back when Elliott Smith was playing Spaceland, I could have experienced it. If we had recorded stuff like that, I mean, forget about sales, but what it means, documenting that experience -- my goal with this is really to provide a point of reference for history.

DMW:
There are some people out there doing similar things, recording live shows of both indie and major label acts: Clear Channel's Instant Live, Disc Live, Digital Club Network, AOL/XM/Knitting Factory, even NPR. What's different about Spaceland Recordings?

Brady Lahr  
(31-year-old co-founder and president of Kufala Recordings, also a live show label, that is printing Spaceland's CDs on-demand):
It really boils down to the quality. Clear Channel's company, and a lot of the other folks, they're really focused on making CDs at the show. Which is great for a fan, because it's instant gratification. But the quality suffers. The band also suffers -- because they don't have control over the quality of the mix, and can't take out a song if they screwed up. [Clear Channel] isn't producing a product that the fan is going to cherish and want to listen to over and over again.

Brady Lahr of Kufala Recordings (next to live recording rig)

KamranV:
Unless they spend a fortune recording it, it ends up sounding like crap…and the business model isn't lean enough to survive.


Unlike Instant Live or Disc Live, who are mixing live on-the-fly to create a master that's then replicated onto CDs on site at the venue, Spaceland Recordings takes orders for the CD at the show, then goes through a streamlined, off-site mixing process that includes artist participation and final approval, and is able to turn around and release the finished product in as little as a week.

Sound quality aside, Clear Channel has been providing stiff competition for smaller outfits like Spaceland, Kufala and even the larger Disc Live, which put itself on the indie world's radar when it documented the Pixies' historic reunion tour in 2004. Clear Channel acquired a patent that same year that it said applied to the practice of burning and selling live CDs on site, and went so far as to ban Disc Live from recording Pixies shows in its venues, the band's manager told Rolling Stone.

 
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) mounted a challenge to the patent that compelled the U.S. Patent Office to agree in April 2006 to reexamine it.

Update: The U.S. Patent Office has announced that it will revoke the Instant Live patent on live recordings.

Brady Lahr:
[The patent] is specific to certain technology you could go buy at Fry's and do yourself. You just add one more gear, and it voids their patent. But Clear Channel does have the venues, and they have the leverage -- not to force bands to reject our offers to record them -- but they can incentivize bands to do it, because Clear Channel is producing their entire cross-country tour, in mostly Clear Channel venues.

DMW:
Has it otherwise generally been a challenge to get bands and labels on board with the idea of recording their performances and putting them out on CD?

KamranV:
With indie labels, some of them get it right away, and they're in. Some others are like, 'Is this going to cannibalize my record sales?' But I'm extremely confident in the quality, our deal is extremely fair and flexible (Spaceland splits profits 50/50 with bands), and all the people working on it have the best intentions. In the end, I know all of them will come around.

Darker My Love at the Echo (Fuck Yeah Fest 2006)

Darker My Love was the first band on Spaceland Recordings, which recorded their month-long Monday residency at Spaceland last summer.
Download a free live track from that show:
"Summer is Here" MP3

DMW:
How does it affect your business, though, if you're basically recording these bands on spec.?

KamranV:
If a band doesn't play well, and they're not happy with their performance, I'm not going to force them to put out something that they don't want. And the way that we've structured the business is such that we don't lose our ass on it. We have the venues, so we're not paying venue fees. The biggest costs that come in for us are mixing, editing and video -- we're doing three- or four-camera shoots.

DMW:
What rights do the bands retain to the recordings themselves?

KamranV:
We share the rights, essentially. If after the term, they decide they don't want to put it out anymore, we'll stop putting it out. However, once the term is over, we don't give it back to them, so we can do our best to recoup our investment. But we do that without any kind of recoupment fund. They get paid from the very first record.

Brady Lahr:
And we do all of our distribution deals direct, without an aggregator like IODA. So if something comes up, we can do a deal and send them the files via FTP the same day. It's great to send a check to the artist every month, even if they only sell one download and the cost of postage is more than the check, because they're happy, and they trust you.

In addition to their print-on-demand CDs (and eventually DVDs), the label is aggressively seeking other sales avenues, from iTunes downloads to mobile, P2P?, video-on-demand, IPTV and even regular ol' TV. Case in point, a live track from Patrick Park's Spaceland performance was featured on the series finale of "The O.C."

DMW:
How would you define "success" for Spaceland Recordings?

Kamran V:
Our threshold for success is very low. We don't have to sell a million records. What I would like to do is make 50 records a year, record about a record a week, and sell them through any means possible. I'd prefer if people got to this paying through their cell phone bill, or maybe it be ad-supported, or some new business model where it feels as free or inexpensive as possible. I'd like to 'give away' the music as much as possible, but still pay the artists. Two of our records so far have broken 1,000 units. One has only sold 10 copies [granted, in one week of sales]. I would rather help a band be successful, and have it help them in the long run.

Snowden at the Ex-Plex

I tracked down Spaceland founder Mitchell Frank -- who has been referred to sometimes as the "Mayor of Silver Lake" -- out back on the patio between sets at the Echo.

DMW:
So how did you hook up with Kamran and decide to start this live recordings label? Have you had experience running a label?

Mitchell Frank:
Kamran was an intern at Interscope years ago for one of my partners. He pitched me the idea, and I'd been trying to do it for a while, so it was an easy 'yes'. I also had another label called Nickelback, which I sold to Disney in the late '90s.

DMW:
Have you found it difficult thus far to get bands you've booked into your venues to agree to allow their performances to be recorded for the label?

Mitchell Frank:
It's like any A&R experience. It's all about timing, because some bands say they're wanting to do a major label deal, or have a record coming out in six months and don't want this to interfere with it. Or the label is saying, 'We own the masters, and we don't care if you're only going to sell a couple thousand records.' So it depends on where the band is in their career.

Mitchell Frank

DMW:
Some of your recordings have come out of the monthly Monday residencies you've booked at Spaceland and the Echo, which along with (rival promoter) Scott Sterling's Tuesdays at The Fold have become sort of a local proving ground for emerging bands, who get unusual exposure, with added incentives to attract the locals like no cover and cheap drinks.

Mitchell Frank:
I ripped off the idea from the Whisky or the Roxy -- they were both doing free Mondays in like '93. The residency was designed so a band could develop their sound, and their live show. We're always looking for a local band, or somebody that has momentum with press, touring, radio, something like 'We just got done recording our record for two years, and we need this showcase.' The first Monday, there are probably 150 people, but by the fourth one the line is around the block. It happens every month.

I know some bands have gotten deals out of Spaceland, there's certainly been enough A&R people, managers, agents and music supervisors in attendance that, by the end of the residency, it gives them a leg up, a springboard. It's been helpful for acts like Broken West, Cold War Kids, Moving Units, Midnight Movies, Silversun Pickups, Giant Drag…

DMW:
On top of the live audio recordings, you guys are also capturing live video?

Mitchell Frank:
It's going to be packaged and re-packaged, so there'll be DVDs, and different formats for different uses. I'm hoping that will happen in the next month or two…maybe three. We have eight shows now recorded on DVD.

DMW:
How would define "success" for the label?

Mitchell Frank:
Success is where it sounds great. Everything else will work out. It's the same way we book the clubs. If it sounds great, we'll book 'em. Either we'll be a front-runner or we'll be somewhere on that curve.

DMW:
Are you still planning to open another venue downtown?

Mitchell:
Yes. Everything is a little nebulous, though. We were in escrow on one building, and the escrow fell out. Last summer I had to move the Arthur Nights shows downtown to The Palace, because this place wasn't done. Hopefully we get into escrow again, or get a different place.

DMW:
How do you feel about the demise of Arthur magazine?

Mitchell Frank:
It sucks. I hope they can settle their differences. There was such a niche for that style of a magazine, socio-political, art, culture…hopefully we do some more events with Jay [Babcock, Arthur's founding editor], I haven't talked to him since the whole thing went down. We are going to have an Arthurfest DVD coming out. Lance Bangs directed it and he and I are producing it. It's just a matter of getting the financing together. Lance 24-tracked the whole thing, had ten or twelve cameras, so it's a lot of post, but hopefully…maybe…we'll release it by the fall.

Comets on Fire at Arthurfest

DMW:
With Kamran as a partner, you guys will be doing some pretty progressive things with digital distribution. What do you think about the current state of the industry, for instance the baby-steps that are being made away from digital rights management?

Mitchell:
DRM? is just bullshit. I don't understand why labels don't sell MP3s for less than they're selling CDs.

DMW:
Is $1 too much for a song?

Mitchell Frank:
For some songs, yeah. And I think $9.99 is too expensive for a digital album, considering the fact that in the end the band is getting $1, the label is getting $2 -- there's a lot of hands in those pockets. The first thing the labels need to do is just get the fuck away from iTunes, and start their own store, instead of giving Steve Jobs 35 cents. It's gotta happen or otherwise the record industry is just going to fall into the toilet. And, as we speak, all the big muckety-muck guys are shittin' bricks. Every year their sales go down 5%.

DMW:
It's those pesky downloaders.

Mitchell Frank:
It's piracy, and also a bunch of bullshit A&R guys, thinking they're going to sell six million copies of some fucking lame-ass record. At some point the record companies need to figure out how to make more money, and how to give the bands more money. And that's by cutting out the middleman. So you cut out your physical, and what is your "CD cost?" That should be discounted online -- except no one's doing it…yet.

Once Doug Morris and all those old fuckers die, Jimmy Iovine gets stabbed by some gangster dude -- which probably won't happen because he has so much security -- but once they're out of the business, and let some young guys in there, they're going to change the format and change the business model.

[Hesitating] I mean…I don't want that part about Jimmy Iovine to be in there, because I'll probably get shot by one of his guys. [Leaning into my recorder, pleading tone:] "Jimmy! I'm sorry!"

Mark Hefflinger