Golf Team Records: Compilation Vol.0 – exclusive stream
Published April, 2012
by Easterndaze
Bedroom pop and lo-fi in Hungary has evolved to the next stage since early 2011. The first record label to cover this scene, Golf Team Records, was born a few days ago. Being an umbrella for the scene, it has collected the young artists’ best electronic side and dropped a tasty compilation for Record Store Day on 21st April in a cassette format from the likes of Piresian Beach, Route 8, Belle Belle and many more. On the B-side an eclectic mixtape (incl. Teen Daze, Actress, Tropic of Pisces, etc) gives us an insight into the sonic reservoir of the label and hints at possible directions for their new endeavours. We talked to the label boss, promoter, member of Gumipop DJ team and multitasker Ákos Vereczkey (aka szobahipszter.tumblr.com), about the project to find out more.
Could you introduce the new record label? Its history, concept, objectives and people involved in it?
The Golf Team Records was founded at the beginning of 2012 to promote Hungarian electronic producers of the bedroom pop music scene in particular.
As for the activities, we’re doing artist management, record releases, event management and booking, in order of importance. At the moment we don’t have an official background yet, it’s just DIY, built from the scratch. Our catalog number 0 refers to this, too.
Among the people working on the label are Ádám Moroncsik for creative design, Balázs Tóbi for webdesign, Kinga Jánossy, Ádám Lang and Gergő Dankó for promotion. Obviously, these are not really separable roles yet, each of us takes an active part in everything, it’s just a future direction.
What’s the story behind the Golf Team Records?
There are several projects that led us to found the record label. This compilation can be considered an evolution of Hungarian Bedroom Noise, an earlier compilation, at least it was inspired by that. Another compilation titled That’s What I Call Lo-Fi, which recently came out with its 11th installment, laid a foundation for our release. We have been organizing concerts for years, at the beginning as part of TWICLF later with Gumipop. We had regular club nights, where I was able to get to know loads of Hungarian musicians and recognize a niche in this music scene: the players behind the scenes. We have a lot of small DJ and promoter teams, but the country lacks professional bookers/promoters/artist managers/record labels.
I believe that musicians and artists are not supposed to manage their own gigs, sell their own music, just create. This year could be a break-through for the fresh, emerging Hungarian (and Eastern European) artists, and put the Budapest scene onto the sonic world map.
How was the compilation vol.0 born?
The concept of the compilation is similar to the label’s philosophy. I wanted to collect new tracks by the best Hungarian electronic producers from the Hungarian bedroom pop scene. Most of them wrote an exclusive new song for the compilation, that’s why it became really special. I also wanted to have remixes on the cassette. As for the format, it was an easy decision, no CD (maybe for promotional purposes), no budget for a vinyl and a tape accompanied with a digital release seemed to be the perfect solution.
What can tell us about the artists on the compilation?
The selected producers are those with future releases on our roster or who we want to work with. Among the highlights are: Models Can’t Fuck’s (an extremely friendly dream pop project by EZ Basic frontman Árpád Szarvas) hit Move To Iceland remixed by Canada based producer Márk Lechner, one half of electronic pop duo Möbel. Another nice take is by Sleeping Machine (who remixed Route 8’s Neverending Stories on his new, self-titled EP) of the pioneer of Hungarian bedroom musician Piresian Beach aka Zsófia Németh. Emerging producer and visual artist Belle Belle is also on the cassette as well as glitch-hop duo Headshotboyz’s rap-project Rockz Ova Lean.
What about the future of the label?
Our goal is to have at least one release every three months, mainly EPs in a digital format, but later also vinyl releases. You can expect records from the likes of Models Can’t Fuck, Route 8, Belle Belle, Le Hjärta or Fatime, first in September 2012.
by András G. Varga