“You have these moments when you are playing a record when you get caught in a location and time,” said Mr. Bernich, who lives in Brooklyn Heights. “There is a magic with vinyl and the memories that are connected to it.”
Thomas Bernich has been working to preserve vinyl as a format at Brooklynphono, his Sunset Park factory, since 2003
Mr. Bernich stumbled into the record business after he realized that his talent for sculpture, which he studied at the Pratt Institute, could probably not support a career. But while at Pratt, Mr. Bernich, 40, started collecting records, inspired by a friend’s passion for vinyl.
vinyl: side 1 of Easter Everywhere
“I’m really not very musical, and the best thing I can play is the stereo,” Mr. Bernich said. “This fits because I have mechanical experience.”
Zach Cale, a 32-year-old musician and a founder of All Hands Electric, an indie rock and folk music record label in Brooklyn, is one of Brooklynphono’s clients.
Aside from the convenience of having records made by a local plant — his label saves on shipping costs by picking up orders — Mr. Cale prefers having his music on vinyl because, he said, fans like the tangibility of a 12-inch album. “We’ve always been really into the physicality of vinyl,” said Mr. Cale, who paid $1,300 for 500 records. “People really respond to it because it’s visual and it feels like you have a piece of the band.”
While vinyl records have largely been consigned to the dustbin of the music industry, Mr. Bernich said he still found magic in turning musicians’ ideas into physical objects to share with the world.
“Once a musician makes a record it lasts a very long time,” he said.
Say #RecordCollection like You Mean It
Weaned on CDs, They’re Reaching for Vinyl
Vinyl is growing out of its niche.
There were always record collectors who disdained the compact disc, arguing that an LP’s grooves yielded warmth and depth that the CD’s digital code could not match.
But the market largely ignored them. Record labels shuttered their LP pressing plants, except for a few that pressed mostly dance music, since vinyl remained the medium of choice for D. J.s.
As it turned out, that early resistance was not futile, thanks largely to an audience of record collectors, many born after CDs were introduced in the 1980s.
These days, every major label and many smaller ones are releasing vinyl, and most major new releases have a vinyl version, leading to a spate of new pressing plants.
When the French electronica duo Daft Punk released “Random Access Memories” in mid-May, 6 percent of its first-week sales — 19,000 out of 339,000 — were on vinyl, according to Nielsen SoundScan, which measures music sales.
Other groups with a predominantly college-age audience have had similar success: the same week, the National sold 7,000 vinyl copies of its latest album, “Trouble Will Find Me,” and 10,000 Vampire Weekend fans opted for the LP version of “Modern Vampires of the City.” When the Front Bottoms, a New Jersey indie band, posted a photo of their players carrying stacks of LP mailing boxes on their Facebook page recently, their label, Bar/None, racked up what Glenn Morrow, who owns the label, described as “phone orders for $2,000 worth of LPs in 10 minutes.”
A growing number of classic albums — including the complete Beatles and early Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan catalogs — have had vinyl reissues in recent years as well.
Michael Fremer, who monitors the LP world on his Web site, Analogplanet.com, said: “None of these companies are pressing records to feel good. They’re doing it because they think they can sell.”
About a dozen pressing plants have sprouted up in the United States, along with the few that survived from the first vinyl era, and they say business is so brisk that they are working to capacity. Thomas Bernich, who started Brooklyn Phono in 2000, says his company makes about 440,000 LPs a year, but a giant like Rainbo Records, in Canoga Park, Calif., turns out 6 million to 7.2 million, said Steve Sheldon, its general manager.
One plant, Quality Record Pressings, in Salina, Kan., opened in 2011 after its owner, Chad Kassem, grew impatient with delays at a larger plant where his own line of blues reissues was being pressed. His company, which runs four presses — acquired used, but modified to run more efficiently — now makes LPs for all the majors, and lists Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton and Nirvana reissues among its recent projects. He is currently pressing 900,000 vinyl discs a year.
Q: Your name, age, where are you from, and where do you currently live?
A: Jess Rotter, 33, Brooklyn NY (Currently in Los Angeles, CA)
Q: What’s playing right now on your turntable?
A: Na Hawa Doumbia- La Grande Cantatrice Malienne, V. 3-released by the great Brian Shimkovitz of Awesome Tapes From Africa, The Hot Dogs -Say What You Mean (pre-Summer fun), Annette Peacock-X-Dreams, and my best friend Susannah just bought me a Grateful Dead vinyl box set of all the Warner Brothers studio releases, which I can’t turn off…
Q: What was your last purchase?
A: Athanor-Graveyard, Phil Manzanera Remixes (so expensive, but so awesome), Laurie Spiegel The Expanding Universe reissue, To What a Strange Place Vol. 1 compilation by Mississippi Records, ready to get dark with the latest Death Waltz Horror soundtracks (mind blowing cover art), Affinity’s s/t reissue
Q: Who sparked your love of music?
A: My Father for sure-it was his collection that opened my eyes and became an old soul super quickly. He made sure I had my own little Fisher Price Record player at a very early age. It was love at first play- even when asleep as a child I would wake up, turn the side the record, then go back to sleep-repeat. My family was all about channels to bring your imagination out-as they firmly believed the world tasted much sweeter that way. Enjoying records was a great way to unleash that…making pictures immediately in your head.
Q: Why vinyl?
A: Listening to music via computer speakers is just not as groovy…
Q: Do you focus on a specific musical genre?
A: I definitely listen for the most part to music of the past, but within that time period- all kinds of genres.
Q: How has your passion for vinyl affected the rest of your life — friends, life partners, lifestyle, jobs?
A: Vinyl has always been this endearing way of communication I have with people. A friend once told me a life well lived is when you have a heavy music head(s) in tow to teach you about records. Through the years, mixes I have received and exchanged with greats like Zach Cowie (Turquoise Wisdom), Chris Ruggerio (Preservation Sound), Keith Abrahamsson (Mexican Summer), Matt Werth (RVNG) in particular have been constant inspirations and bonds between us. It can get deep! I try to send mixes to friends from time to time, as a little diary of what has been found via myself and others, always hoping to pass those lil zingers on..I still hold on to that gasp passion of learning about music-that enthusiasm and drive never goes away.
Q: You’re an illustrator and a lot of your work is based on music and album covers. How did you get into that?
A: The music scribbles came to play when I was in college-I spent every summer interning at London/Mo’Wax records in the city, whose aesthetic was heavily built on album art and creative promotion. When I was living a semester abroad in London, my scribbles caught the attention of a clothing label called “Birdie” who commissioned me to do prints and tee shirts paying homage to bands and artists of the past. We did prints for dresses of Elton John’s “Benny and The Jets” and George Harrison’s “My Sweet Lord”- was such a great and exciting time- I was only 22. One of my favorite designs we did was of the song “Oh Yoko” which featured John in the middle of a bath calling to a large portrait of Yoko (In Harmony reference, anyone?). When Birdie ended in 2006, I began my own tee shirt line called “Rotter and Friends”, that paid homage to even rarer music of that time like Link Wray, Badfinger, Yo Ha Wah 13, Big Star, and Linda Ronstadt. R + F to this day garners so many supporters and good vibes it definitely helped shape my illustration and painting career to where it is now. It is an honor to still receive letters and mixes from young teenagers and older adults who are looking to learn or reminisce about the records we salute.
Q: Where do you acquire your vinyl these days: flea markets, record shops, personal dealers, ebay, other online stores?
A:A dream day is to wake up, grab a coffee, and quietly hit the shops for inspiration. Personally, record stores are like little art galleries and I enjoy them also greatly when out of town. Pretty thankful to receive a number of records on the frequent as gifts-those mean the most as someone had put thought into the piece. Also working at record labels for over ten years is a pretty awesome and easy way to nab vinyl.
Q: Do you think collecting vinyl helps preserve our musical heritage and culture?
A: The beauty of vinyl is the act and sound-no other format works the same. Music breathes on vinyl, it has heart and forces you to listen in a much different way than an mp3. I enjoy the physicality of the experience.
Q: Do you have a record collecting philosophy? Any special routines when you enter a store?
A: I definitely always peek at the walls for the store’s weekly “edit” and then head straight to the “New Arrivals” bin. I rarely go to record shops knowing exactly what I want, prefer to just take the ride of digging and see what happens…
Q: What’s your comfort record, the one you can always go back to? What makes it so special?
A: The Ted Lucas album really makes me feel safe. That man had one of the most beautiful voices out there and the songs are full of warmth. There’s a bootleg version of Neil Young’s song “On The Beach” that will always be a special go to as well for comfort. Also, since my early teens-there is no other band like Led Zeppelin- forever and always.
And some musicians & musicians as music fans just have to hear how it sounds on vinyl "the record" = that's what they care about. .. the sound when the needle drops. ..
Rolling Stones - Happy (the boys listening to Exile in '72 on vinyl in a hotel room during tour)
rare footage (watch here) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7iXDkmBsyI
at the end we hear a seemingly stoned Stone say, "does anybody wanna order some drinks up to the room?!" ...
john alan conte jr.
&
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