Issue 96 / February 2019

“Our lifeblood is
the city. Our main
audience, first and
foremost, is the
people of Liverpool”
RAY MIA’S
ADVENTURES IN SOUND
What’s going on at Jacaranda Records? The former Universal Music executive behind the label talks to us
about his Liverpool roots and his plans to create a micro-industry in the city.
A
small but venerable list of record labels to have
originated in Merseyside: Deltasonic, Probe Plus, Zoo
(that issued the earliest Bunnymen and Teardrop
Explodes releases) and, more recently, The Coralfounded
Skeleton Key. Joining such illustrious company this year
is Jacaranda Records: headed up by Liverpool-born producer and
former Universal Music Group (UMG) Executive Vice President
RAY MIA, the company has plans to create a cutting-edge
recording studio, film and broadcast facilities in the city, along
with the UK’s first major vinyl pressing plant in decades.
Re-established as a coffee shop, record store and venue
along with a bar in 2014, a potted history of the legendary locale
almost isn’t needed. Established in 1958 by Allan Williams – who,
between 1960-62 managed a pop group of some import you
may have heard of – the venue has been a stalwart of Liverpool
city centre ever since.
An alumnus of Merchant Taylor’s School in Crosby, Ray Mia
went on to study law at Oxford and film school at Canterbury
before starting in work in the music industry, going to become a
Vice President at Universal Music. For Ray, his introduction into
the Liverpool music scene began early. “My dad owned a shop
in Seaforth which had loads of second-hand music and amplifier
equipment, disco and DJ equipment,” he explains, sat in the
performance space of new Seel Street venue Phase One. “We
had loads of records, eight-tracks, singles and records. You can’t
name a single band in Liverpool that was coming through the
ranks that didn’t have some kind of handprint of my dad’s shop
in terms of equipment, because it was all dirt cheap. When you
go into 69A and look at those counters, they were all from there.
Trevor [69A owner/operator] bought them all from my dad when
the shop closed down in 1990.”
A straightforward question, then, to someone recently relocated
to the city after a successful career in the London-centric
music industry: what does Ray feel are Liverpool’s main assets?
“Talent,” he replies simply. “It’s a city of troubadours and poets and
gobshites!” he laughs. “And attitude and authenticity, and they care
about the music and the craft. It’s a city with an incredibly attuned
bullshit detector. It’s unforgiving and relentless in its pursuit of
straightforward talking. Liverpool’s one of the only places that
doesn’t call itself a music city, ’cos it doesn’t need to. It’s a bit
rubbish saying you’re a music city. If you have to say it, you aren’t.”
“I left UMG five months ago and set up a deal with The
Jacaranda,” he explains. “We’re building up towards crossing the t’s
and dotting the i’s on ten local artists, Liverpool first. At the same
time, we’re working with a bunch of publishers, catalogue owners,
producers and artists to work in Liverpool, too. Once we’ve got
the footprint down of the studio, we’ll be bringing musicians
to Liverpool to record and do mixing here. The entire business
is based here in Liverpool, it ain’t moving anywhere. From a
mathematics perspective it’s a good idea; from a talent perspective
it’s a good idea; from a can-do attitude and people who give a
shit about music perspective it’s a good place to put it here. What
is there not to like about coming to Liverpool if you’re a musician
to perform, to write, to get a deal? To go into a studio, to find the
talent, to find a band?” The Bohos, one of the bands they have
been working with under the Jacaranda Records banner, have just
come off a national tour supporting Cast and have recently been
recording in Parr Street Studios as part of their development.
Despite the doom and gloom forecasts about the state of
physical music sales and Britain’s high street in general (news
about HMV had been on earlier that day), Ray has a positive
outlook about the business environment. “I know that all the data
has been pointing towards 2018’s physical sales in the UK fell off
a cliff. But the independent sector has been buoyed,” he states.
“There are over 300 independent record stores across the UK, of
which Jacaranda Records is two of them. Somebody’s got to stick
up for the independent sector and that’s what Jacaranda Records
is all about. In terms of artist discovery, development, recording
it with the cutting-edge technology so we can get it out digitally
and how you monetise it. The relationship between an artist and
a label is changing; the very idea of a label is changing. What’s
the definition of a label? Strip it all right down and it’s about good
music. ’Cos wherever’s there’s good music there’s audiences. And
you gotta find ’em –that’s our job.”
“There’s never been an infrastructure to support through-theline
independent sector, it’s never had a vinyl production facility.
It lacks a sense of transparency,” Ray says of what Liverpool
needs. “We’re buying a studio or we’re going to build a studio,
we’re putting a physical production plant in, our record label is in
The Jacaranda on Slater Street. There are venues here, there are
record stores here, there’s artists here – we’re gonna link all of
that together. Whether we sign people or not we want there to
be a community of writers, performers, engineers and producers.”
“We’re not reinventing the wheel here,” he continues,
warming to his theme. “There’s already a series of
establishments: the original Jacaranda, Jac Phase One, EBGBS,
which already put on artists. There’s an appetite for it, so we’re
already doing it from that perspective. Will that grow? Yeh. Do
we want the sound on the street to be, ‘We wanna be heard at
The Jac’? Yeh. We’re gonna bring the best and the brightest we
can bring together, we’re not focusing on our core which is fourpiece
guitar bands.”
“We’re re-evaluating the way deals are struck as well. We’re
not offering standard label deals. We’re doing everything in a
very different, transparent way. Lots of people have been talking
about these pro-artist deals. What’s the label’s relationship with
the city that it’s based in? What we’re being is community-first.
We’re working on an announcement for local artists and external
ones we’re bringing into town. Working with the Mayor’s Office,
the Liverpool City Region Music Board, building up connections
there. Showing not telling basically,” Ray explains. “We’ve got
some really interesting gigs we’re lining up. One in February here
at The Jac that will be really cool.”
“We’re gonna have to invest in the city. Who’s gonna run the
vinyl plant? We’re gonna have to train. Liverpool is favourably
positioned geographically in the UK. We’re not just doing this
’cos we believe in a romantic idea of this steam-punk machine
with some dude in a white coat with a clipboard seeing what
lacquer smells and tastes like. It’s not gonna be a Charlie And
The Chocolate Factory version of it, it’s gonna be an operational
business that’s gonna hire people and then load on to trucks to
go and deliver to shops,” Ray enthuses.
“We have independent labels larger than ours interested
in the vinyl plant, are we gonna we gonna work with them?
Course we bloody well are! It’s for the independent sector. We
wanna build a community of people we’re talking to and build
up rapport. We’ll tell you really transparently what we’re doing.”
With the interview clock rapidly running down, Ray gets round to
summing up Jacaranda Records’ ethos: “We’re reinvigorating the
whole culture of what The Jacaranda was originally all about. Our
lifeblood is the city. Our main audience, first and foremost, is the
music of Liverpool and the people of Liverpool.” !
Words: Richard Lewis
@JacRecordsLtd
22