This experience however did not deter us from still wanting to put out records. The radio station we had worked at now had a studio to have record live bands on air. Excited by this prospect we sent out emails to many local labels and bands looking for interested parties. Again we met with little success. One band that did agree to come on Air was Lae-Tseu.
We had heard of Lae-Tseu through the grapevine but hadn't ever saw them live. When they arrived we were surprised that we actually knew one of them, Marc, who had worked at a local record shop.
Unlike the Fugazi screening, this session did not go so smoothly. We had only 3 working mics that we had to alternate between the DJ booth and the studio. Also the studio was tiny and may have worked for 2 or 3 people but Lae-Tseu were 5 people.
We somehow pulled it off and in the end everyone had a lot of fun. We ended up speaking to Marc for a bit about our label and frustration about getting bands to come here. It turned out Marc also had a label and was promoting shows as well. We stayed in touch.
Not long after the radio station session we got a call from Marc. Having a very busy life he was finding hard to promote the shows he was doing and said he needed help. We ended up co-promoting quite a few shows with him.
The shows we did together were great. We met a lot of great people and bands and we were getting more known in the local scene. Soon bands stated contacting us for help with their shows (The Dears!, The Frenetics!, etc). We were surprised and shocked by this and excited at the same time. It seems people were noticing the name Blue Skies Turn Black.
Again though we really wanted to concentrate on our label and we ended up co-releasing the BLAKE 12" with Marc and that record was received incredibly well. Through the shows we were promoting we met 2 bands who we thought were great and wanted to work with - Spengler and Kiss Me Deadly. Not long after we would meet the Marato and agreed to put out a record for them too.
In the year that followed we would release the Kiss Me Deadly / Spengler split 7", the Spengler CD, The Kiss Me Deadly CD and the Marato CD. That was a total of 5 records in a year and half. All these releases were self-financed by us as the "company" wasn't really making any money. We didn't really care though because we were just so excited to be working with bands whose music we really loved.
Our next release would be the double LP by Rockets Red Glare. We first met these guys working on the Blake release as 2 of them played in that band. The first time we saw Rockets live was life changing. To this day they are one of the greatest bands we have ever seen live period. We felt so excited and honored when they approached us about releasing this record.
The record came out in august 2002. It would be the last record we would release for over a year.
In that time we would put on a lot of shows. We had gone form maybe 2 shows a month to an average of 8-10. The promotion part of the company began to take over. The label side things weren't looking so great. Kiss Me Deadly and Rockets Red Glare were still working hard touring and such but the Marato broke up a week after their record came out and Spengler were playing less and less. We had sunk a lot of own money into the label and we weren't seeing much of it coming back.
What we were seeing was the promotion side flourish. Most of our shows were actually making money. Booking agents who had ignored us before were willing to work with us. We were now putting on shows where 300 people were coming out. As the promotion side grew less and less people seemed to realize we even had a label.
Nevertheless In August 2003 (exactly 1 year after our last release) we released 2 new records- the new Rockets Red Glare CD Moonlight Desires and a 7" from a new local band called Les Angles Morts. The Rockets record would be their last. The band toured a little bit for it and then disbanded. We were sad to see them go as it seemed more and more people were finally catching onto their incredible sound.
And that was it for 2 years for the label side.
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