[Korean Version]

Q: Matador is one of the most recognized independent labels in the world. Would you tell us how you have achieved the current reputation nationally and internationally?
A: Our focus of Matador has been always on new music and new projects. We've always had our identity, I think, identity really based on the music and groups we put out. About international exposure, I think we've always opened to the foreign artists. We have foreign artists from Japan, Germany, Scotland, England, Holland, et cetra. One thing we didn't do is to licence individual artist to different company. We'd like to have the whole label together. In that way I think the idea of Matador as a brand was able to grow, as opposed to individual groups. That's why we have maintained our identity and become more famous as a whole reputation rather than as an individual group.

Q: Then when do you think was the exact moment that you became internationally well-known?
A: I don't think [there was a particular moment]. I think we've working together through long time. We have Matador in New York, and we have Matador in London. That's it. We have other labels work with--in Taiwan and Brazil things like that. It's kind a like the relationship with Alles music in Korea.

Q: Is your company still independent?
A: Yes, we are an independent company. My partner and I started this label twelve years ago, and we've been independent since then. No stock at all. We started to put in our record--artists and music we would like to listen--in New York, and we would like to be independent. It's more of a label of love. I started it and it grew for a while. My partner came in after, because I can't handle it myself. And it grew. It wasn't designed to grow to bigger company from the beginning. It just organically grew. As we have more artists, we have more staffs. And then we opened an office. Over the years, we have had a relationship with a major label, but we're wholly independent now. It was a Capitol Record. We sold a part of our company in 1996 to Capitol-EMI, then we bought it back. Because it didn't really work out. They geared towards more commercial albums.

Q: Was there any specific album that Capitol-EMI was interested in?
A: No, they were interested in music we have--bunch of our groups such as Pavement, Liz Phair, etc. They owned 49% of the company. First time we had worked with Atlantic Record, and we personally work with them. But it was very difficult, becuase you have to go through revolving door and you have to have a connetion to the power. You have to meet with the president (of the company) whatever, but it was very difficult to being successful because we were not located in the company. It was very difficult to motivate the people (in the company).

Q: Were there a lot of hands-on policies from them?
A: They left us for a while really, but we had to do whatever we really wanted to. But it was hard to motivate the people to work with our record. They don't deal their work very well. But they are good for us, because we are able to build our company. They give us financial support. I think we are also good for them. I think having relationship with a label like Matador helped them build the credibility to major labels. They can say to the artists who appreciate a label like Matador--"Oh, we are a cool label, because we work with Matador." So working with Matador gives them credibility rather than saying they are commercially driven. When they want to sign cool music, cool artist, they can use us as a calling card. This left them some credibility.

Q: How do you distribute you albums without any help from major labels?
A: We from the very beginning sold our own records to the stores directly. We have our own warehouse and sales staffs. We send them(staffs) to cool shop, like mom-and-pop stores, specialty stores. Then we sell our record to independent distributors like Tower Records. But more important thing is selling our records directly to the shops that have a real relationship with fans--a kind of grassroots. Those are the most important people who are talking about our music. Those shops play real music to real people, as opposed to the big shops that play whatever big sellers.

Q: Do you have any specific target audiences or fans in your mind?
A: I think our audiences are educated music fans who would like to buy their own music.

Q: In an article, Alan McGee, who had run Creation label, said that independent labels are to be either picked up by major labels or gone bankrupt. How do you maintain your status as an independent label avoiding those two extreme scenarios.
A: It is very difficult, you know. But it really depends on how you create your label. We are not trying to make money. We always try to create a very successful label. We're always under the pressure of bankruptcy, you know. The marketplace now is very hard. We are not in the business for making money; we are in the business to make door open and put out good music. We are not out there to sign big groups. We are out there to connect groups that don't get involved in major labels. It is really difficult right now for independent labels. Hopefully it will be better for independent labels near future, because major labels are consolidating and in that way they are choking themselves. They can only survive by selling, say, multi-million copies. They used to have an artist who sells hundred thousand copies, and that was considered to be doing their jobs. Now they only live for home run, like golden, platinum, or million record sellers. It is important to note that there are a lot of great groups out there. They have a hundred of thousand ranging fan base, but they are not attracted to majors because they do not play a kind of music that major labels are interested in. It is really difficult right now. In America, there were many routes that many groups can compete and music fans can find out good music through college radio, through some alternative programs of MTV. But not any more. Magazines are only focusing on multi-multi-million records, and MTV only plays music videos by top fifty artists. ((Q: Like Britney Spears?)) Yes. Outlets for other groups are limited. Years ago, DJs in college radio would play music they wanted to and put some advertising. But now, they are consolidating with bigger commercial radio stations and they are terrible right now. It was bad, but now it is really bad. Its all about advertising now. There are only a few people right now who can really play music. Hopefully satellite radio will help. I think they will open a lot of doors to the groups. Like you go to Amazon right now and you buy a few records, then you get a recommendation list, saying you bought this then you would like these too. So for satellite radio, I dont like this example, but, say, I like Radiohead, then I got a recommendation of such and such groups. I don't know who that is, but you get a chance to listen to it. I like Velvet Underground and they play Yo la Tengo. Oh, who is that? That is Yo La Tengo, they can notice that. So people can get more educated and more groups are noticed. It is much better than to try to reach a random guy in Arizona.

Q: Is the independent music market very small in the US?
A: It is small. I think it's all about money-making. It's not all about taste. I think music industry goes in cycle. When alternative music broke in the early 90s, well, prior to that in the 80s there was a punk scene. Then there was a hair band, and boy bands like New Kinds on the Block, you know. They are all similar in a way.

Q: How many albums do you produce in a year and how many copies do you need to make ends meet?
A: It depends. It really depends on particular artists, and it depends on how many copies we need to sell. We make between fifteen and twenty records in a year. But sometimes we make less and focus on fewer records, because of magazines' editorial space. Even though we make three albums in a month, they can only write about one for Matador. They have to write about more popular albums. So we kind of going back to fewer releases and spend more time with them.

Q: What's the relationship with you and the artists who belong to your label?
A: It is dictatorship. (Laugh). One of the great things in Matador label and also one of the great things in this area is that the artists can do basically whatever they want. They write, sing, package, advertise, and everything. We ask them to make their music, not the other way around. I'm not a musician, you know. My partner and I--we try to get the best music to the fans out there. We are there for the artists to give them help. But we don't say about music per se. Hey, this is a really nice wardrobe. We can say about how they look, but I think that's what we are all about.

Q: As a music critic, I'm interested in what does it look like the relationship between your label and music magazines and critics. Not a lot of Korean fans are exposed to American independent rock scenes. So they are mostly dependent upon some magazines like [CMJ], [Alternative Press], [New Musical Express] etc. Could you tell us what do you think the relationship between the small labels and music magazines?
A: We have a pretty close relationship with the magazines, because they are the ones that cover new albums whatever. I think the writers of these magazines are required to cover the most popular music, because that's what sells the magazines throughout advertising and cover story or whatever. They are not going to put a Matador artist. It is very difficult to put the artist on the cover of the magazine, because the magazine tries to sell as many copies as they can. But we have music that most writers want to write about. The writers themselves are much more excited to write about good records and cool records they actually listen to. So they will plea to editors to write about our music, because writing about Matador music is more interesting. That's why the journalists write about the music they really care about because they are music fans. For them it is very tedious to write about, for example, the 100 rock records, boy bands or bubble-gum pops whatever. So whenever there is an opportunity and if the space is available they can devote to the music they really care about. There is only small space for a lot of great music. So when it comes available they can write about what they believe good music.

Q: Do you promote your records to the magazines?
A: Yes, we do. We send out copies to everybody--all the writers, reporters, etc. We also talk to them to make them care about our artists and want to write about our music. Of course, they can to write about Eric Clapton, they can write about George Harrisons' death, and they can write about Motown.

Q: Can you give us the names of the license companies in each country besides two offices in New York and London?
A: Mexico's Suave. Brazil's Trama, Japan's P-Vine, Taiwan's Magnum Music, Australia's Spunk, Argentines Ultra Pop. Argentine covers all South America except for Brazil. These are the companies that license several foreign labels and distribute the records into their countries.

Q: Do you also produce music of their domestic groups and singers?
A: No, we used to have other labels that deal with their domestic artists. Now we don't any more. We just operate our label separately.

Q: Do you do well in those markets? Which one is the best?
A: Probably Brazil. Ultra Pop is good too. Hopefully Korea will be good. The bigger the market is, the more people buy the records. Brazil is pretty big. In Mexico not many people know about independent music. I don't know much about Taiwan. They put out new music and they are doing pretty well, but I really don't know much about it. The label in Japan is doing well.

Q: About Japanese groups Pizzicato Five, Cornelius and Guitar Wolf, did you pick them up or did they approach to you with their music?
A: Pizzicato Five is the first Japanese artist that we work with. We signed them in 1993 or 1992. We saw their video tape and they were great and very unusual. We copied the tapes and play them in New York. We signed them after that. When it first came out in America, it did pretty well. We've been trying to gather demo tapes, you know. We get hundreds of demo tapes in a day. We have boxes, boxes, boxes, and boxes. There is a room for the boxes actually.

Q: How many demo tapes did you get from outside the US?
A: A lot actually. Its amazing. A lot from all over the places. They are not always sung in English. But it's from everywhere. Actually the biggest selling artist ever was from demo tapes. We got a couple of gold records with that.

Q: How do you think about digitalized music such as Napster and mp3 files?
A: I think people are willing to pay for music. As far as they can find good music, I think they are willing to pay for it. If they have a great selection of music and download it, and they think the musics are reliable, then they go back and look for particular artist and particular music over and over again. I think it is a good thing. We consider Napster as a totally good thing, actually. I think that is the one way people can find music. I think more people are finding music that way. A lot of people have their personal identity and have record collection. It's about expressing yourself in that way. People don't hide their record collection. But if you have all of your collections in your desktop, then its not as cool as having shelves of records.

Q: People can download their music through, for example, emusic.com. Does that effect your label financially?
A; Now people have to pay. They pay for mechanical royalty, like a record sale. Its not as big as record sale though. We got a whole bunch of deal with those online music sites, four or five. I don't think online music and downloading music will be actually taking over a great percentage of our record sale. So the thing that our record is available online--- that is actually something we can review our music about where we are at now.

Q: Let's go to the final question.
A: I hate final questions. (Laugh)

Q: Are you interested in Korean independent music scene?
A; Definitely. I was talking about that last night with Alles music. I'm very interested in what's out there. I would like to go to the record store and get some recommendation about local bands and music. We don't really know any particular group, but we are very open to listen to the music. I think there's a lot of interesting things going on here. I'm looking for working with Alles music in Korea, and I hope Korean people can listen to Matador music. So we're very excited about it.

Q; In fact, Korean independent market is very small.
A: Not after working with Matador, I hope. (haha..) I hope we could say it WAS small.
Q: Do you have any suggestions for boosting the Korean market?
A: I think working with more artists as possible is the most important thing. Coordinating the artists to the label, for example, having Japanese artists come over to Korea and let them work together or whatever, and get them more promoted and get people more involved. I think that is the most important thing. I think that can really create the needs for the local artists. 20020115

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