Sorry for the long period of radio silence from Retreat HQ these last 3 months, but Hauke and I have been quite busy working on the “Treats Vol.5” compilation as well as promoting it via the Retreat “5 Year Anniversary tour”. Now that things have cooled down a bit (unlike the thermometer in Berlin) we wanted to give you some insight on the past, present and future of your favourite vinyl-only label.
First of all, Hauke and I were overwhelmed by the positive feedback of “Treats Vol. 5” and we would like again to thank all of the artists involved in this adventure: Jamie Lloyd, Session Victim, Johannes Albert, Reverend G, Kim Brown, Quarion, Mr. Beatnick, Iron Curtis and Robert Oh for the exceptional music plus Gesine Todt for the ultra-slick design.
A special thank you goes out to the promoters and bookers that helped set up the “Five Year Anniversary Tour”, it was a real privilege for us to be able to play in all these locations. There were many highlights and some will definitely stay ingrained in our memories, whether it was Kim Brown’s excellent live debut in Berlin, Session Victim’s mad DJ set in Leipzig or Quarion and Iron Curtis’ techno-fuelled b2b mix in Paris.
Finally our gratitude goes out also to YOU, the DJ/dancer/record collector/Fan who has supported Retreat one way or another during these five years!
But after so many highlights in the past months, the two last weeks have however been very difficult for us: On the 16th of July, the media company Intergroove officially filed for insolvency, thus making Retreat a label without distribution from one day to the next.
Our relationship with Intergroove has always been very positive and respectful. To this day, we still don’t know what was the cause for such a major company to file for insolvency and we would like to express our sympathies to the Intergroove employees in these difficult times.
But the future of our label was looking grim so Hauke and I had to take some fast and radical decisions: first of all, we managed to retrieve all the Retreat stock from Intergroove (about 400 records) and store it in a safe place. But more importantly, we managed to get in contact with different companies who had interest in distributing Retreat. After a bit of reflection, we decided to start the second phase of our label with one of the world’s most renowed distributor: Word And Sound.
So all the remaining records are on their way to the WAS offices in Hamburg as we speak and we’re very much looking forward to work with this prestigious company for promoting our entire catalogue and all our upcoming projects.
But in the meantime, since it might take a few weeks for Word And Sound to offer our releases to the shops, we would like to invite every person who’s in need of some Retreat Wax to visit our webshop or the one from Oye Records and place an order directly.
Needless to say, Hauke and I are more motivated than ever to continue our mission, which is to bring you quality dance music on the best-sounding medium. Rest assured that you can expect RTR016 to hit the stores in the near future…but more on that one next time!
Thank you for your support and please stay tuned!
