Spinning support for vinyl venture

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This article was published 06/04/2023 (945 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Making an album ain’t cheap, says John Baron, a third of the brotherly trio FIINN.

It’s never been that way, but for FIINN’s upcoming album, Baron, along with his brothers Matt and Dan, are hoping to go all out: their as-yet-untitled sophomore record will be the first one the group has pressed to vinyl.

To raise money for the endeavour, the band takes to the Good Will Social Club stage on Friday, April 7, supported by the delightful indie group Sun Dayclub and the rising singer-songwriter Taylor Jackson, who will be playing with a full backing band. Mike Dunn will drum with FIINN.

“This is the first time we’ve done an album fundraiser,” says Baron. “It’s mostly to let ticket buyers know where the money is going, which is straight into the mastering phase to finish this record up.”

The popularity of the vinyl medium has soared of late, with vinyl sales outpacing CDs for the first time since 1987, according to the Recording Industry Association of America. Revenues for vinyl records grew by 17 per cent in 2022, reaching $1.2 billion in the U.S. With such high demand, the supply comes into question: as the year ended, vinyl pressing orders routinely required a lead time of one year.

United Record Pressing in Nashville, the continent’s largest record manufacturer, had to up its production capacity by nearly three times to keep up with the pace, according to Grammy.com.

But the pressing costs only make up one portion of the album production costs, says Baron, who has recently toured with artists including Winnipeg pop diva Begonia and Noah Derksen, who just won Sirius XM’s Top of the Country competition.

The brothers Baron have used their accumulated equipment and gear at home studios to record and track the album. They paid their drummer to track his parts, and then went to Winnipeg’s No Fun Club studio for a three-day session. They paid local singer Kris Ulrich, fresh off an album of his own, for engineering services. Then, they enlisted Roman Clarke, a bandmate of Baron’s in the Funky Miracles and other projects, to mix it. “It’s a per-song rate across the board, and there’s no real buddy rate,” says Baron. “We want to support our friends.”

After the mixing, the album heads to Toronto to be mastered by Kristian Montano. And aside from that, the album art was produced by American illustrator and graphic designer Kinsey Hotchkiss.

Then comes the vinyl pressing, which FIINN will accommodate with pre-orders. Other marketing cash goes toward T-shirts and other merchandise.

“To create art, it ain’t cheap,” says Baron, who with FIINN released Try Me, a 10-song album, in 2021. The band has about one-fifth of its production costs left to cover, Baron says.

Tickets for the band’s show are available through thegoodwill.ca for $17.50, or $20 at the door. The band is giving free coasters designed by Hotchkiss to the first 100 people to buy tickets. The coasters also contain a scannable QR code to give access to one of the already-mastered songs from the upcoming album.

ben.waldman@winnipegfreepress.com