Pressing delays: where the records are

Several people have asked where "Rue des Cascades" is. It will be out on 25 February. Margaux Delorme delivered in September, and that gap is now normal.

In 2019 a 12 inch took about eight to ten weeks from approved master to boxes in the spare room. The most recent quote was thirty-one weeks, and people with bigger catalogues say thirty-one is good. Here is what I have been able to piece together, and some of it is trade talk, so treat it accordingly.

The lacquers

Before a record can be pressed, the master is cut into a lacquer disc. In February 2020 a fire destroyed a factory in California that was one of only two places in the world making the blanks. Supply was already short before anything else happened, and cutting engineers have been rationed since. Ours now asks for dates three months ahead.

The compound

PVC has been expensive and hard to get. Freight has added to that, as container prices have risen sharply and boats have been held up.

Everyone else

This is the big one. People stayed in during lockdown and bought records, more of them than anyone expected. Large companies book very large runs of very famous albums, and a run that size can occupy a press for weeks. There are not many presses. A label ordering 500 copies of a deep house 12 inch comes well down the list, which is understandable. The plant has been straight about it throughout.

What this has changed here

Slots are now booked before records are finished. Frieda Lux's album is booked for a September release, and at the time of writing it is about two thirds written. It is also why "Venloer" and "Fourvière" came out seven weeks apart last autumn: that was when the slots fell.

The label has also had its first bad test pressing since all this started, with non-fill on one side, where the vinyl does not flow fully into the groove and you get a sound like frying. You send it back, lose your place and wait. Round 2 landed three working days before its release date, with one pallet corner damaged by a forklift.

Thanks to everyone waiting on a pre-order. Revised dates are on each release page.