There are a lot of record labels out there, but there are some really exceptional teams out there working on some truly fantastic work. Based in Barcelona, the electronic music Classicworks released is no holds barred, daring, and yet finely curated. Their releases aren’t for the novice listener by any means, but for those looking for next level releases in everything from techno to electro to acid and much more, Classicworks has been a well-hidden secret in DJ circles and the subject of our profiling today. We chatted with Cardopusher, the co-labelhead of the label with fellow-artist Nehuen to learn more about all of their fantastic releases.
What are your highest moments throughout the label? On the flip side, what were major difficulties you found along the way?
Our highest moments are the ones when we finally see any of our releases out. Also having our own platform to put out our own stuff has helped us to be under the radar. Great artists, festivals and proposals in general have reached us. Major difficulties could be the financial area. Sometimes you have an specific idea in mind but you have a limited budget so this makes it difficult.
Going into crafting a label, are there any lessons you’ve learned that you wish you knew before you started it? If someone was looking to start a record label, what would be the one word of advice you would give them?
Having a label is a lot of work. Even if it´s a small label like us, it´s a day to day work, planning next releases, working with deadlines, finding the right distribution (which is really difficult these days for starting). The advice i would give to someone who is planning to start a record label is to be responsible, specially if other people´s work is involved and the most important, quality over quantity.
If someone heard about your label for the first time, we’d obviously recommend they check out your entire back catalog (of course), but if you could only recommend 5 tracks, which ones best highlight what Classicworks is about?
Worker/Parasite – Gourd
Lolo & Sosaku – Man Ray
Nehuen & Nick Hook – How You Feeling (Cardopusher E. Rave 93 Mix)
Nehuen – Jam2 (El Gaucho Mix)
Cardopusher – Hyperwave
You’ve probably met thousands upon thousands of people, what drove you to team up with Nehuen to create a label. What inspirations do you draw upon each other? What qualities do you each have respectively that helps you guys work and collaborate together?
I met Nehuen just when i moved to Barcelona from Caracas around eight years ago through a mutual friend. After few years of hanging around and playing gigs together we were at the same point where our music didn´t fit the standards of regular record labels because some of them are very purists and since we don´t care too much about that we were having a hard time to get our stuff released. Also we have similar tastes so next logical step was to start the to release our own musical vision. One of the qualities we have is that we like to do things without thinking too much, so this makes things easy when taking decisions or making tracks.
What can we expect from Classicworks for the rest of 2016?
We are working on few releases at the moment, our first tape compilation called “Common Denominator” is about to drop in next weeks. It will include 8 tracks with familiar names on the label with new ones. Also we are preparing an EP by a swedish artist called Daniel Araya (who is featured on the compilation) and just after there will be probably a Cardopusher/Nehuen 7″ split too. There is more to come obviously but we can´t talk too much right now as some stuff is in early stages.
