KEEP THE RHYTHM ALIVE: HELP SAVE MIND GAMES REC FROM CLOSING

KEEP THE RHYTHM ALIVE: HELP SAVE MIND GAMES RECORDINGS FROM CLOSING

Dear friends... Sadly, Mind Games Recordings is at risk of closing. Founded by me in 2017, with the first release published in May, exactly 8 years later, some events are leading to this sad possibility. What is happening? Given the rapid growth of the label, and to provide an even more professional service to the artists of the label and to the lovers of this musical genre who follow, support and share our work, I decided that the time had come to change distributor, to move from the "original" one to a much more professional and complete one. From that moment an odyssey began, since the old distributor didn't accept that the label and therefore the work of the artists, their and mine music were distributed on all the main platforms by anyone other than them, despite being known, and, I assure you, not in a positive way, by many people who work in this scene. For several reasons. After weeks of trying to resolve the issue in a peaceful and friendly way, we arrive at today, where I am being asked to pay what to me is a large sum of money to "free" Mind Games and EFPW, a small sister label, which I launched a few years ago, with about ten releases, but which is currently inactive, as I have focused all my work in the last few years on Mind Games and my own productions. I have always called this an extortion attempt, as I am told: "Either you pay or you will not be free". But maybe that's just me being an idealist. Anyway, that's why the label's latest release, Playmo's Liquid Circuits album, to be precise, is available on all major electronic music listening and purchasing platforms, but is not available exclusively in the Beatport and Traxsource shops (for the moment). Those who work in this industry know that stores like Beatport in particular are vital for the survival of a label these days (which is already a very difficult mission in itself, who knows, knows), as well as Bandcamp and similar platforms, of course. In recent years, especially in the last ones, Mind Games has been a point of reference for fans of the genre, DJs and not, but above all for talented artists who, in many cases, are not given the necessary tools to express themselves, because maybe they are not "famous" or don't have many "followers" on social media or similar stupidities, despite being very cool musicians. I myself, in my early years as a producer, had many "closed doors" because I didn't have the right friends, I was not "famous" enough etc... As I have said several times in the past to my fellow producers, "I don't care about the number of your followers, but what you transmit with your music". As a producer with several years of experience in the industry, I always listen to all the demos I receive, and when I have some free time I also give some advice to producers in whom I see potential. A good part of the artists who release their music with Mind Games, later grow even more and release on other labels, in some cases even more important, or are invited to play in shows or record podcasts... I like to think that I help some of them in their very personal artistic journey. In short, for me Mind Games is, as obviously other labels are, a family, but also a glimmer of light for talents, in a system rotten to the core, where money and "popularity" always seem to prevail. We try to resist all this and fight it in our own way, despite the many difficulties. Honestly, I would have liked to avoid getting to this point, but either we save Mind Games now or I will be forced to close it. It would be really sad to have to do so, after more than 8 years of work, but as you will have understood the current circumstances are more than unfavorable and I would have no other choice. So I thought I would try to raise the funds needed to pay the amount required to "free" the past and future releases, and then finally distribute them again with the help of someone I trust and who is a 100% industry professional. Only if you can, I ask you to donate even a small amount. If you can't, I totally understand, but I would still greatly appreciate a share on your social profiles, a supportive comment, anything that can help save something beautiful, something constructive. As you can imagine, for legal reasons I cannot publicly provide details about the old distributor and the exact amounts requested for every single release, in the form of extortion. This money will be used to pay all the costs (which I will call extortion) necessary to delete the releases from the old distributor to have the possibility to re-upload them thanks to the new distributor. We are talking about more than 80 releases. Those who know me well and/or who has had the opportunity to collaborate with me in the past, knows that I have always done everything with my heart and for the love of music, to give "voice" to well-known but above all "emerging" artists, as I was a few years ago. Artists I truly believe in. Each Mind Games release, not only reaches the social audience (furthermore, struggling every day with the social algorithms that you all know, which limit the visibility of posts if you don't do ads), but also thanks to a powerful Promo Pool built over the years, the music of those who publish on Mind Games reaches so many people: DJs of all levels and consequently podcasts, radios, magazines, YouTube channels (not only ours, which recently surpassed 1000 real subscribers, I want to point out) and many other sites and platforms, but, above all... The dance floors. So I think I can say with certainty that each release, in the end, reaches tens of thousands of people around the world, if not more. So... If you believe that all this is positive, right, beautiful and that it should have a future... I ask you to show some love! Therefore, to help us fight (and win) this battle against this fucked up system. However it ends, thank you to each of you who are reading my words. In the end, if you can or want to help save Mind Games, you'll find the GoFundMe link in bio. Thank you so much to everyone, really. Of course, I will keep you updated about everything.

With love,

Luca Maniaci

The "Mind" behind Mind Games Recordings.