Imagine if you'd had more support when you were younger.
What might you have achieved?
If you are a young person who has no support, no family, if you are abused or neglected, homeless or poor, imagine how much more that support might help.
That is what we offer.
18 months ago, we
started a music program called XYZ in the Blue Mountains of New South
Wales to support and encourage 12 to 21 year old's through the writing, rehearsing and recording of their own music.
In an area with high youth unemployment,
high drug use and very few resources dedicated to young people, we
were astounded by the amount of talent and enthusiasm that we found
here.
The program expanded to arranging local,
all ages gigs for young bands to play at and gain experience. It also
gave people who lived in the area, no matter what their age the
chance to hear what was going on around them.
The project has continued to
grow, and now, we feel the best way to serve the young musicians we
work with is to take the project to the next step and form our very
own label, XYZ RECORDS.
This will enable us to
take young aspiring musicians through the entire creative process,
from writing the song, to recording the song to distributing the
song. The whole time, the young people involved will be completely involved in the process,
learning along the way, whilst keeping complete control over their
own creations and helping to run the label itself.
BUT we need your help
to make this happen.
XYZ is a volunteer run
organization with a staff of, uh, one (that would be me) and up until this point, I have been very willingly putting my hand in my own pocket.
Now though, with the initial
costs needed to set up an independent label, we don’t have the funds
to cover the initial outlay.
And how much is that
initial outlay? How much will it cost to set up this social
enterprise, completely unique independent label?
$2000 dollars.
That’s it. $2000
dollars.
This will cover our
initial recording costs (we work lo-fi and we work efficiently) and physical printing of CD’s, posters,
badges as well as the administrative fees for online sales.
It’s not much in the
great scheme of things, but it would enable us to empower, encourage
and possibly change the lives of a great many young people.
We believe that what we are attempting is pretty unique in the
world; a social enterprise, independent label, entirely co-run by
young, under privileged people FOR young, under privileged people! A label where all profits go to the performers who control every aspect
of their own music.
We don’t know if this
has ever been done before and we would like, with your help to make
it a reality.
We have the business
plan. We have the talent. We have the enthusiasm.
We’re ready to go,
all we need are the resources to start.
If you can, please dig deep and help these young people take control of their own music, their own passions and their own lives.
PERKS!PERKS!PERKS!PERKS!PERKS!PERKS!PERKS!PERKS!PERKS!PERKS!
Of course,
we here at XYZ KNOW that kindness and generosity of spirit are their own
reward… but we’d be FOOLS to live by that on a crowd funding campaign, wouldn’t
we?!?
So we’ve
got LOADS of fantastic PERKS for digging deep and helping us build this mini empire.
Of course,
being a music label, we want to reward you with free music, free albums and, if
you donate over a MILLION dollars we will personally play at every birth,
birthday, wedding, funeral, graduation and/or bar mitzvah you or your loved
ones should EVER have in your lifetime!
Short of
the million we would very sincerely like to thank you by offering free digital
singles, free digital albums and even the chance to have a lifetime membership
of free CD’s from XYZ.
We also
have a range of T-Shirts we’re putting together for you lucky, lucky people (so
you can wear them around town and show all the cool kids that you were into XYZ
waaay before they were) as well as a collection of posters (so you can stick
them up on your bedroom wall and show all the cool kids that you were into XYZ
waaay before they were) and an awesome collection of band badges (so you can
stick them on your face and show all the cool kids in town that you had lost
your mind waaay before they did).
Most of
all, we just want to offer you the chance to be a part of something important that will make a MASSIVE difference to the lives of many kids for a long time to come.
The names of ALL those who donated will be included
within our Charter and will be framed and hung on the wall in eternal honour of
your kindness. We will daily salute it, sing our pledge allegiance (it sounds a bit like the Ghostbusters Theme but with much more swearing) and, when appropriate we shall dance in
a rather uncoordinated fashion to hits of the eighties whilst chanting your
names alphabetically.
The footage
of these sessions will be available on youtube and can be viewed at
a very reasonable price.
THE FUTURE!
THE FUTURE! THE FUTURE! THE FUTURE! THE FUTURE!
We’re not sure what the future holds, but we
think it looks a little bit like this;
Scary, no?
For XYZ,
the future means always moving forward and with the forming of XYZ RECORDS, we
know we’re moving in the right direction. We want to be able to provide
whatever the young people we work with need; to help them grow, find new ways out of bad situations, do for themselves
and gain a sense of worth and meaning in what they do.
We also
want to help them melt people’s faces with the sheer awesomeness of their music
(sorry, didn’t want to get too maudlin there).
I know how
hard these young people work at what they do and I know how good the results of
those efforts are. XYZ RECORDS will enable us to show the rest of the world
this too. So check the pitch, check the perks, take a couple more minutes
looking at the dancing GIF (hypnotic, isn’t it?), then, please dig deep and be a part
of something that really matters.
Questions? You have questions? Go for it...
What happens if you don't reach your campaign goal?
Well, firstly we will openly weep.
But then once we've pulled ourselves together, we will carry on regardless. We very much preach a 'do it yourself' philosophy through this program and part of that, is facing adversity and carrying on regardless (while we're on the subject, how much does a kidney sell for these days?)
In all seriousness though, we will just have to work on a much smaller scale, using whatever funds we do receive and using this whole experience as a learning tool for the young people involved and finding ways to make it work in future. We don't really have the option here to just stop and say, oh well. This label is too important.
What is the money actually for?
We want to be able to better maintain the studio space we have, providing young people at risk a secure and safe place to regularly go.
We are looking to release the recordings we already have as a physical and digital product. This requires costs for printing and online administration (subscription fees and such).
Your money will procure us ongoing resources to put on our ALL AGES GIGS regularly, where young musicians can gain experience and self worth, whilst those not playing have somewhere meaningful to go and something meaningful to participate in.
This is grass roots stuff. We're not looking for the most polished product here or to compete with Iggy azalea (although i look FABulous in hot pants). We are looking for raw, unpolished talent, energy and enthusiasm and we've got that by the bucketload.
Is 2000 dollars going to be enough?
Absolutely. This budget has been measured out to the dollar to accommodate for the first three releases of the label (as well as the accompanying All Ages shows), allowing us then the latitude to promote, record, recoup our costs and proceed with the next portion of our releases.
Of course, more will always help. The more funds we raise, the more we can help our young people. So if you see that amount hit $2000, please don't stop as the more you give, the more we can do.
Who the hell are you?
My name is Richard. Nice to meet'cha :)
I'm a 40 year old dad of two boys who works as a co-ordinator in the healthcare industry by day and tries to crowd fund social enterprising, independent record labels by night. I spend every minute outside of my day job helping the young people of my area and listening to their stories, their problems and their amazing music.
I have played music all my life and know first hand the difference music can make to a young persons life. I started the XYZ project to help the huge amount of young people i've seen here in the Blue Mountains feel supported, encouraged and accepted through music, allowing me the privilege of listening to their music first hand, being able to help them realise it and being allowed the gift of seeing who they really are.
Why 'Flexible Funding?'
Because, no matter what, we're going to make and release these young musicians tunes!
However much we make, it is ALL going to go towards this label, EVERY cent and come hell or high water (whatever that means) we're going to see these young bands through the entire process.
So, when will this label actually start?
Unofficially? We're already running all the behind the scenes shenanigans and administrative duties and will continue to do so up until the cut off date.
Officially? The second the campaign finishes and we tally up what we've made. Then we'll know exactly where we stand and we'll be hitting the ground running.