14.12.2014 by Simian Keiser

Club Talk — Public Possession and Independent Logic

It’s a dire sign of the record market’s current state: that so many DJs have traded in their vinyl for digital media, which has led to a wave of record shop closures in recent years. It’s especially dire because worldwide vinyl sales have actually been increasing, not decreasing. Only now the point of sale has migrated — to mega online record stores or marketplaces and to department stores like Virgin in Paris or Dussmann in Berlin, which have long since re-introduced vinyl into their music sections.

This development runs parallel to the market-shift in other artistic branches. Bookstores have also become dominated by neoliberal principals, with online sellers and department store-like chains having displaced countless local and specialized shops, and few publishers haven’t been pulled under the umbrella of a publishing giant. Yet the capitalistic promise — that demand will regulate supply — hasn’t been fulfilled. What’s produced isn’t necessarily what consumers covet, but rather what can be most easily sold under even the most difficult conditions.

Filling the gaps in the mass markets’ offerings are the independent labels which have sprung up in recent years. Driven by their love of the material, they’ve not only proven that quality is rarely the result when the goal is to sell as much as possible, but also that a product produced well — as opposed to just well enough — often does draw consumer demand.

Munich’s Marvin Schuhmann and Valentino Betz have dedicated themselves to just these ideas. In March 2013, when they founded Public Possession —

a record store and label — many considered them mad. But the duo saw no alternative: “The records we were looking for simply weren’t available anymore in Munich, and we knew this was the case for others,” Valentino says. At some point they decided to “Just fuck it.” And they were right — about 80 to 90 percent of their customers rarely or never visit the city’s larger record-selling chains. It’s because of them that Public Possession isn’t worried about the future. “At the

moment it seems like people like us,” Valentino says.

What visitors to Public Possession find is a sound selection lying somewhere between that of Wackie’s, Workshop and L.I.E.S. — to search here for a copy of Get Physical or the like would be in vain. Furthermore, Marvin and Valentino work closely with the artists and labels they admire. In-store sessions are regularly held on Friday or Saturday afternoons, and have featured acts like Ron Morelli, Hunee and Ilias Pitsios of Echovolt alongside local DJs, whose albums have their own section in the store. The sessions are often followed by the monthly Public Possession party in Charlie, Munich’s best club at this moment. Charlie’s founder, Benjamin Roeder, also attended grade school with Marvin and Valentino.

In the first PP Zine, released for the shop’s one-year anniversary, the Public Possession duo described their drive as the “fun of creation” — “let it be a sticker, a handout/flyer, the next vinyl or this zine.” Theirs is a DIY logic, driven by seeing oneself as a producer rather than always a consumer. In this spirit, the independent label credo, “If you don’t make it, we will,” is also Public Possession’s. With it, Marvin and Valentino are continuing a tradition that many other vinyl-only labels have compellingly advanced in recent years: connecting the love of sound to the love of the well-made final product.

The catalogue of a Public Possession label now consists of five releases, including two edits. ‘Leftfield House’ is probably the category that best describes the sound, and demand is high — the first record has already been repressed three times, to keep it from becoming too exclusive. “Naturally you’re secretly happy that the records cost tons on Discogs,” Valentino says, “but in the end, no one profits from this except for some guy in Belgium.” What matters is making what one loves available to the public — even if it means fighting the odds — an idea embedded right in Public Possessions’ name.