For a country as small as Ireland, for many years now there has been no shortage of quality independent record labels from each corner of the island that have punched well above their weight in terms of output. While some, like Sligo’s always excellent Art For Blind, have called it a day in recent years, one of the burgeoning newer labels picking up the mantle is Blowtorch Records, founded by Richard Burke in early 2019 and increasingly involved with some of the finest records coming out of these shores.
Though based in Galway, their roster covers the length and breadth of the island, with perhaps particularly notable releases coming from Dublin’s Search Results, Limerick’s His Father’s Voice, Belfast’s Virgins and Cork-via-Lisbon’s pôt-pot. Defining itself boldly as ‘The Future Sound Of Ireland’ and with a passion for affordable physical formats, Blowtorch has been going from strength to strength over the past couple of years.
Cathal McBride caught up with Richard to learn more about the label’s past, present and future.
Explore Blowtorch Records here and here
Hi Richard. Blowtorch Records has been running for a few years now. How did it start and what was the original impetus for setting the label up?
Yes, Blowtorch Records will be six years old in January 2025. As well as loving music I’ve always been fascinated by record labels, what they stand for and how they are perceived. When you read about eccentric labels like Postcard or Fast Product (who remarkably released the first records from Gang of Four and The Human League), you can see they always struggled with getting information out to fans and also distributing records.
Six years ago, I could sense that the digital democratisation of music i.e. bands and producers making music in bedroom studios and delivering it to fans, had been hijacked by Spotify and others. While nominally giving musicians a platform to upload their music they were also acting as gatekeepers and of course in the interests of their own profits. So a sense of injustice, coming up with the name and logo, a love of DIY labels and the ability for non-techies to design and build a website, all inspired and conspired over Christmas and New Year 2018 to create Blowtorch Records. For a committed left winger, it’s the dream of the worker owning and controlling the means of production and distribution.
You’re based in Galway but you’ve also released music from acts based all over the island. How do you find new acts to work with? Is it more a case of artists approaching you or you approaching them?
Initially we weren’t explicitly an Irish label – we didn’t particularly make a thing of being based in Galway and we promoted music from all over. I found stuff I liked, mainly on SoundCloud, and got in touch with the makers to see if they were interested in working with us, mainly on digital promotion. We had bands from USA, Australia, UK and Japan as well as Ireland.
This changed when I started managing Turnstiles. Luke, who was the drummer, is my wife’s nephew and he told me how hard it was for them to get gigs. Promoters wouldn’t take a chance on an unknown punk band. I thought this was both ridiculous and unfair, so I offered to help them out getting gigs, using the name Blowtorch Records which I guess sounded more appealing to venues.
This helped me realise that having a local focus and narrowing down our roster to music from the island of Ireland would be much more effective. And also the importance of physical releases. The quantity and the quality of new music coming out of these 32 counties is both incredible and inspiring. So with that and also people becoming more aware of who we are, we have no shortage of bands to work with.
With Ireland’s only pressing plant Dublin Vinyl closing down this year and other pressing plants apparently lumbered with huge backlogs of endless unnecessary Record Store Day reissues, how easy is it to regularly release music on vinyl at the moment, especially for a small boutique label?
We work with a brilliant Scottish company called Seabass Vinyl – Scotland’s first and only vinyl pressing plant. Their turnaround time is about 9 weeks for an album release which is amazingly short compared to two years ago but also they are such joy to work with. Sound people, no corporate bullshit and a big environmental commitment.
We recently had to use a big plant in the Czech Republic as they were the only place which would do a specific type of printing which the band wanted. Total nightmare – we would never use them again.
Interestingly we are getting plants contacting us offering deals – there is now more supply than demand. I don’t know if this is because more have opened or whether fewer bands are doing vinyl – maybe both.
Blowtorch releases always seem to be very reasonably priced at a time when the price of a record often seems to be going up and up in many places. Is it ever difficult to keep costs down, and is this something you feel is important to maintain?
Price is very important to us. It’s part of who we are and a big difference between us and high street vinyl shops. Partly it’s practical of course – nobody has much money, you can get everything for free on streaming services and of course we have shipping charges. However like when The Clash forfeited profit to bring out Sandinista as a triple album for £3.99, it’s also a principle. Don’t rip people off.
We don’t have big overheads which helps. When you look at the majors flogging multiple versions of the same tired old crap you have to order where the money goes.
The label website also contains a blog featuring regular reviews of both Irish and international artists, and a podcast interviewing musical figures both from the label and not. Was it always important to you for Blowtorch to be more than just a record label?
Very much so. I see Blowtorch Records as a beacon for culture as well as music. We celebrate great Irish music for sure but also design, writing, video – ideas I guess really. I love people with ideas which don’t gave to be costed or make money. Rob from The Swedish Railway Orchestra is a great one for that. Art for art’s sake as 10cc said. I’d be delighted if one of our bands did a movie like Kneecap. If I had the time I’d love to do a physical magazine. So Young do one and also The Goo in Dublin is brilliant. They’ve been very supportive of Blowtorch. I guess our website is trying to be a digital music and arts magazine.
We’re huge fans of the Search Results album here in particular, but do you have any of your own personal favourites from the Blowtorch catalogue, or is that an impossible question?
The Search Results LP is amazingly unquantifiable and probably my favourite too. I love the immediacy of 7” singles so if I really had to choose I’d probably go for Some Remain’s Never Enough/Montoya single. Long sold out. Or Japanese Jesus’ Depression Breakfast EP – I can’t understand how that hasn’t sold out. It’s brilliant and has one of the best song titles ever in ‘Eamon Dunphy (Is Always Grand)’. And of course there’s the new Turnstiles record. FYI Search Results have a new EP out on December 13 – Hot Night. Check their Bandcamp for details.
Finally, what’s 2025 looking like so far for Blowtorch Records?
Busy! At the moment, our first physical release of 2025 will be the debut EP from Blue Slate on 10” vinyl but that could well change – we are talking to a new band about a CD release in January. That’s what I love about keeping it DIY – we can be organised up to a point but we can also be very agile and take on new stuff very quickly. I can’t wait to see what happens. It will be physical and fairly priced whatever.
