Poneman: The Postal Service's 'Give Up' is Sub Pop's second best-selling album
Jonathan Poneman · Sub Pop Records: Bruce Pavitt and Jonathan Poneman · Jun 1, 2020 · at 1:18:46
Sub Pop co-founder Jonathan Poneman discusses the early 2000s renaissance of the indie record label with host Guy Raz.
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“Second best-selling.”
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More from Jonathan Poneman
Poneman: Running Sub Pop was easier broke than funded
“In some ways it was much easier to run the label with no money than it became when we had some money.”
Poneman: Warner deal proceeds went directly to the founders, not Sub Pop
“Similarly, the deal was done with Bruce and myself, singularly. It was not done with SubPop, so the money went directly to Bruce and myself.”
Poneman: Sub Pop pioneered direct COD retail sales for US indie labels
“And at the time, independent record labels weren't doing this in the United States. We all figured that we needed to have a relationship with a distributor to get our records into the stores. But Bruce and I picked up the phone, and we decided to start selling…”
Poneman: Kurt Cobain regularly insisted Nirvana should sell a million records
“Kurt would Tell me regularly. We should be selling a million of these. And I'd be going, you don't understand, you know.”
Poneman: Post-Nirvana, we paid $150k for bands that previously cost $2k
“Well, there were bands who, before Nirvana had their explosive success, we would have signed for 2000 dollars. In one particular case, I signed one of those bands for 150,000 dollars.”
Poneman: 'Grunge' as a cultural gestalt will outlast the era's bands
“There are few things that I think are going to stand the test of time than the word grunge. I think a lot of these bands will long be forgotten, but that word grunge and the Style, and time, and gestalt. You know, everything that it summons will stay.”