RSD ambassadors: spelling the end of the independent celebration
Record Store Day is back upon us, like the music geek’s Christmas. But are we ready for an uncomfortable truth?
I think that Record Store Day has lost the spirit of what Record Store Day really means. It’s supposed to be a celebration of the lesser heard, rough and ready, and fiercely independent side of music, both for the fan and the artist. Instead, what we’re being met with now is an increasingly monopolised event, only focusing on getting bodies in shops for one day alone.
There are many routes I could go down to make a case for this argument, but the role of the RSD ambassador seems to be the most powerful and incisive tool with which the market of the day is being narrowed and pushed into the mainstream. Of course, it’s easy to see the reasons why, but it doesn’t stand up to a whole lot of scrutiny.
Before starting to dissect the entire bones of RSD, it’s important to say that I appreciate the role the ambassador plays on the most basic level – it’s an endorsement of a name that many people will know, and therefore attracts a new kind of audience into independent record shops every year, aside from the typical vinyl diehards. That much is at least understandable.
Yet, when you look at the line-up of both global and UK ambassadors in recent years, it just seems as though the choices that the organisers of RSD are making are somewhat missing the mark of the event they first set out to create. I mean, forgive me if I’m mistaken, but Taylor Swift, Bruno Mars, and Elton John don’t exactly scream indie, do they?
This is meant with no offence to any of the artists involved, particularly Olivia Dean, who is taking the spotlight this year as the ambassador for the UK, as they all take up a place in the musical zeitgeist that is undeniably significant to the scene at large. But nevertheless, I can’t shake the feeling that a day dedicated to championing the vital cause of independent record shops should also be doing more to lift up their fellow independent artists.
After all, was that not where the modern resurgence of vinyl began, with sonic savants refusing to let go of nostalgia and searching out the deepest cuts and most obscure records they could find? It was that commitment, largely above all else, which gave record shops their much-needed leg back up into the world of today.
It just creates the feeling that they should really be repaying the favour, rather than cashing in on a chart-led, social media-fuelled zeitgeist which dictates the moves they make from one year to the next. Yes, they’ve achieved the aim of getting younger and possibly less familiar demographics into a new music-buying territory, but what about the people who paved the way for it?
As I say, I do not mean this as an attack on or any of their fans, but it simply feels like a great shame that RSD is positioning itself more and more as a giant commercial juggernaut with huge names attached. That’s surely never the ethos of independent record shops themselves, never mind when branching into the wider realm of artists and venues.
But the state of the music industry was ever thus. Losing the heart of what you stand for, only for the sake of getting the shiniest new pop star on the poster, is sadly the name of the game, and I am under no pretence that one slightly irate rant is going to overhaul the entire system.
Wouldn’t it be great to see individual record shops have the ability to champion their own choice of local unsung heroes, or even, at the very least, have one big star pick out a selection of independent names to highlight for the day? After all, it’s not about reinventing the wheel – just returning to the heart of what a celebration of independent record shops should really stand for.
RSD is very much its own cultural entity now, and long may it continue. However, if it hopes to still have any bargaining power as the bigwigs of the industry continue to monopolise, they need to hear this call from the sonic underdog: we’ll support you if you support us. It’s really that simple.
