Ross Shotland of Enjoy The Ride Records

This article has been imported from chorus.fm for discussion. All of the forum rules still apply.

This past month I was able to schedule a Zoom call with Ross Shotland, the owner/founder of Enjoy The Ride Records, to discuss how he operates his company. In this interview, I asked Ross about what keeps him motivated to run his company, the most rewarding parts of his business, and much more. If you’re enjoying the interview, please consider ordering an item from Enjoy The Ride Records here.

So thank you for your time today, Ross. It’s great to finally meet you face to face, albeit by zoom. Enjoy the Ride Records has done so many cool releases over these past few years, as I can see behind you, that treasure trove of releases. What are some of your proudest moments at this label?

I mean, everything we make is something that, more or less either me or our label manager Michele, would buy or want to exist. So, from the beginning, like the Drive-Thru Records catalog, Equal Vision catalog, which was the first 30-40-ish releases…I mean, it was all within there. But out of the first 10 releases, I think six or seven of them were Drive-Thru <titles>, which was a dream come true. But that was in 2010, before anyone cared, for the most part <about vinyl>. Most of that stuff was 500 copies, and stuck around for a few years at the time. But, definitely those catalogs, and Maroon Five’s Songs About Jane, and Limp Bizkit’s <Chocolate Starfish> release, and Tony Hawk’s release,(which is behind you i see), for Tony Hawk, I put that together from scratch. Like there’s a reason why there hasn’t been an official Tony Hawk Soundtrack.

Yeah, with all of the different record labels, I can only imagine…

Yeah, but we did the documentary on Blu-ray, and it was a nice little loophole where we had somebody who contacted Tony’s team and stuff already. So yeah, that one, and Baseketball we put out this year, which is one of my favorite comedies. And I’m a huge South Park, Matt and Trey fan, Nick Toons, stuff like that was always my favorite stuff growing up. That was huge!

What’s the hardest part about getting some of these compilations, to kind of come together, or get the right artists to commit to your guys’ label?

I mean, every project is different. Some stuff, we’re approached about. But, some stuff takes five years. I’ve definitely had some projects on average, where stuff takes a couple years, from the original idea to it actually physically being out. We generally avoid doing pre-orders. Both Michele and I are collectors, and from a personal standpoint, I hate pre-orders. I don’t like waiting for stuff. People generally arent good at making mock ups, but I’m sure you’ve been there, and I’ve been there many times where we’re trying to get a record that looks nothing like it was supposed to look. And it sucks.

What is the basic turnaround time in terms of making vinyl these days?

In terms of manufacturing? I mean, some labels are still kind of hiding behind saying, “oh, there’s such a delay…” But, granted, we use a few different places, and there’s not much of a delay, or turnaround time. Especially for a repress. But for a new release, we could get stuff ready to go in a few months, pretty easily. Maybe even quicker, if we had to call in the favor and there was an anniversary. Especially a re-press. But, for a while there in 2020 it was a year, easy.

And that’s when the height of vinyl interest was there too. I’ve talked with several different people, not just record labels, but the record stores themselves, and they’re like, “Yeah, this is crazy…!”

I mean, I think this was a combination of people being bored, people having the stimulus check, nostalgia, and just the right age range. Vinyl sounds good, looks pretty, the packaging is cool. And then people were on social media, because people didn’t have anything to do. And they realized a lot of this stuff existed until they kind of came across it. But I mean sports cards and all that stuff kind of exploded also. I think it was kind of the perfect storm of all the things I just mentioned.

What’s your basic process? Let’s say you have an idea of a soundtrack or band you want to work with. Would you pitch the idea to the label that owns the masters? Can you walk me through that process?

Yeah, every project is really different. With Hey, Arnold, for example, that was a very complicated, long process. We’ve done a lot of pressings of it, thankfully, and people love it. But that being said, it’s a very complicated process, depending on how things have been released, and if they’ve been released. The artwork, asset availability, audio availability…we try working with the band, labels, and the people as closely as we can. But a lot of the time, people don’t really care about vinyl, or don’t really understand it, and when we are actually explaining the different color variants and stuff like that, it gets kind of complicated. Especially when management is involved. That said, we always, at the very least, give them a heads up that we have the right to do this. And we would like to have you involved, but if you don’t want to be involved, that’s cool. If you are and don’t want us doing it at all for some reason or another, then let us know that too. But, that being said, you can be as involved or as little involved as you want to be. More often than not, they don’t really want to be involved. Sometimes, they’ll take variants for the web store or the studios are, depending on the property, like movie studios, if it’s a newer film, they want to promote and kind of push the film out in theaters. We’ve done some of that stuff. We’re approached by the studios for that stuff. Like, we did the Minecraft movie this year.

That was big for you guys!

Yeah! Looney Tunes’, The Day the Earth Blew Up, was another film that we did with the studio, while it was in theaters. And it just kind of helped them push it. And we’re fans of the franchises, too.

What’s been some of your favorite best sellers that you’ve put out?

I mean, Hey, Arnold is probably the thing that we have made the most, We’ve generally tried repressing things, but It’s not always that simple, which people don’t really understand. Sometimes it’s contractual stuff. We only make up to X amount <of copies>, or we can only make a couple of <something for> one label. We can’t <post> our pressing information. We can only make X amount of colors…Other labels want to approve every color, or want to approve every aspect of it. depends.Every label and every company is very different. The movie studios, and every company is very different in terms of how they handle it and how hands-on, and also not hands-on, that they want to be. We did The Sims, which was an anniversary thing. The music is really awesome. Yeah, and that said, it was also a very long process. We’ve been trying to do something with The Sims for at least five years, probably more, and then it just happened to be the anniversary and they were like, “The anniversary is coming up. We want to do something! Do you guys want to do it??” Because we’ve asked a million times. But everything is dependent on the situation. Who’s involved, the right place, the right time.

And how do you kind of stay in tune for when something comes up for an anniversary? Do you have a master calendar?

I mean…no. Some stuff, I’ll kind of have reminders, for sure. Depending on what it is, to be honest, more often than not, the labels or the rights holder, is going to do it themselves if there’s an anniversary. So that usually doesn’t really help our argument by kind of bringing it to their attention. So, it really depends on what we’re talking about and how the people feel about it. And also that was, during the pandemic or whatever up until now, the labels kind of combed through everything for what they thought would do well, and now thankfully, it seems like there’s some openings now. They’ve kind of done what they’ve wanted to do. It’s kind of a case-by-case basis, but a lot of these labels, we also do exclusive color variants with them where we don’t manufacture the albums, but we’re gonna press on ourselves, and then I’ll be like, can we get some? And sometimes it’s a decent amount. So these are all things that I’d want to own or whatever, so to have some sort of involvement one way or the other is cool.

How many people actually get a hold of those test pressings when you have them?

It really depends on the project. At the least, it’s me, and our label manager Michele, will listen to them. Usually our sound engineer, who works on the majority of our stuff, gets a copy. If the studio and or label wants them, sometimes they get copies. Sometimes their sound people get copies. If it’s a band, usually a member or two, or the band’s management will get copies. Like with Reel Big Fish, we’ve done a lot of stuff with Aaron, the singer, and he goes through everything in addition to our sound engineers, and Michele and I. So I mean, at least a few people, but sometimes it’s a bunch, sometimes up to 10 people.

So I also saw that you pressed All Time Low’s Dirty Work. And also Reel Big Fish’s Cheer Up, which are two big ones that were on my bucket list ,for sure. Is there some stuff that you’d really hope to get a hold of for yourself?

I mean, a lot of it is Disney or Fox, which is complicated…

Yeah, I think I mentioned on Instagram, about the Varsity Blues soundtrack. It’s my favorite of all time…

Soundtracks for physical media or soundtracks that have third party songs on it…meaning, bands that aren’t necessarily on the label of the soundtrack, get very complicated. Most labels don’t want to touch that stuff. They may or may not have contracts <for the songs>, and they don’t really want to spend the time for a random film that came out 25 years ago. But that said, South Park is definitely a dream. I mean, we did Baseketball, and I’ve tried doing many, many South Park related things, with Team America, we’ve tried many times. I mean, we’ve been told, quote/unquote, that they “have plans.” And then every couple years, I follow up, and it’s <the same answer>. That sort of stuff happens a lot, where they’re like, we have plans, and then they just never do it. And it’s very frustrating for both labels and consumers too. I want them. And then there’s some things, rarely, but a couple things that we’ve gotten to the test pressing phase, and then, for one reason or another, the higher-ups at whatever company decided that they didn’t want it happening at this point, and they’ve pulled the plug. Which is heartbreaking, and I can’t really give details, but it’s a tiresome job. And we’re a small company. We’re a few people. Michele and I are full time, and then we have a bunch of people that are part time, but I still pack the majority of orders myself.

And you also recently signed some bands, like Out Of Service. What did you learn about this experience, and kind of dipping into that side of the industry?

Well, first of all, thanks for promoting them. The first band we signed was Harvard. That was what I always wanted to do was to sign bands. Like I’m wearing a Drive-Thru shirt right now. I grew up wanting to have a label like where people checked out every band because they trusted the label and whatever. Granted, that still kind of exists, but not really like it did <before>. Harvard was successful at the end of the day. It was just a very long grind that we got pretty fortunate with Equal Vision getting involved later on. But like that took a couple of years, and at that point, they were my baby, and that was all I really had. So, I grinded very intensely with promoting on AbsolutePunk and all sorts of different places or whatever was popular at the time. But, I kind of pivoted into vinyl. I started collecting in 2003, and I was in college at that point. And then when I graduated in 2007 I started pretty seriously collecting and realizing most of the stuff I wanted didn’t exist, or had one very small pressing that was next to impossible to find. And then a couple other companies kind of popped up doing some other stuff. And it was the right place, at the right time. And I saw an opportunity. And with Out Of Service, I mean, I learned it’s hard. Even with their following, I figured that if I find the band that I genuinely think are good and I show them to the “X” amount of people who I hope trust my judgment, or whatever it would be, relatively simple. But nothing is relatively simple in the music industry. I mean, it definitely could have gone worse, and I think the records are great, all of them. Burden was the reason I signed them, and when the band sent me Burden a couple of years before, and I basically told them we don’t sign bands, but a couple years later, they followed up with these demos. And, I mean, I think that was during or around the pandemic, they kind of kept in touch. I thought it was good. I took a shot. And, I guess the rest is history.

So where did you go to school and what’d you study?

I went to the University of Buffalo, New York. I actually made my own major, which I guess is a thing! <Laughter> My degree is in music business. That being said, I took business classes at Buffalo, and then in the summers I took either remote or NYU music business classes. I don’t really think I learned that much in college that I’m really <today> I definitely didn’t take licensing classes and did not expect to go this route, for sure. I think everything is kind of the right place, at the right time, knowing the right people and having the right gut instinct too, I guess. The work ethic and everything else, particularly what I do, it’s a large financial risk on a lot of stuff. And I’m of the philosophy, generally, that you can always make more…although sometimes you can’t. <Laughter> But in most cases, you can always make more, and once they’re made, they exist, they take up space, and they cost money. And I think that a lot of other labels’ downfall is they use the overstock break, they’ll make double the amount, and it’ll sit with them forever. It’s a double-edged sword. Rx Bandits’ Progress is a /500 record. But, I can’t make more.

So you’ve also dipped your toes into cassettes and Blu-Rays, like you mentioned before. How often do you get pitched ideas from weirdos like me online?

I’ve been doing this for 15 years.The first vinyl release was Juliana Theory’s Music From Another Room EP, and that came out in July or August of 2010… so because I’m a pop culture junkie, and most of the ETR media Blu-Ray stuff are pop culture documentaries, and I watch music and film documentaries and stuff, which kind of always gives me ideas…and Michele has been working with us for nine years this october. And between the two of us, we have pretty eclectic tastes, and talk about a lot of stuff. Obviously, we don’t know everything, and we definitely are pitched stuff from time to time, but usually we’ve already thought of it, or it’s a legal issue, or something, where another company did it.

And do you feel like you need to respond to each person that reaches out to you?

Both of us do social media, and I mainly handle the DMs, but at the very least I read everything, and I respond to almost everybody, if it’s something to be responded to. Because I am also a collector and a customer to a lot of other companies, and I know for a fact they don’t do that. And sometimes people will send a DM instead of an email. Like, they said they’ve moved to a different address, and it’s gonna end up being a larger headache for me down the road. Plus, as a customer of any company, people are just used to it, and don’t realize that they’re talking to actual people. I’ve had people threaten my family because they couldn’t get a Transformers record before…

My god…I’m sorry you had to deal with that.

They couldn’t get the color variant of the record that they wanted, but the other color was still available. That has happened!

Vinyl collectors are a different kind of animal…What were your goals when you first started this company of Enjoy the Ride Records, and how close are you to achieving or potentially surpassing those goals?

I mean, realistically, the goal was to do this full-time and make a living <out of it>. And I mean, I’ve far surpassed that, thankfully. I mean, we’re coming up on 250 ETR catalog releases.

Because you number them, right?

Yeah, I mean, every label has some sort of catalog. Some labels have insanely long numbers with dashes that you could never keep track of. But Drive-Thru Records as an example, their older stuff was, DTR-007 or whatever. And, as a collector, I mean, nobody has everything, except for me, I’m pretty sure. <Laughter> Which I, in no way shape or form, blame. Because, most labels are like, “Oh, we do 80’s horror movies!” Or, “We do pop-punk bands”… We do everything under the sun from the McGruff 80s cassette soundtrack to Limp Bizkit, too.

But that’s what I appreciate about you guys. You’re not pigeon-holed into one thing, you know?

I mean, I think that’s one of the smarter things I did. Truly, it’s stuff that I want to see exist from a customer and consumer standpoint. But the goal, truly, was to be able to make a living, especially in 2010 where there weren’t reissues coming out and bands weren’t really even familiar what I was talking about… There weren’t really people clamoring for <vinyl> So I’ll keep this going for as long as I can, while I still enjoy it.

So you are Enjoying the Ride??

Well, the name comes from where I was in a car accident…I haven’t done that many interviews, but I’ve mentioned in some of them, but I was in a car accident. I was managing my friend’s band at the time, and they were recording their debut EP. We were coming back from the studio. We got T-boned by a drunk driver, and I grabbed the bar that the laundry usually goes on and we flipped. And the hood crushed my hand because I was holding the thing, and it kind of fucked up a couple of my fingers. But, I took the settlement money and started the label that said I always wanted to do a label. So, I would have never had enough money to do what I did <without that accident> My original budget for Harvard, which included marketing, was less than what the album cost to record alone.

Wow!

And that was a huge price break from what Brian McTernan, who recorded it, <quoted>. He recorded a lot of my favorite records that he did, and the fact that he even answered us, and was interested, was shocking to us. And then he was willing to basically, he was like, I do a couple albums here, like a passion project, and I won’t really charge my normal rate. But even with that deal, which was a fraction of what he would normally charge, it was still under what my original business plan budget was good.

Yeah, Brian’s a cool dude, so that doesn’t surprise me.

Yeah, Brian’s great. He’s genuinely a really good dude. Harvard, the band really loves him. They did both of their records with him, and I’m pretty sure the guitarist still kind of has a relationship with him.

The last question I have for you is, what continues to keep you motivated and wanting you to keep doing this label?

I mean, we love physical media and I’m just tired at this point. Both of us work a lot, but I mean, I’m genuinely thankful and grateful and privileged that I get to do this. The fact that I am able to, for the time being in the entertainment industry, which is constantly changing. And going back to the college thing, the time I went to college, I was taking marketing classes and stuff in ‘05, ‘06, ‘07 and was putting ads in Kerrang and shit like that. I mean, that’s how you used to break bands. And that immediately changed, basically, as I graduated from college. The internet was breaking, and then I interned at Sony Music, doing A&R stuff, and just scouring MySpace and PureVolume and stuff. So things were changing. But the marketing aspect, there’s a lot more of just grinding and word of mouth. And Harvard toured a lot. Jason, their guitarist, who also booked them, was very good at seeing bands that ended up getting big followings, and I remember Harvard and let live, I saw them play at like, and, you know, let live has a notoriously insane live show. Jason found them early along with Sainthood Reps they played with alot. I mean, Sainthood Reps never got that big but Jason was very good at kind of picking out bands and forming a relationship. They just didn’t stay together long enough to be able to kind of get their seat where, well, we brought you out. Now bring us out. Unfortunately, they just started doing that as they broke up, unfortunately. Their last tour was with Say Anything, when they were on Equal Vision…

You have a very good memory, by the way!

<Laughter> Thanks, but I mean, the motivation is that I don’t know how long this is gonna last. I’m very thankful and privileged that it’s lasted this long, and that I’ve been able to pivot and form a lot of relationships with a lot of different labels, artists, and studios, and thankfully, particularly the soundtrack community, although it is constantly fluctuating, it’s a pretty tight-knit, welcoming group of people that are like-minded. Where a lot of us are friendly, and a bunch of us are meeting up for that later in the year, which should be cool. But, I’m just hoping we can keep doing this and still make cool stuff.

Yeah, I’m gonna keep buying that shit! <Laughter>

<Laughter> Thank you. I mean, I truly appreciate you and the support, the kind words, and I was a die-hard AbsolutePunk reader before Instagram and social media was what it was. Literally, the first thing I would do was check AbsolutePunk, out of habit, five to ten times a day.

I’ll pass that along to Jason, too! Thank you so much, Ross, and it was so nice to meet you!

Thanks, Adam. Nice to meet you too!

more

Not all embedded content is displayed here. You can view the original to see embedded videos and other embedded content.