The international success of Milk! Records acts such as Courtney Barnett has given credence to the idea that in the age of digitisation, the artist can retain some agency. We caught up with Jen Cloher, one of the labels driving forces and prominent artists to discuss the relevance of independent labels in Australia.
“Courtney Barnett started it in 2012 to put out her first EP,” says Cloher. “I watched the label slowly develop. She asked friends of hers around Melbourne that she’d played with or had songwriting partnerships with to come and put their music up on Bandcamp under the Milk! Records label. So it was pretty simple, it was just an online store. I saw how well she communicated with people, particularly on social media. She really speaks directly to people and I think they find it refreshing. I think her whole approach and ethos as an artist is really genuine and low in bullshit. I saw people really connect with Milk! Records, and I thought I might release my third album through it. I’d worked with other indie labels in Melbourne and Sydney, and it was good, but I could see how that DIY, keep it small and keep it all approach was probably going to serve me better.”
Milk! Records’ laidback accessibility is completely free of pretention. Despite Milk!’s humble origins, this uniquely Australian attitude meant the label had the capacity to grow into something much bigger than a simple Bandcamp page. The increasing popularity of the featured artists meant more exposure. Fortunately for those at Milk!, Cloher’s wealth of experience in the music industry fending for herself left her well poised to steer the label in a successful direction.
“I’d been running workshops for independent artists where we just mainly talk about managing your own career, because there’s a real lack of good managers in this country, so you have to learn a lot of skills to be able to do that yourself. I know the whole ideology with Milk!! Records really connected with what I was talking about in the workshops. So I brought my ideas over to Milk!! Records and started to implement them, and they worked.
“I think the community feel is definitely a factor, but essentially, it has to be the music. It has to be of the standard that prompts people to come and buy it and see it, or you don’t really have a label. There is a sense of community, we are friends and we do all play in each other’s bands, but we’re still particular about the songwriters and bands that we put out through the label.”
While Cloher is certainly pleased and appreciative of the support her peers have shown her, she still says the greatest measurement of success is the reaction of the music loving community.
“I don’t know the name of their school, but there’s a group of adorable schoolgirls who come along to any underage show. They came up and they said that they’re all in different year levels, but they’re united by their love of Milk! Records. I think that kind of thing, hearing that back for me is the success. Hearing back from fans. We all fall in love with certain things and we all care about certain things in our lives, and it’s just cool that there are a few groups of people out there that care about what we’re doing.”
BY KEATS MULLIGAN
