Interview : WILL BUTLER / TO LIVE A LIE RECORDS

When talking about Powerviolence or Fastcore, there's plenty of bands and plenty of labels, but one of them last is a favorite of the Partners In Crime editorial board. TO LIVE A LIE RECORDS started out in 2005 with Will Butler leading the ship, and from now on it released tones of great bands and records. We interviewed him through email, and he had plenty of thing to say.

By his own words, Will say he started TLAL because he is not a musician and he wanted to be involved the best he could, and actually he is doing it pretty well. For him, it's still something interesting and fueled by D.I.Y, for the sake of loving music and sharing a passion, which is confirmed by the fact all the 7 inches are only less than 5 dollars, a ridiculous price compared to some other labels. Moreover, with all this involvement, Will doesn't put « politics » aside and he take care of the sound and also of the ideas, keeping the message behind this music alive : refusing to conform. We also wanna add he is the coolest buddy we interviewed so far.

Yauh Will, how are you ? We're MDLM and Tieuma from Partners In Crime

Nice to meet you both! I'm a little weary from a long day of work, but who isn't by the night?


Do you have some "selction criteria" for the bands you sign, about the genre, the attitude or their political statement ?

First, major, and overarching thing is that I need to like the band. I guess that is silly to mention but some people run their labels as a business. TLAL is not run like that. Second thing is absolutely nothing racist, sexist, or homophobic. There is just no space in the world for that. I know there are some gray areas for things like this but if I know a band is running in a crowd like that, I won't consider them. Also not big into the porno/grotesque imagery but if a band I love wants to put something into their art that may be something like this, who am I to censor it. Genres don't matter... obviously there are some I don't consider but if it is rooted in punk I will try and sell it if I love it! Having said that, I think there is a general attitude that DIY bands exude that other bands don't, and I really pick up on that and align myself with that naturally.

left : Will / right : Sergio from ACxDC

The only pre-order I got from your is the 10" split ACxDC/Sex Prisoner/Magnum Force. It was sold out quickly, in few days only whereas there was 100 copies of this edition. For me who run a really little record label it seems insane. How do you deal with
it ? About packaging the stuffs, sending it, not messing up with the orders ...

I absolutely hate doing pre-orders. Number one problem with it is seeing people overreact to the time it takes for the record to be out. Of course lots of people have suffered through many month-long pre-orders but I have people write me and ask me where their package is two days after they've ordered it. I'd rather have them in my hands or 99% ready to go before I take someone's money. I can't believe I even tried to do a pre-order with that three way split, the FULL pressing of 600 sold out in two weeks.


Besides for a long time, your online store was closed. You needed some fresh air ?

I always need a breather, I'm constantly burnt out or about to be. No on realizes how terrible it is to become successful in mailorder. That sounds weird to most people but imagine working 40 hours a week plus all the normal life stuff then having five orders a day to ship out. So you wait till the weekend and you have about 30 orders to ship. Some of those orders are easy but then you have a huge load of records to ship and package them neatly. That isn't even the worst weeks for me, but I figured I'd lay it out in a a manner that seems to make sense. I do a lot of hands on stuff with TLAL in addition to orders like graphic design on releases that stack up a chunk of time too. I think what I have learned is that I love the process of putting a record out but sometimes highly dislike the necessity of selling it myself. I recently signed on exclusively through a distributor and I love the work they do but I think the size I am, I still need to make money off my store and sell directly to people and run a distro. Bigger labels get to kick back and just worry about stocking up their distributor, and I can't say that one day I wouldn't love to be on that path!

While roaming on the internet, I found the To Live A Lie Netlabel. Can you explain what is this ?

Obviously I'm an avid music lover. I can't help out all the bands I love, so to help out bands out who I can't help out due to the financial strain of putting out more releases, I put their digital music out. Think of it like when you see big movie directors slap their name on movies they had nothing to do with to get people to check them out. It is like a curated digital library of music I like and want to support in this way.


You recently put out a book of Fastcore pictures. What's inside ? Where the idea came from ? Did you put out some fanzines previously ?

Inside is actually three fanzines put together to form a book. Two I self published... the first one is the most primitive, it is all photocopied and has very little writing and a ton of pictures. The second zine was show reviews with photos to go with them. The third part of the book was never published in a zine but it has interviews with bands I took pictures of during 2012 in addition to the pictures of them I took. The book also has some very old pictures I took of bands on film when I was a kid, which were few and not the greatest. The book is my offering of my best photos and writing about shows and bands I like. Further homage to the music I love!

What are your favorites bands of the moment ? And in Europe ?

I listen to the oddest array of music at any one time. This goes against saying how I love DIY but I keep listening to the new Ghost LP as cheesy as it is. The last records I picked and put on since then was the first D.I. LP, the Zykolme A LP, I recently got the Inside Out repress, and for some reason I have been listening to a lot of Eyehategod. Really weird mix up of stuff, I can't explain what I listen to. I haven't had much time to listen to stuff so that may explain how scattered it is. Love bands from Europe, name a country and I'll probably be able to name a band I like from there!


Do you know our local powerviolence band CHIENS ? What are they're external repute ? Do you think they have potential to grow up ?

I am familiar! You can't sneak one past me. My friend Paul helped release their split with The Afternoon Gentleman. I think they have a pretty good reputation. I haven't heard much positive nor negative on the band but I have heard their 10" is coming out soon. I always dug what I heard of their stuff! They definitely have a ton of potential, stuff sounds heavy! Speaking of French bands, quick shout out to Charogne Stone and Fatal Nunchaku!


Are you "politicaly" (about feminism, veganism, etc..) involved outside the label ? In which way ?

I don't always consider myself outwardly political but I do hold tight to my opinions. I am vegan, straight edge, I very much respect feminism/queer culture but do not consider myself a part of it. I get super amped to work with bands on that same wavelength like Rape Revenge from Canada is all the mentioned things and I love that about them! As far as pushing an agenda and only working with bands of a certain political ilk, I don't use TLAL in that way.

NO COMPLY with Will

What are your relationship with the people of NoComply ?

As of probably 2009 I have been a part of NoComply. Justin Abare is the heard of the band and I'm lucky enough to contribute to new releases as my time allows it. Currently Pat from Backslider is playing drums on the newest stuff and I think that may continue to work well and I talk to both him and Justin weekly if not daily. I play (second) bass, attempt to sing, and play noise in the band.


What do you personally believe the future of music distribution
will look like?

I have crazy ideas on this topic. Here is my insane vision which will extend into other media. Well I'm pretty sure as far as movies go, that blu-ray is the final format... I think everything with movies will be in the cloud or on harddrives, some kind of media player device. With music, everything will keep going towards digital and away from CDs. Vinyl will do well but I have seen that people have started to make records with 3D printers and if you can copy an LP, then why would you buy it? If 3D printers go down in price which I don't see why they wouldn't become a needed thing in a house, and the technology is there, I think that may be the final death of vinyl. For the law abiding citizens, you could buy an album or songs you love and freely and legally make a record out of just the songs you want. Maybe someone will come up with a lossless audio to vinyl machine that is a stand alone thing like a CD burner so that it is totally user friendly and there are no moral concerns.
Until the crazy future I imagine I do expect vinyl to sell the same, tapes to make even more of a come back (why? I don't hate tapes but I don't see why the big push for them lately!) and CD sales to drop out completely. DIY will warm up to digital sales as I've already seen it happening!


Any last word, shout out, love message ?

Thanks to the both of you for the interview! Thanks also to anyone reading this. I hope my releases are available over on your side of the sea. Check out tolivealie.com and check out tolivealie.bandcamp.com for some free tunes. Start a band, do something DIY!