| The Hypnote label is owned and run
by David Rothblatt, who has a long history of Marketing and Promotion experience
in the independent record business and also in network TV. He has run the
creative studio of one of the world’s top design firms and himself
is a Creative Director, Designer, Production Artist, Writer, Typographer,
Marketing whiz and computer nut. At a time in the music industry when “physical
product” has become more difficult to sell to an audience that, if
resourceful, can find nearly anything for free, HYPNOTE is dedicated to
offering a superior physical product which attempts to be something well
worth owning and collecting, as well as listening to, of course.
Starting in the mailroom of Arthur Baker’s seminal StreetWise label in 1984, David made StreetWise the first black dance music label to reach out to American College Radio, indeed finding success with that audience with several records, including the legendary “It’s Yours” by T La Rock & Jazzy Jay, which also just happened to be the very first release bearing the Def Jam imprint. After StreetWise disbanded, citing David’s success with College Radio promotion there, Rick Rubin tapped David to be the first employee at his new indie label Def Jam, which was just setting up shop and about to release its first Beastie Boys single. Though Rubin himself had been fired by his own college station, he felt that the Beastie Boys’ future success depended on acceptance by College Radio. His partner Russell Simmons decided that David might as well also try doing college promotion for the first single by his first signing, a 15 year-old kid named LL Cool J. Finding success with both of those projects, David was kept on to work a few more records, before being offered a job as Director of Pop Promotion for an independent promotion firm, name withheld. In those days before Soundscan, it was actually possible to have a top 10 record without selling a single copy! Which is very nearly what David did when he simultaneously held the #1 and #2 spots in Billboard for Teena Marie’s “Lovergirl” and Bruce Springsteen’s “I’m On Fire”. David caught a break when the company finally got the assignment of promoting a “legit” #1 record— “Smooth Operator” by Sade, which he may now proudly leave on his resume. This was right before the big Payola scandals of the 1980’s hit, but David had already resigned his post amidst much acrimony (if you count death threats as that), when he learned exactly what the company he was working for was really up to. Having nothing lined up and more than a bit spooked by the experience, David went to work as a temp at NBC, spending what turned out to be a very interesting year there before landing a position in the Marketing department of USA Cable Network. In addition to being part of a team that created literally hundreds of printed promotional pieces, David wrote all the copy for the network and also had a hand in the programming of the network’s youth-oriented late-night line-up. Having convinced the network brass that it was silly to pay for “interstitial programming” to show between B-movies, when you could hold a youth audience simply by showing the right music videos which were free of charge, the network agreed and put David in charge of it. Creating at the outset a strict policy of “indie-only”, by the first night the videos were scheduled to air, only Rough Trade had signed and returned the complex legal agreement the network had insisted on. So, one Saturday night back around ‘89, nearly a million households were treated to approximately a half-hour of exclusively Rough Trade videos, including such strangers to TV as Lucinda Williams, Miracle Legion and AR Kane (it was notably unusual in that era to even see a black face in a video on TV). It was nearly a year later that Rough Trade hired David to be their U.S. Marketing Director to coincide with a trio of their most ambitious releases to date— the debuts of Mazzy Star and the Breeders “Pod” (U.S. release), and the second Victoria Williams album. Since you have probably heard of them, the Marketing was a success. David also handled the marketing for Galaxie 500 and the Butthole Surfers, winning Promo Item of the Week in Billboard for his Butthole Surfers toilet paper— even successfully masterminding a plot to replace all of the toilet paper at the MTV corporate offices with it! It was seemingly that prank which earned their video a single, if censored, airing on “120 Minutes”. Unfortunately, a variety of factors forced the U.S. Rough Trade to close its doors just as all of the marketing hit for the first Mercury Rev album, and David was again jobless without another position lined up. It was several months before David finally agreed to take on what by all accounts would be the herculean task of turning Shimmy-Disc into a real record company, as its General Manager. As with Rough Trade, the label’s biggest-ever trio of records were also about to be released— Bongwater’s final LP “The Big Sell-Out”, Daniel Johnston’s “Artistic Vice” and Ween’s sophomore effort “The Pod”, almost certainly making David the only person in industry history to work on two “Pod” albums. Success followed David to Shimmy-Disc also, and the company expanded from its filthy dive in the back room of a local pressing plant to another bigger filthy dive which included its own distribution company and a second label called Kokopop, essentially a collaborative label between David and owner Mark Kramer, but to be known to the industry only as the company’s new label. David chose as its first release and pet project, a band few people had ever heard of called Nothing Painted Blue. They are still around and put out a record in 2005 while leader Franklin Bruno is now also a part of 4AD’s Mountain Goats. Their erstwhile bass player moved on to form Calexico. NPB are even mentioned in the chorus of a certain famous Tullycraft song! With the ambitious goal of “a single a week”, that plan soon faded when the 7” machine at the pressing plant turned out not to work very well. However, the Kokopop single by Chia Pet achieved simultaneous Single of the Week honors in the NME and Melody Maker, while David’s other standout projects included the first April March EP, plus EPs by Lotion and Aenone (both of whom were snapped up by other labels) and Saturn V, featuring Gregory Webster, previously of the Razorcuts. Less than one month after successfully negotiating and securing a $1,000,000 upfront distribution deal for Shimmy-Disc, David was quite surprised to say the least to be let go. Disgusted with the business, David fell back on his print and design background and began working with another British firm, the ATTIK, which at that time was considered one of the two or three best design firms in the world, and to this day one of the most oft-imitated. Working on packaging for several Bad Boy label releases and creating the on-air typeface for Comedy Central were two early projects David undertook before being named ATTIK Studio Manager in 2000. With a sluggish 2001 economy and after the events of September 11th, sadly the company shut down its New York office. Since that time, David had selectively carried out a variety of print, interactive, typographical and design projects until making the decision to start HYPNOTE in 2005. He is really hoping that his decision was a good one. MORE ABOUT US:
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