On a somber note, we wanted to pass along some sad news and express our condolences to the family of Jeff “Critter” Newell. For those who are unfamiliar with his work, Critter was an early fixture in the Wax Trax! family. Besides credit on countless independent and major label projects,  Jeff worked behind the scenes to help craft Wax Trax! staples such as 1,000 Homo DJs, Lead Into Gold, Revolting Cocks, as well as helping shape the sound on Ministry’s Landmark albums, “The Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Taste” and “Psalm 69″. His contribution to music was wide and deep.
Critter passed away on December 31 at his home in Southern California. He was 45.

I wanted to follow up on our post from last month. We have finally added a few more collectables to our store as well as a couple new Wax Trax! shirts. If all goes well, we should have a some more original pressings and goodies to offer sometime in February. We’ll keep you updated.

In artist related news, we have a couple of notes about Ministry.
For those who haven’t heard, Mr. Jourgensen is coming out of retirement this year. Ministry will be playing 4 US  cities this upcoming Fall with a few European date to follow. Tickets won’t go on sale for a while but now you’ve got time to make those travel plans.
You can find out more detailed info on the official Ministry Facebook page

Speaking of Ministry…Here are a few songs they probably won’t play on the new tour: New audio has just been uploaded onto You Tube of full tracks from the earliest known recorded Ministry show. The 4 tracks are from the March 1982 show at Misfits in Chicago. There are some different takes of old classics..as well as unreleased material. The quality is quite good for a small club recording and is highly suggested for any early era Ministry fan.

Cold Life
Overkill
Funkamental
I’m Falling

If any of you find yourself in Chicago next week looking for a dance floor to occupy, Berlin Nightclub will be hosting their seasonal Wax Trax! Showcase on Jan. 20th. DJs Greg Haus & Jena Max will once again treat us to their vast WT! knowledge with an onslaught of music and video…. They do an amazing job at keeping the Wax Trax! catalog spinning here in Chicago. All Wax Trax! All night.

Last but not least…since this IS Friday. Feel free to head on over to our Twitter page and participate in Wax Trax! Friday. Post your favorite song & video from the label or even new music and artists you found through the store. It’s a place that once a week Wax Trax! fans run the show.

That’s it for now….No we haven’t forgotten about the film/DVD, just nothing to report yet.

Talk to you soon!

xo-J

-Wanted to check in with you all and share a few things that are happening with some of our favorite artists.

Just released is a really nice documentary of Mr. Luc van Acker done for Belgium TV….Of course it’s primarily in Flemish but for all us non-Flemish speaking folks, we have some great vintage footage of Luc to check out…As well as some great comments from Richard 23, Paul Barker and Chris Connelly (filmed during the Retrospectacle weekend).

you can find the Youtube link Here

Also- For all the Chris Connelly fans out there, be sure to check out his latest CD, “Artificial Madness” it’s fantastic!  He will be kicking off the release of the new album with a live show on Dec. 8th at the Hideout in Chicago.  Hope to see you there!
You will find details and directions on the Hideout website.

 

Okay-I know this has been out there for a while, but wanted to mention an interview with a nice deconstruction of Ministry’s “The Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Taste”. The Nov. issue of DECIBEL magazine has Chris, Paul, Al and Bill talk about what was going on behind the scenes during the evolution of this pivotal landmark album.

You can read more about the interview here

 

Last but not least….This past April’s Wax Trax! Retoespectacle has been nominated for concert of the year on legendary Chicago radio station WXRT.
We already KNOW that it was the best concert event of the year (…maybe the decade!) but if you want to show the world your Wax Trax! love, feel free to vote for us
on the WXRT listener’s poll

That’s it for now. Be sure to keep an eye out for new and additional vintage merch at our store starting in mid December (including one of our classic shirt designs from back in in the day)

Have a great holiday week and good luck surviving a food coma on the 24th,
xo-J

Well…Things actually came to a grinding halt over the past few weeks, due to a personnel change in the editing process. Over time it became clear to us that working with the original editor wasn’t going to be a good fit. Even though our goals may not have been in line with each others, we wish him much success with his future projects.
As disappointing as it is to be behind schedule, we are very excited to be working with a new editor, and moving this beast back on track.
There is a total of 54 hours of footage to edit down, so we still have a ton of work ahead of us.
Unfortunately, we don’t expect there to be a finished product before the end of the year, but we are working to at least post a trailer or some rough cuts as soon as possible.

As always, we will keep you updated on any changes. Thanks again to everyone for all their kind words and patients while waiting.

.

On another topic…
We’re excited to mention that longtime Wax Trax! artist, Chris Connelly has just recorded a new album and is planning a Nov.08 release.
Plain and simple…this is a great album with heavy post-punk influences.
We will let you check out a sample track for yourself…but if you like The Fall, Gang of Four or Killing Joke, you will not be disappointed.

sample track here

more details here

-Hope everyone has a great week, talk to you soon!

Julia

We are very thrilled to have helped with this years International Queer Film Festival and their retrospective of the 30th ANNIVERSARY OF THE HIV/AIDS PANDEMIC held this Oct. 18th-23rd in Berlin.
We pulled from our Archives and added to the festival with Coil’s 1985 groundbreaking cover & video of Soft Cell’s “Tainted Love”.
Not sure if many recognize the irony, but when this video was originally released, Wax Trax! received hate mail from many in the LGTB community, deeming the video a highly offensive and tasteless portrayal of gay men and the controversial subject of HIV/AIDS. We feel honored to be a small part of this important retrospective helping convey Coil’s artistic benchmark for this pivotal point in culture.

Also…For all the collectors out there, we have added many more original pressings of Vinyl and CDs as well as some mighty nifty promo posters to our SHOP.
We still have only scratched the surface of our archives…we’ll let you know when more go up.

And finally…since this IS Friday, We wanted to remind you all about spreading the Twitter-Luv…We have our “Wax Trax! Friday” going on right now on our Twitter page. It’s a great way for fans to post their favorites and tweet links to some of the greatest music ever!

Take care

Julia

Hi All!
-Hope you’re having a great summer so far.
Well, as we start updating the website, I wanted to pass along something
else that we’ve been working on.
Here, in the Nash family, we have started to crack open the vault and dust off a
few things of interest. We have decided to clean house of some of our
personal collection from the archives.
We are only at phase one (Many more items to come…the vault is pretty
packed with goodies) but you can pick up the first wave of mint/ out of print recordings
and promo items in our SHOP section of our website.
There will be much MORE to come in the near future (especially some of the
more rare test pressings and other vinyl ) but for now we have a few of the
out of print classics on CD up for grabs.

Also, if any of you have not checked out the Sound Opinions interview wit Mr. Connelly & Mr. Barker from 7/8/11…I highly recommend that you give the archived show a listen. You will not be disappointed

Thanks for hanging in there with us!

Julia

Hello and happy belated 4th of July!

Not sure if the summer heat is affecting you like it’s affecting me but here in Chicago IT IS HOT!

I wanted to let you all know that the radio interview with Chris Connelly & Paul Barker on PRX’s (NPR) Sound Opinions will air this Friday, July 8th. Check your local public station for program time…or check out the podcast, available online starting 7/11

This interview was recorded the week of the 33 1/3 Retrospectacle back in April. We’re very excited that Jim deRogatis & Greg Kot were able to sit down with these two former cocks and talk about music, their relationship with my Dad & Dannie and the glory days of Wax Trax! Records.

This one is not to be missed.

Hello Aagin,

Just a reminder regarding the 2 part interview about my Dad & Dannie as well as music from back in the day. The first show will air at 9p London time (3p Chicago time) and will be archived for a few weeks if you’re not able to listen until later.

-It should be a nice trip back 25 years or so to 2449 Lincoln Ave. You can check it out here:

www.radionowhere.org

Also…Yes, we are now officially selling some of the limited Front 242 shirts from the Wax Trax! Retrospectacle at our MERCH STORE…but when they’re gone, they’re gone!

Since we have put some distance between the Wax Trax! Retrospectacle weekend in April, we wanted to check back with you and let you know what’s been going on.

First of all, for everyone who has been patiently waiting for the Center On Halsted fundraising results, the final numbers are in….and the numbers are great!

100% of funds went to the COH once show expenses were paid. Together, after the dust settled, we all helped raise a whopping $32,000 for the Center!  We feel fortunate that the administration is letting us direct the donation into areas we feel the closest. We have decided to split the funds evenly between the COH Youth Program and SAGE (their advocacy program focused specifically for the LGBT elderly community)
This was absolutely a win/win for everyone. Thank you.

There is an official press release from COH being finished as we speak (Yep…complete with a photo of handing over the obligatory GIANT check). We will share that on our website as soon as they pass it along to us.

Coming up:

1. Monday, June 20, 2011 will be the first of a 2 part show with the super-gracious Mr. Christopher Laird from UK’s  Radionowhere.org. .I sat down with Christopher and chatted about My Dad, Dannie and why Wax Trax! Records was able to do what they did. Tune in for some choice selections resurrected from the store’s playlist as well as my personal favorite gems from the label.
a link for more info and to listen can be found at  radionowhereuk.blogspot.com

2. We are bringing back a couple of vintage Wax Trax! designs for our merch store and should have the items available in a few weeks. We are also hard at work with Front 242 and will hopefully be offering some of their limited shirt designs from the Retrospectacle on our site….More details soon!

3. sigh…yes, we know we are in desperate need of updating the site. We put everything we had into the Retrospectacle and once that was over we basically shut down from exhaustion.
We feel reenergized and the next step is to compile all the amazing fan photos and video from the 33 1/3 anniversary and corral them all in one spot on the site….as well as update our gallery of archived images and artists info.

we will keep you posted!

Thanks again for everything

Julia

Hello again,

-Just wanted to give you all a heads up and let you know that we have the merch shop currently up and running with items from the RETROSPECTACLE.
Just go the our main page and hit “SHOP” in the upper menu bar.
We should start shipping orders by mid to late next week.

As we’ve mentioned before, we’re still working on the film. It’s in editing mode and final cut won’t be ready for a bit. Our original plan was to have theater screenings and a follow up DVD release…and YES! proceeds from the DVD sales are planed to further help the CENTER ON HALSTED.
We will definitely keep you posted of any new developments.

Speaking of the COH…We should have the final number later this week for what you all helped donate. This was truly a win/win for everyone, and we really appreciate the massive effort & contributions…financially, physically, and artistically from all the fans, volunteers, sponsors and bands.

We will be sending out an official press release once we have the final donation numbers.

Thanks again

-j

I wanted to follow up and answer the flood of emails and questions regarding a couple of things from this truly historic weekend.

1.)  YES! …We will be selling official Retrospectacle shirts, posters and other goodies through our website as soon as we figure out the logistics and go through our stock from the shows.
So hold tight, We will make an email announcement when the online store is up and running.

2.)  Not sure if any of you noticed the pro camera gear that was everywhere over the weekend. We had a 30+ crew filming and documenting the 33 1/3 anniversary weekend.
We still have a huge amount of work moving forward to edit down and packaging up for DVD purchase…but I can tell you that the raw footage is BEAUTIFUL!  This is going to be an amazing look for fans that couldn’t make it, as well as the perfect souvenir to for fans who were there.
Again…We will keep you updated through email blasts about the progress and timeline for the screening and DVD release.

That’s it for now…talk to you soon

-j