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Martin Collins - Forty Five Records
May '24

   Scroll down page to read interview transcript.

Transcript (edited for ease of reading) 

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Hi, I'm Ginny Koppenhol. I’m a portrait photographer and DJ from near Lancaster, and at the moment I'm doing a personal project and creating a series of portraits and a set of interviews with DJ's, producers, event organisers and people involved in the electronic music scene in our area, as a way to explore what's happening in the scene at the moment.

 

I hope that this will also encourage reflection on the UK as a whole and what we can do to help nurture scenes in the smaller cities across the UK, because it can be especially challenging without the opportunities that bigger cities afford.

 

I spoke to Martin Collins, who I’ve known for over 10 years, as a DJ predominantly. At the end of 2023, he and his partner Lizzie opened Forty Five Records, a small record shop in the centre of Lancaster. We've not had a record shop for some time, so this is very exciting, especially with the resurgence of interest in vinyl. But what Martin and Lizzie have done fantastically is create a real sense of community, which is one of the things we all have loved about record shops in the past. It’s great to see that spirit is still alive and well. And I was lucky enough to DJ at one of Martins events over the summer and I met lots of new people through it, which is brilliant. They're actually opening a bigger shop this month (January 2025) so do make sure you visit!

 

Listening back to the interview, one of the things that Martin really passionately believes in is collaboration to create a thriving destination city in many ways, not just music-focused. But if we can focus on supporting independent businesses and hospitality and all that kind of thing, that's only going to help the music scene as well and create a place where people want to come, that offers different things, whether that is the businesses or events. That’s where people will meet will create connections and we can keep making and enjoying music together. So enjoy the interview.

 

(Again, I've just recorded this on my iPhone so there are a few little background noises. I'm going to up my game this year on the recording front and book a podcast studio, but I don't think that interferes with what you'll hear, and I'm sure you'll enjoy it. ) 

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How did you first get into DJing?

I first started DJing when I was 15. As a lot of people did, my dad always had lots of records and things in the house. There was always music about, but my dad used to run a nightclub in Morecambe called Crystal T’s. So when I was a lot younger, maybe about 5, I used to go on a Saturday morning with my dad whilst he was in the office. I have a little run round and probably messed with decks and just kind of be around them. And I think it just stayed with me for a long time and I was always around music and really interested in the performance side of it. When I turned 15, I got my first set of decks from Proper Records in Lancaster called ‘DJ in a box’. I think you got 2 plastic turntables and a mixer with just two channels, probably no EQ. Then from about 16 onwards, I was fortunate enough to play in some bars in town. At the time, my dad was running the bar up at the university, so I used to do half an hour warm up before some student DJs and started to get into the scene. I started playing hip hop and then really listening to drum bass and breaks. That scene in Lancaster was massive so it was really easy for me to find places and because I was within a group of people who were a bit older than me, the door kind of opened quite easily. So this was 2004? Places like The Crypt at the time wasn't a fancy cocktail bar. It was very dingy and what was opposite Revs? It was called the Farmers’ Arms and downstairs was a place called Corners. And this was all around the time that The Warehouse had closed down and in a lot of places Drum & Bass was banned. You have to say you were putting on a ‘music event night’. The Warehouse was closed due to drug problems and drug dealing issues, so I think I don't think it was just Lancaster, it was a nationwide thing that they thought “oh, there's drugs in nightclubs, it must be to do with the drum & bass music. Therefore you can't have drum and bass music”, which obviously ridiculous. So that was my introduction to it.

 

I’m really fortunate that I'm still best friends with a lot of the people I met then. My group of friends took me under their wing. They were first years at university, I think, and I was 16. They taught me how to mix, gave me records and things like that. So I never really looked back.

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The first ever DJ mix I ever did was with a 1 cassette tape and my PlayStation, which I put CDs on and I used the volume on the TV and the stereo, to mix in and out! Not beat match obviously. And it just went on from there and even though I started a different career path and had a family, I’ve always been around DJing and even though I've not played out as much recently, I’ve always bought records, always had them in the house, never had to sell any, never had to sell my decks, so I'm really fortunate. 

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Has your musical style evolved over those years, would you say?

It’s been really varied. This might sound quite deep, but when you are younger music is your identity, so whether you're into sort of hip hop or punk. For example if you're into Indie, you dress like you're into Indie. So when I was a younger DJ,  I thought “well I’m a breakbeat DJ, or a Drum & Bass DJ”. And then I was like, “well, actually I really like trance. I'm going to be a trance DJ.” So I think over time, I have played every dance genre there is. And even though I don't DJ out much at the moment, I find it really hard to pick what I'm going to play. I was really fortunate to inherit my mum and dad’s record collection, so there's a lot of Northern Soul, disco, I guess what you'd call ‘early Manchester music’ like Joy Division and things like that. So all the stuff I probably hated is a kid, I'm now listening to it and wanting to play it out.

 

The last run of proper gigs I did was at the Stonewell, which is pre-COVID  but that was a mix of everything - house, disco, funk, soul. There was jazz in there too and it was more about what records I really like and what records I think other people will want to listen to, and the environment. When I was younger I’d play house music and probably play far too fast and far too heavy for a bar in town. So for me it's evolving. It’s about knowing the surroundings that you're in and going “What would I like to listen to if I was sat having a bit of food or a nice drink?”

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Can you bring us up to date… why did you decide to open a record shop?

So when I got my first set of decks, I worked in a skateboard shop that was underneath a record shop in Lancaster, which was called Blue Tubes and the record shop was called Proper Records. I always loved getting paid on the Saturday, £25 or whatever it was, and I’d go up and just hang around in the record shop. I loved that environment where people would come, and they would stay for ages and talk about music and you would find these white labels or bootlegs that nobody else has. It felt really special. It felt like a little community of people that descended.

 

As you kind of get a bit older and you start a career in in whatever you're doing, I’d always have conversations about what I’d do when I got to retirement age. I always though “I'll open a record shop and I can have that as like my retirement business”. Then after Covid, I decided I was going to start an online record shop. I had a little bit of knowledge about building websites and marketing. So I started website. I liked that business side of it as well. I wanted to create my own kind of small company, and have a ‘side-hustle’ (although I hate that word). Me and my partner Lizzie, who started the shop with me, always had Friday night conversations after a couple of glasses of wine, “one day we'll have a record shop. One day we'll do it” and we just started looking at Lancaster. We viewed a couple of places, some were fantastic some weren’t quite right, some were amazing but we just couldn't think about the money side of it at the time. We lost out on a couple of nice places and we put the idea to bed when we lost out on one by a couple of hours. I just thought that the stars aren't aligned, and it's not meant to be. And then one day I was walking through here (Kings Arcade). I think I'd parked the car up at the top and I was walking through and I saw this little unit, I think I saw it on the Wednesday and I called them straight away. I think we viewed it on Thursday and then I think on the Monday we put an offer in and it was ours!

 

It's been terrifying because we've never run a shop ourselves. We've worked in shops and things, but we've never run a record shop. We've never done anything like that but it's been well received. It's 20 years since Proper Records was here so to see all the people that used to go to Proper Records has been really nice. I'd stopped buying records myself, but every time I find a certain LP or for example ‘Man With the Red Face’ by Laurent Garnier, a record I’ve loved forever, I think “brilliant, I'm going to buy it now on vinyl”.  But then we had that, “Oh, ****” moment. We've got a lease on a shop. We have to actually do this now,  but it's been great. And as I said, it's me and my partner, Lizzie, who started it. She predominantly runs the more day-to-day operations. I'm a bit more behind the scenes but do a day or two in the shop every week.

 

Does Lizzie DJ?

No, but she's always been around dance music, and she's been lots to Ibiza quite a lot in the early 2000s and things like that. But yeah, she absolutely loves dance music. She's been around vinyl since being a kid. Her dad's still in a band and he's in his 70s. Since we got together, even before children, we'd have music on all weekend. And now we do have children, we still have music on all weekend. She understands it and the culture of it you know.

People may argue you don't need vinyl but we both believe that it's just a really nice thing to have, something for the pure joy of it. You're not selling something that's a necessity but it's something somebody will buy and hopefully get joy from that every time they put it on. 

 

Why is having an electronic music scene important, in a small city like ours? 

Electronic music culture has changed so much in the last 10 years, it's become so 'big business'. I mean it was big business in the early 2000s, but was still a little bit 'behind the scenes big business'. I was going to say that it's important to have an alternative music scene, but you do hear house music and dance music in bars now. But I remember when I used to go to Sankeys (in Manchester), I used to wear my worst trainers because they're going to get completely covered in people stepping on them and beer. Whereas people dress up a lot more now, there's a lot more consideration to going out. But ultimately it's a way for young people to go out there and and have fun. That's all it is, you know. And and I think electronic music, whether it's drum & bass and you're in a really dark, small intimate gig, or it's a big house gig and you're watching Eric Prydz, that's the way it is. And I think that's always been the draw for smaller places like Lancaster, is these little pockets of communities of different types of music.

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In Lancaster, we have such a diverse population simply because we have two universities and have a lot of people who come here to maybe work and they just stay, so we have lots of different nationalities, lots of different backgrounds, and with that comes lots of different music tastes. So I love it at the moment that working here you find out about these little tiny events going on that I never knew about, places like the Golden Lion putting on a jazz night or something and you hear about all these people who are really passionate about jazz. So it's lovely to hear about all these smaller events and promoters popping up. 

When bigger night clubs and bigger event spaces close, people don't disappear, they just disperse. They go and do smaller things. So obviously we've got Kanteena and the Sugar House (but I think they do predominantly student events). But other than that, there aren't a huge amount of nightclubs nowadays who do big few hundred capacity events. But I don't think that's a terrible thing because you get the smaller ones that pop up and it's it's a real kind of microsystem of people that come together in your life. There's 100 people absolutely loving the music, and I think that's really nice. 

 

What else do you think helps a scene to thrive somewhere like like Lancaster and Morecambe?

So if you if you think about a scene in music, it's all done independently. You don't have a big corporate coming in putting a drum and bass night on. It tends to be smaller events, so to help it to thrive, I think local businesses and independents and local promoters and bars and clubs need to pull together and go, "we're all in this together. If we don't get people in, you can't DJ, which is what you want to do. You want to put nights on. We need people in the bar and the restaurants too". So if you're somewhere like Lancaster it's a little bit of a tipping point. We've got so much opportunity and so much potential. But if it goes to the left, I think we'll end up like a lot of British towns where it's pound shops, vape shops and charity shops and that's all you have. Whereas I think it could go the other way. When you look at places like Stockport, for example, where it's so strongly independent in the centre. And they're really protective of that. I think that brings people in. I was looking at on Instagram yesterday and SK1 Records did a launch event for Luke Una's new label and there was a huge road block of 100s of people! And so I think that's what it is. A strong scene, whether it's a music scene or people who are really passionate about books or knitting or whatever it is, is only going to be as strong as the people who are involved in it. So we try to shout and champion any independent business with, regardless of whether it's to do with music or not. We're really friendly with the guys at Holm (a local coffee shop). It's really important to us. A load of chain shops is just boring. 

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I've a lot of hope for Lancaster. I think working with Lancaster BID has really opened my eyes to how many independent shops we have and how many businesses that have been there for decades.

It's crazy... Lapels (menswear shop) is over 30 years old. I think Jane's had Arteria for over 15 years. Filberts Bakery, although that's unfortunately just about to close, but they were there 11 years. We have all these incredible independent businesses. 

The people who buy records from us will also go to places like Kanteena, and there will also go buy coffee from Holm or Journey Social and then they'll go to Filberts for bread. That's they're culture and we want to nurture that. We always say to other independents, anything we can do to help just let us know.

Without going too political, I think governments could do could help more, of course they could. And local councils could do more initiatives, but I know a lot of their hands are tied by funding and things, so it's instead of waiting for that, crack on and do it ourselves.

 

On the flip side of that, what things hinder the development of a scene locally?

The overarching factor is everybody's a bit skint. Everything costs an absolute fortune. People are earning more than they ever have but they've got less money than they ever have. I was talking to a few people the other day and they were saying they used to see the same faces in their pub every Friday, but now it's maybe the payday Friday  they come so all of a sudden you're down 75% with the business from just those people.

So I think that's a big issue and yet it's probably quite a broad answer, but it's things like the cost of parking. But having enough pull in town as well for people to want to come. If there was just was us and 3 other independent businesses, people aren't going to travel from Kendal or Preston or Leeds, because they've got Primarks, they've got Costas, they've got McDonald's where they are. There's a reason why people go to Kirkby Lonsdale, they have shops that are nowhere else or people are going to Stockport.

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I'm no politician and I don't know anything about the economy but that, to me, sounds like a really easy way of getting more people in, which surely is going to get more money into the city. There are a lot of affluent people that live here surrounding areas. There are lots of people who work at the universities, doctors, solicitors and from speaking to people in that world, they want places like this, they don't want to see the same thing on high streets because they can go anywhere and see that. So investing in that and making it a little bit easier for smaller businesses. Councils can't tell Landlords what to do, they have no influence whatsoever on private rents and things like that, but I've been in contact when units have been empty for so long and said, "why don't we just take it for six months at half the rent so it's full, and if someone wants it, you can us kick out." But the response is, "It's £1000 a month. Either pay that or pay nothing." So I think there's there needs to be common sense, and if that prevails, more independent businesses will start popping up. I think they'll be more successful and that'll generate more money into the city, which brings in more visitors. It makes people want to come and live here.

 

Did you have a connection with bigger cities like Manchester or Liverpool? Did you strive to connect with those places when you were younger or did you were content in Lancaster?

I've always lived in Lancaster or Morecambe. But in my late teens and early 20s, I spent a lot of time in Manchester, and a lot of my friends lived there. We used to go out a lot in Manchester and it was always a big draw and I think probably back in that time Manchester was a little bit different. You had places like Sankeys and Music Box.

But yeah, there was a lot of influence and recently I've been working in Manchester quite a bit and spending a lot of time around the Northern Quarter and Ancoats, and to me that was a big inspiration behind what we were doing here. I saw these and on paper, they shouldn't work, but they do because of the the environment that they're in and the type of people who are in those spaces.

There are some really cool shops like Suzy Loves Milo, which is a concept streetwear fashion brand and it's just the coolest place in the world. I used to walk past it and look in and go "I'd love to own a shop that cool". And Tib St in Manchester. You walk down there and there's some really nice places. It almost looks like they're so effortlessly cool but there's a lot of consideration that's gone into that.

 

I've spent a little bit of time down in London, went to some really cool clubs there, which I think certainly have influenced my musical taste, seeing people like Gabriel & Dresden and Sasha at Turnmills, and I think seeing the London clubbing scene, which was a bit bigger.

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But Manchester especially when I was 16... I went to music College in Manchester for a year. So I would get the train down and go to Oldham Street with my record box and go into all the record shops, and then I'd walk to college. And I got the 9pm at night or 10pm train home. But Oldham St when I was 16 or 17 buying drum & bass was the Mecca, because you'd go there with your £30 and buy the best records in places like Eastern Bloc and Vinyl Exchange. And they just had these records that you couldn't find anywhere else - they weren't online. I think at the time maybe Proper Records (in Lancaster) had closed by that point.

So yeah, it's certainly Manchester has had a huge influence and I think now I'm a little bit older and looking at the business side of what we're doing now, people like Sasha Lord and Luke Una who've created a business on stuff that they love to doing. I mean, that's the of Holy Grail. If you love something and then you manage to pay your bills with it, brilliant.

People like Luke Una are a big influence on me. If you see him on Instagram and he's playing these great events and putting on these great nights, but then when you start looking at other things he does... he has a couple of places like called Volta. And a place called Electrik in Chorlton or Didsbury, really nice restaurants and bars. He's part of the people who created Freight Island. I think until recently he ran the Refuge bar on Oxford Road. 

You start to look at these people as not just cool people who play really good music, but actually, they're quite inspiring. I wanted to be a business person without being a corporate ********. You can still be who you are whilst being in that world. So yeah, it's definitely had a big influence on me.

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So do you think there is a vinyl resurgence at the moment amongst young people? â€‹

Yeah, I think so. We're we're fortunate that our demographic, you can't box it in. So we can't say "Our customers are Male, 25 to 45" for example. We're close to the Girls Grammar school and we get a lot of traffic coming through, and a lot are our customers as well

I have to remind myself that kids of their age have grown up with Spotify. Probably the first time they've listened to music would have been on the streaming service. To me it seems quite a new thing still. I think because they've always had that, they haven't necessarily have seen an alternative like cassettes or records. The technology is fantastic, but physically owning something, whether that's a CD or a record. We get quite a few kids at that age, not kids they're young adults, coming in and saying, "oh, have you got this?" And they don't necessarily even have record players, they just want her to own it and have something physical in their hand. 10 years in a row now, vinyl sales have continued to grow. I think that will level out at some point, but I think it's very cool. Records are very cool at the moment, but this is an analogy; one of my friends owned a Tesla, but also owned a 1968 Shelby Mustang. They're both cars, they drive back and forwards, but one the epitome of technology and one is a classic car. 

I think now people are starting to see that. These mediums of music can work in parallel, not just as alternatives. Maybe I should be a purist in vinyl, but we have Spotify at home and we find a lot of music that way and then we'll try and probably find the vinyl if we love it.

I personally think streaming services need to do better in paying their artists, but we get younger people coming in with Spotify open and go "Can you get this in for me? " so it's their introduction to it. They've put it in their headphones, they've gone school with it in,  and then they go well, "I want to own that or buy a little record player to play it." The analogue approach is definitely coming back and I think people are appreciating it.

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More as I do more of these interviews, I really you know, there's so much overlap with what people are saying and like Krysko was talking about something for a different project but was saying how The Warehouse Project in Manchester is like a gateway club for a lot of people, an intro to dance music. It might have become this big concert experience, but in itself that's there's nothing wrong with that, because then they might think, "oh, where else is the DJ playing?" Or "I'd like to see them in a small event".

 

I've got a strong opinion about it. People when they slate poppy dance DJs like maybe like David Guetta or Calvin Harris, don't think about how that person who's listening to that record, or that tune on the radio, then might find something else and within a space of three years, they might be into the most niche techno or something. And it is a gateway. If you go to a big club, you might get into the support acts. This there has to be that more commercial element to it because without it you can't just have the underground.

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In conversation I had with Dave Haslam, he said that without the underground, you won't have the mainstream... so it's a cycle isn't it? It's mutually beneficial.

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What would you tell people who want to make more connections in the music scene? 

Social media makes it easy to connect. But do go to events, chat to people. I think DJs especially love when somebody says that they appreciate what they're doing or they they've enjoyed a night or they like the music they're playing. So even if even if you don't get to meet them in person, I think sending them a message on Instagram or Facebook or whatever.

Quite a few people who come into the shop and they say "I'm really into this, do you know any places to hear it?" They might not be from around here or they might just move or there might be a student. We'll suggest The Stonewell, or Kanteena or these little spots.

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Music is such emotional thing so I think everybody's really willing to talk about it, and speak about it passionately - I would say 99.9% of DJs or performers. If you just message them or you see them at the venue, they'll help you. I speak to Ben quite a lot who has a bigger record collection than me, and he puts me onto a lot of new stuff I've never heard.

The word 'networking' comes with all the 'corporate-ness', but it's just talking to people.

And you know, there are people I've met through the shop, who I speak to really regularly now, but I wouldn't have got to speak to without that. And you know, finding out that there are people in Lancaster who are really into some obscure music that I'm really into, and then you get chatting about that. It's just going out and chatting to people.

But I think if you want to make that first step, especially if you are younger and you can't go to an event, sending messages on social media or commenting. I remember when I used to put out mixes on SoundCloud and the biggest thing ever was when someone sent you a direct message, saying they like the mix. It'd make my day! 

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It works the other way too. Years ago, I messaged Hot Since 82 on Twitter after his Essential Mix, saying how much I loved it. He replied saying "thank you mate" and  that was it for the month. I was thinking me and Daley are best mates now haha.

Remember that they're just normal people. The music world is very inclusive. We want to tell you all about the cool stuff we know. So come and talk to us and we'll tell you and you can tell us too. It's one of the best things about having a records shop. I have heard more music in the last 6 months, than I have in the last 20 years! If I didn't pester some lads I met at the uni for a warm up set, I probably wouldn't have started DJing. 

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If you could distil you reasons for opening a record shop, what would you say? What's your core 'why'?

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Certainly not money! haha

I've spent a long time building up a separate career so we can buy a house and start a family, and I think you can get a little bit blinkered in that. Even though I love what I do, I think sometimes you need something that is just purely for you. And not sound too corporate, we saw an opportunity that Lancaster didn't have a record shop and we saw that when there were record stores on the market, they did well and we knew that vinyl sales were going up and people like me were still buying records. And we just wanted to try it. 

After COVID, everybody kind of went "you know what? Were stuck inside for a long time and not being able to do what we want to do". Certainly for us, we were like, "right want to do what we want to?" And we always said that "after a year of doing this, if it falls flat on its face and we have to close it. That's fine. We did it for a year, you know, and we did it."

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And yeah, just being able to stand here like today and talk about music and, you know, people come in everyday and I chat to them about music. That was the driver behind it. It's something I'm passionate about. I think is a really lovely, to buy records and sell records. And Lizzie felt the same. We liked this idea and we liked the environment that a record shop created. It's not something boring. A record is something really exciting to buy isn't it, because you're going to take it home and enjoy it whilst you're having your tea. Something really nice to do. 

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Brilliant. Thank you.

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No, thank you. It's been really nice to chat through it all. 

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