Central-America, with its sweltering temperatures and rhythmic music that takes care of hip swaying movements is the place where you can find a great bunch of people managing a sway label. A trio hailing from Guatemala and Panama, who got together to do awesome things. They formed Cacao records and decided to take on the world.
Only recently we attended a lecture and a label owner said: “if you have the time to figure out all the details concerning rights, management and contracts … just go for it”. So we at Tanzgemeinschaft are amazed by the amount of record labels we encounter every day. Guess we need to say that we are seeing a lot of passionate people with a great love for music, working in their own style, promoting sublime music.
So let us introduce you to Cacao Records. Here’s their story. Enjoy!
Hello guys, how is it going?
All great! Thanks for the opportunity to talk about what we do 🙂
While temperature is dropping week after week in Europe, it’s becoming more warm on your side of the globe. How do you fill your days?
Well basically we all three make events in our countries. The K.E.E.N.E. brothers live in Berlin and tried to get everything ready there before they leave to Central America. Gonzo in Guatemala working on his Mr. Tropical album final details, our upcoming Cacao Trio Logistics and more.
Maybe tell us how you’ve met since you all live in different country is South-America?
We’ve met because of music. Gonzo-gonzo is part of a project called “La semana de musica avanzada” in Guatemala and the K.E.E.N.E brothers contacted him to check if there was a chance to participate. That was probably in 2014. From there we’ve met each year for gigs and fun. Would be cool to make it clear that we’re from Guatemala and Panama, both Central America. The brothers now live in Berlin.
And how did you come up with the idea to start Cacao Records? What was the motivation to start with this label? Especially when one of you is already running an imprint (Danzon records).
Basically we wanted to have a place in common where we could share music from our own point of view. Playing together in many events trough Central-America and talking a lot about music made us realize about the opportunity of doing something like this.
Tell us a bit about the background and concept of your label?
Actually, there’s not much more behind it. We want to release music as dope as possible, with a touch from our self, pay tribute to the artist and music we love, while working with a pretty awesome team. There’s also a taste of ethnic flavour within all the Cacao Trio project. Graphically we’re lucky to work with a very young artist from Panama called Mimi Vamvas who’s making everything we do look special.
As you are multiple people running Cacao records, tell us about how you split tasks. Who’s doing what?
That’s an easy one 🙂
Label MGMT: GRISE Agency, A&R: Lloyd, Social Media: Kevin and Tours and Showcases: Gonzo.
Is there any specific genre you focus on or is the label genre independent? Focus on quality within any electronic music genre instead of a niche like deep or tech house?
Not really to be honest. If we had to choose something like that would be Timeless Dancefloor music. We TRY to be around that idea in general.
We’d be curious about what really does not fit within Cacao records?
If there’s a track we’re not willing to play in one of our sets, we could say that one doesn’t fit. Pretty simple eh?
Claudio: that’s indeed a simple trick
What do you have coming up in the near future and what are your goals on the long(er) term?
In the super near future (as in next week) we have a tour together as Cacao Trio and our third release coming out. This will be a compilation called Timeless with tracks that have been special for all this year, but we can still play and work like the first time. A little more long term could be our CAO004 and CAOO5 releases with Gonzo-gonzo and K.E.E.N.E. respectively doing their thing, with help of remixers friends Franck Roger, Till von Sein, Re.you and Boddih Satva. We hope we can keep making many more Showcases during 2017.
Any specific artist you want to put on a pedestal? And why?
From the Cacao perspective, I’d say all the ones who have believed in this project and collaborated with us with their music. Before we started our project, we were just fans of their music. Now we can say also as human beings, because of their kindness and willingness to share their talent with us.
Do you have a process to get people signed?
Nope, we just go with the flow.
Tell us a bit about artist development within the label. What’s the approach?
Each of us is responsible for developing his own vision. In the end, we’re just 2 projects who make a third one when collaborate, so we must take care of our own visions knowing that we can count on each other.
On the other hand, what do you expect from your artists in your story?
Since we’re the same, artist and label… I guess we’re just cool with each other. No “FALSE EXPECTATIONS”.
Name on or two majors you who like to release an EP or album on your imprint.
Rick Wade and Henrik Schwarz
What’s your favorite release of 2016?
K15 – Hall of Memories Maybe?
Thank you very much! Appreciate the time and effort.