Money Mark – Change Is Coming Limited Reissue via PIAPTK / Soild Gold

The first time that I ever heard of Mike Dixon or his label, People In A Position To Know, was about 4 years ago, when I came into the possession of a Money Mark CD single that he’d released.  The person who gave it to me was Carlos Valdez, who runs  Analog Ghost Recordings, another small label doing small run lathe cuts.  Since he’s friends with Dixon and had extra copies, he said that I could have it, but he just needed to make sure that I got the adapter for it, so that I could play it on my turntable.  [?????]  The back of the CD sleeve read, “This CD-Record is an analog/digital hybrid.  It will play on your turntable and in your cd player or computer.  Included is a small washer to be used as an adapter.”  If you’ve seen any of the truly innovative lathe cuts or unorthodox pressings that Joyful Noise recordings has put out in recent years — the “12-sided” Dale Crover (Melvins, Shrinebuilder, Altamont, Fecal Matter) record, Skins, and his other release cut straight into a brass cymbal being only a couple of them — those are all coming from Mike.  But, much more than simply the guy who cuts weird shit on his lathe for other people, Dixon releases tons of genuinely great stuff through PIAPTK, which is described as a label offering “Limited Edition Vinyl Records and Handmade Artifacts from Tucson, AZ via Olympia, Wa.”  He just chooses to focuses on a more hands on process pushing quality products out in much smaller and more limited runs.  It’s his skill, attention to detail. and focus (on the things he actually cares about) that are the reason he has names like Dead Meadow and Devendra Banhart hitting him up when they need a one-of-a-kind small batch product to take out on tour with them.

One great series of records that PIAPTK has been releasing is under the sub label of Soild Gold.  Now approaching it’s 11th release, the project which Dixon has referred to as his “little weird Faux Bootleg label” has put out titles by artists like Grandaddy, Little Wings, and individual members of Dr Dog.  As to be expected, each of the Soild Gold releases are extremely limited, including paste on covers and hand stamped labels.  The latest in the series, which just went up for pre-order today, is a reissue of a title by none other than Money Mark, himself.  The producer/musician is best known for his work on the keys with the Beastie Boys, working tightly with the group from the Check Yo Head (1992) era, until their final release, Hot Sauce Committee Pt 2, in 2011.  He’s also the one responsible for the organ intro and basic phrase that operates as the foundation for Beck‘s “Where It’s At,” and has collaborated with and/or appeared on recordings by a vast array of artists including U.N.K.L.E., Handsome Boy Modeling School, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, Blackalicious, Femi Kuti, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Dangerdoom, Seu Jorge, Tommy Guerrero, De La Soul, and Omar Rodriguez Lopez Quintet, of which he is currently a member.  But aside from his appearances on the work of so many others, the man born Mark Ramos-Nishita has a fairly prolific output of solo albums in his own right.  Today’s Soild Gold release will “mark” the first ever reissue of his great 2001 instrumental album, Change Is Coming, which features support by such guest musicians as Sean Lennon and Los Lobos.

Again, this is a super limited edition pressing with only 250 total copies in the run, so, if you want one of these things, you should probably try and scoop it up sooner than later.  Another cool feature with this thing — and, apparently, all Soild Gold releases — is that it comes with a 12 x 18 cardstock poster.  While that is likely not as important to a lot of folks out there, it might just be the thing that sells me on this officially.  For the Change Is Coming poster [pictured above] it’s a portrait of Money Mark wearing a cap printed with an image from the 1983 Dan Aykroyd x Eddie Murphy classic, Trading Places.  The vinyl itself is “gold,” but there will also be 50 randomly inserted copies of a special colorway, along with a pretty “soild” opportunity to possibly win yourself a test pressing.  The following details come via the PIAPTK product page.

50 copies of the special “Coins and Bills” splatter vinyl (trans gold mixed with silver and green, which gives it a crazy wavy look) will be randomly inserted into orders. As always, Soild Gold is ANALOG ONLY… Does not include downloads.

You can also join the “Test Pressing Guessing Game” by adding some extra change onto your “Pay What You Want”. For example, if you pay $22.38 and Mark chose the number 38 for this release, you win a free test pressing along with your order.

There’s no good reason that these should stick around for too long, especially since they’re only $19.99 for a hand assembled record like this.  If you want to get on it and grab one of these, you can head over to PIAPTK and pre-order it now through HERE.