After 20 Years of Independence Ash Grunwald has changed his business model

Ash Grunwald has been one of Australia’s most successful independent songwriters but that is all changing. After 20 years of “minding his own business”, Ash Grunwald has signed his first record deal with Michael Gudinski’s Bloodlines.

“My record company is amazing,” Ash says enthusiastically. “So this is what it feels like to have a team around you? It is amazing. I could get emotional about how good it feels. I’ve got a good manager who is fresh and enthusiastic and connected. I’ve sat outside of this my whole career and just did my own thing. It feels good to get support from the industry. The record business back in the day was so huge, so much money. One of the ironies is that we all like money and I’d like to have more but it takes the passion out of it. The ones left standing, Warren (Costello) and Dean (McLaughlin) and the team there, are keen, not jaded”.

Ash self-released his first record ‘Introducing Ash Grunwald’ in 2002. Since then he has had 11 live or studio albums, all released independently. He has been nominated for five ARIA Awards and three APRA Awards, taking home two of the three APRAs.

Ash came from an era of self-produced, self-released artists brought on by necessity after watching major labels drop real music artists for reality TV contestants. He wasn’t the only one thinking that way at the time.

“I was definitely part of a group, maybe three or four down. There was John Butler, The Waifs, Xavier Rudd, The Beautiful Girls, that was all that “naughties” roots,” he tells Noise11.com. “Nobody signed a record deal. We had it so good. We were the first ones doing albums relatively cheaply. We did whatever we wanted to do and no-one told us what to do. We made a lot of money. We had a distribution deal, we worked mailing lists in the late 90s, social media wasn’t flying. It was mailing lists, then MySpace then Facebook. It just worked out well. People were buying albums too. But everything has changed now and I’ve just signed my first record deal”.

Ash Grunwald will perform at 1pm Saturday 3 August on the Marsh Mezzanine Stage at the Melbourne Guitar show.

He will also be launching his new Pratley Signature Guitar at the show.

MELBOURNE GUITAR SHOW DETAILS
SATURDAY AUG 3 | CAULFIELD RACECOURSE |10.00am – 6.00pm
SUNDAY AUG 4 | CAULFIELD RACECOURSE | 10.00am – 4.00pm