Music

Jack White launches vinyl pressing plant and record store in Detroit

by Dan MacRae

Ol’ timey rock cartoon Jack White may be living in Nashville these days, but that’s not stopping him from opening up shop in his hometown of Detroit too.

The chalk-skinned musician is adding to his Third Man Records empire with the creation of a vinyl pressing plant in the city, as well as a proper retail record store. The audio amusement disc emporium is slated to open just in time for Black Friday, while the plant is due to kick into gear midway through 2016. Ideally, a film about Jack White as a Willy Wonka-esque plant operator will come out by 2018, but that could just be our imaginations running away with us.

The opening of the plant is a bit of a big deal. It’s the first of its kind to be launched in Detroit since Archer Record Pressing opened its doors in 1965. Third Man has purchased eight presses from the German company Newbilt for this pursuit and will now get to enjoy the fruits of having this manufacturing option during a period of high record manufacturing demand.

“There’s a bottlenecking in the record pressing industry right now – so much glorious demand, so few presses,” said Third Man in an online statement. “We want to help ease the flow, and we want to bring more real-life manufacturing jobs back to Detroit.”

Third Man co-founder Ben Blackwell told Pitchfork that he hopes the plant can provide an option for smaller acts to put their work out as a record and that the company’s work in Detroit can help further educate the public on vinyl culture. In Blackwell’s words: “This is going to make it easier for a little punk band to make 300 copies of a 7″.”

[h/t diffuser]