Life got in the way of Burlington-based band Swale's first full-length album, A Small Arrival. It took the group more than seven years to produce the album, which came out at the end of 2012.
The band’s fans aren’t going to let them rest so easily this time. When Swale launched a month-long Kickstartercampaign to get funding for a vinyl press of their second album, they reached their initial goal in just 30 hours.
Eric Olson, one of the band’s three members, said he was initially uncomfortable with the idea of crowd funding. “We come from the old school where you tour, you scrape it together, and you dump your savings into it. So we tried to come at it as less of a fundraiser and more of a pre-order.”
The band’s incentives to potential investors included an offer to play someone’s wedding. While no one’s taken them up on that idea (yours for just $4,500!), three people have pledged $400 to the project and will be rewarded with Swale as the backing band for a private karaoke party.
As the clock winds down on the Kickstarter campaign, fans have more than doubled what the band was asking for. Olsen says he’s floored that so many fans kicked in. And he’s hearing from people who are going to have to make an even bigger investment once they get their reward. “There have been quite a few people who have pledged enough to get a record and have written saying, ‘now I have to get a record player.’”
Swale promises to have the album mastered and pressed to vinyl by June of this year. Their Kickstarter campaign ends March 23rd.
