the Minorthread LTD... What is it?

I have been racking my creative brain to try to think of some articulate and clever way to announce a project I started. Yet, similar to everything else I do it just seems to be said best as in, from me in my voice. I have spent a lot of my life buying merch from bands either at shows, their web-store, or back in the day a mail order catalog that just said “1/C shirt” and the choices were L or XL. You never knew what it was exactly but you had trust in the bands to deliver what you would consider quality merchandise. It was quite gratifying really, to get a package with the bands return address on it, ripping it open unfolding a shirt in awe where some stickers and a note fell out. Also for some ungodly reason I sniffed it. I have to think I am not alone here on this, it was just some carnal instinct, but it really was part of the process.

Which brings me to now. Often I find myself looking at a band’s merch ad (usually on instagram) where there is some sad mock up of a shirt, an Inage haphazardly placed on a crappy looking shirt shape, or even worse one of those stock pictures of some schmo looking like a total clown who actually makes me no want to purchase said shirt. Now I know some bands need to do this in order to drum up sales to then produce said shirts because no one wants to front the money up front. It's a lot easier to say,
“Hey, here is a new design!” And if no one pre-orders it then it doesn’t get made because the receipts are there, the design sucks. Now I can’t tell you how many shirt designs I have had in the past form bands that were awful, but after much time these designs say, ripened with age and became classics. Often these designs are made from the gut, or with a heavy handed sense of humor did not rely on public opinion to flourish. Look at Mooney’s Nirvana Heart Shaped Box for example, not popular when it came out, didn’t sell a lot, but now it is one of the most iconic Nirvana shirts out there.

My Second thought (yes there is two) is the crap shoot. Order something online it comes in the mail and it looks and feels weird. Doesn’t pass the smell test either. It’s a let down. You want to support a band you love, but for whatever circumstance, your merch comes back printed in poor quality I.e. print on demand, printed in a t-shirt printing machine or something like that. It’s printed with little thought or care. This is usually the case where the band signs off merch rights to a company who is just banging out merch by the millions to create some empire. They are told “their merch looks great and this is what people like”, “people don’t care about quality, or lasting the test of time.” There are exceptions to this rule and merch Companies who give a shit, and try to steer musicians and consumers to a better product, I’m just saying its getting harder and harder to know what it is you are getting before you buy it. Then there are the trillions of bootlegs out there. These are the worst, every market is flooded with them. It’s such a bummer to see. Don’t get me wrong I’m not talking about the fan who printed something because he really loved this band and they never made merch (I am guilty of that, I won’t lie). I did it because I just wanted to give other people who shared the same passion and love for something like me to hold on to. Im talking about the places overseas mostly in China where they don’t give a crap, they don’t even know what it is they are stealing/selling 90% of the time, its just 100% greed.

So here it is, my point. Sorry you had to go through all that to get here but I wanted to paint a picture of what I am doing and why. I started an officially licensed Merchandising company called Minorthread LTD, or MTLTD for short. I wanted to offer bands that I loved a way to produce some merch that we can both be proud of and let people know they can consistently rely on to manufacture good products that you COULD blindly order and know it will meet my quality and standards, but you won’t have to.

I also did this because I don’t want the music or the bands to be forgotten. just because they don’t have a merch deal, a website or just don’t have the time they still need to exist in todays internet ecosystem. So when you come around and decide you want some band merch, you will be able to find some.

I am also keeping the print runs extremely low. So when I say Limited edition I don’t mean 300 or 500 of one shirt design, I mean 100 give or take. 300/500 is what a band would print when they go on tour, that is not limited, it is just a run. I don’t want to flood the world with more un needed merch, these are just intended for fans who have been searching but can’t find, got too fat for the one they own, or their Ex stole it in a sad breakup…bye Goldenboy!

It has been extremely hard but I have already printed the first 6 pieces so far. MTLTD001-MTLTD006. The first 3 will be launching Wednesday 12PM PST on www.minorthread.com please enjoy. Lookout for another post with info on what 001-003 will be. Talk to you later. -Isac