The first thing that struck me leafing through ECM’s hefty 172-page offering Catalogue 2013 is that printed catalogues are very hard to come by these days. I can’t remember seeing one in recent years in printed form apart from a brightly coloured flimsy booklet occasionally on a record shop counter, or as a modest small booklet inserted in a CD that falls on to the floor no sooner than the shrink wrap has been ripped off. Catalogue 2013 is presented beautifully with two album covers on each page for new releases and smaller text later for the deep catalogue. ECM values the visual element of its presentation in three ways on each individual album: in terms of graphics, typography and cover art; and this latest catalogue more than relates to this. ECM isn’t like any other independent label, or come to think of it major label. Majors particularly are blasé about how they present their treasures in catalogue form and some struggle to know what they’ve got and to publicise them, let alone list the “deep catalogue” in a coherent way. A catalogue doesn’t have to be a work of art or resemble one, as Catalogue 2013 certainly does. Yet it helps, and especially if it bears little resemblance to the Argos catalogue. Turn the page and there’s an acrostic that in the middle spells out the word ‘Catalogue’ in red reading down. Dip further in and in classic minimalist typographic design there’s an austere contents page and at the back a 7-page index that has more in common with a university text book than an extended sales document. And there are clues scattered about to future releases set to appear in the months ahead, after the label founder Manfred Eicher turns 70 this July. Look carefully and among the new releases coming up there are entries for albums about to come out: the intriguing Baida for instance by Ralph Alessi accompanied by Jason Moran, Drew Gress, and Nasheet Waits recorded in October last year and expected in the autumn; and also recorded in 2012 the Christian Wallumrød Ensemble’s Outstairs is also due. Trios, to appear on ECM rather than the extraordinary Watt imprint, Carla Bley, Andy Sheppard and Steve Swallow’s latest is also on the way.
Catalogue 2013 is available for the cost of postage only from www.ecmrecords.com