A Labour of Love for Dance Music
Founded in 2019 by Donald and Susan, Dealt With Records is an independent label born out of pure passion for dance and particularly, deep house music. What started as a side project for two lifelong music lovers — Donald, a former music journalist, and Susan, a seasoned industry professional — has evolved into a respected platform championing underground, unheard, and exciting new artists.
With deep roots in the UK electronic scene and a global outlook, Dealt With Records exists to amplify emerging talent, providing a stepping stone for producers who deserve to be heard. One of their first ever releases featured LF SYSTEM — long before their UK No.1 hit with Warner Music — proving their knack to spot raw talent before the world catches on.
A label for the artists, not the algorithms. Whether from the UK, Norway, Lithuania, Switzerland, France, Italy, Tunisia, USA, Canada, South Africa, Bahrain or Malta, Dealt With seeks out fresh talent, offering them a launchpad into the industry. The label promises dedication, passion, and the right connections to help artists reach new heights.
Dealt With releases variations of house, acid, DnB amongst other types of dance music.
Based in the Middle East, the label is uniquely positioned in the fastest-growing dance music market in the world, and they’re just getting started.
Ultimately, all of this is about those unforgettable moments on the dancefloor — sweaty strangers hugging to a perfect beat, the joy of discovering your new favourite track, the pure connection of music. That’s what drives Dealt With Records.
Q: Hi Dealt With, Good to meet you! Who is behind the label?
Donald: Hello Club Map! It was founded by myself & Susan. Lovers extraordinaire.
Who is behind the label? How long have we got here? Behind the label is a whole bunch of creatives and music lovers; All our wonderful artists from across the globe, PR teams, Designers, Mix & Mastering Engineers, fans & supporters, too many to mention, love you all!
Susan: Hey, greetings from Bahrain. Dealt With Records is the love-child of myself and Donald. If we’re the parents to DW, we have to give massive shout outs to all the amazing aunts and uncles who make up a perfect family and support our little baby. Puns aside, we really have built a great team of trusted and talented partners in a variety of fields and none of our records would see the light of day without their input & unwavering support.
Q: When was the first idea to create the label?
Donald: I think 2019? Maybe at the end of 2018. We both love house music and thought “fuck it”.
Susan: Our first release with Scottish-Skye born producer Ros T was in August 2019 and I think this was the product of months and months of work. I would say that from early 2019, ideas were floating around: names, logos, branding and all that fun stuff. I remember Donald had a list of names/word combinations on his notes app – they weren’t for anything in particular from what I can remember, just cool names for stuff. I think he’d just started jotting them down over time and saved them for the day he knew he’d start a record label.
Donald: My original idea for a logo was a guy slapping another guy’s face, like, you’ve been dealt with (jeez that’s a bad idea). There is some crazy stuff on that list, I’ll need to dig it out.
Q: What is the inspiration behind the label?
Donald: I knew I wanted to work in the music industry. At the time I was a music journalist in Scotland writing for a few amazing publications but the money was shit (sorry!) – it was never gonna be a full-time thing, which is what I wanted. Then the label idea came up. Collectively, Susan and I, we know a lot of burgeoning musicians and the idea to start a label and help the wee guy — the bedroom producer or the diamond in the rough — was and still is the mission of Dealt With.
Susan: I think the inspiration for DW really came from our passion for house music. When we first started dating, music was something that really connected us both and a passion we both shared. We’d venture out into Glasgow and enjoy the nightlife – a highlight being seeing Larry Heard aka Mr Fingers at The Barrowlands in Glasgow. I think from around that time, we started to discuss the possibility of starting our own label, with a vision of supporting up & coming DJs/producers initially on the local scene.
Donald: I was lucky enough to interview Larry over a phone call for a magazine and then when he came to Glasgow, I met and chatted with him backstage at the Barrowlands before his gig. He’s been a massive inspiration for me, I mean, he’s the Godfather of Deep House. Maybe we will get lucky and have one of his tracks on DWR one day.
Q: Do you have any statistics since the label was created—how many releases, how many vinyl, and how many units have been sold?
Donald: Hmm not my department, I do the airy fairy creative stuff like writing track descriptions, artist profiles, A&R and artist liaison work. I think currently we have 26 digital releases. And this year we celebrate 5 years of the label.
Susan: We’re yet to take the plunge into vinyl releases but that’s something we’re definitely planning for this year, both as a next step for the label and a product to celebrate 5 years of Dealt With. In terms of other statistics, we’ve surpassed over 1.5M streams on digital streaming platforms and have amassed over 1000 digital downloads and sales.
We’ve really taken pleasure in being able to support a vast array of producers and artists from across the globe – something which just happened naturally and through good old word of mouth. We’ve released over 60 tracks from 24 different artists. We’ve handpicked and supported artists from Tunisia, Scotland, Malta, Canada, South Africa, France, Norway, Lithuania & Italy to name a few.
Q: Can you describe what a typical office life means for you?
Donald: Typical office life for me is working in my fulltime job, I’m an area manager for a European company based in their Middle East branch, Bahrain “the Las Vegas of the Middle East”. The Dealt With office is anywhere I can open my laptop in every spare minute of the day that I have. Both myself and Suze work full time outside of the label.
Moving to Bahrain really opened our eyes & ears to the amazing music scene that is here and as is our mission, we are on the hunt for a Bahraini or Middle Eastern artist for our label. The fastest growing region in the world for electronic music in the world is the Middle East.
Shining a light on amazing local talent we have a top class DJ based in Bahrain Julian Mesa and he has provided us with our latest guest mix, recorded live on warmup duties to Lamache, check it out!
Susan: I’m so fortunate to work from home – so waking up to a normally sunny day in Bahrain (although right now it’s uncharacteristically windy and cold!) I take our dog Ruby out for walks. Then every day I set aside some time to work on DWR. I also work full time for an entertainment company based in the Middle East, so getting the balance can be difficult sometimes. We’ve always said Dealt With is a labour of love and it’s a passion project that’s grown into something truly remarkable.
A typical week’s worth of work from my side is more on the administrative side, Donald has the creative brain! I will upload all assets and files to our distribution channels, create release calendars, social media calendars and prepare royalty statements for our artists.
Q: Do you produce yourself or are you a DJ?
Donald: I dabbled in music production in the past, starting when I got MTV Music Generator 2 (feat. David Morales) for the Playstation 2. I then progressed to making tracks on the PC but I think I lost interest with it. Some tracks still exist on YouTube. I started posting house music that I really loved on YouTube with pictures of mine or some images thrown together and realised people liked that more than my productions. Here is one of my favourite house tunes of all time, found on a compilation CD, French Fried Funk vol.VI, that I had rented (for 50p) from my local library 17 years ago. Common Nature – Can’t You See The Sunshine Through The Rain . I of course copied the CD and then returned it (sorry Kirkintilloch Public Library). I then felt it was the right thing to do about 12 years later to buy the vinyl on Discogs.
Susan: Not a producer, that’s for sure but we did invest in a small set of decks which come out on rare occasions. I’m not sure we’ll be gracing the stages of international festivals anytime soon & I don’t think Arman Van Helden should be shaking in his boots just yet, but keep your eyes peeled.
Q: Which distribution channels do you use?
Donald: Currently LabelWorx, previously it was Horus.
Susan: We are currently distributed by LabelWorx having made the move last year. We’re really happy with the new relationship we’ve developed. Outside of LabelWorx we also utilise Bandcamp as a tool to sell our music and soon to be announced merchandise. More news on that very soon.
Q: Where do you find hungry and ambitious artists?
Donald: We were lucky to have a good network in Glasgow, Scotland, of local musicians, venues, clubs and I guess through that we were able to find people. Now, we are lucky that we receive demos direct to our inbox( it’s dealtwithrecords@gmail.com if anyone is interested). I still take pleasure in searching for new stuff, scouring SoundCloud or going to gigs wherever I can – what’s better than listening to new music?
Susan: It comes from a variety of places – sometimes via our demos inbox (see above), sometimes via Instagram, sometimes we find artists we love and reach out and try to build relationships that way.
I find it so heartwarming when someone recommends us to an artist or producer. It makes me feel personally like wow, we did good. It happened with an incredible artist we’re supporting – tildatoonz. She was recommended to us by Sonic Juncture, an electronic duo who we released in 2024 – an incredible EP ‘Can’t I Just Be?’ which featured a remix from Chicago house legend Alton Miller. We connected with tildatoonz and have plans for more releases later this year. It also happened recently when Kaysoul, an incredible South African artist we released in 2022 recommended a fantastic DJ and producer and we’ve recently just signed her tracks, more details will be announced very soon…
Q: What impact does Spotify streaming have on the economic stability of an indie label?
Susan: The economic impact of streaming and platforms like Spotify is a testing one. The digital revolution was great in a sense that people can now access the world’s songbook with a few clicks on their mobile devices. However, it’s come at a detrimental cost to creators with the return on streams being so low. It’s massively undercut and more importantly undervalued music – and I feel it’s going to be difficult to change that perception back to what it was pre-digital.
For me, I think of it as a game and you have to play the game. It’s better to be on those platforms than not, as they have such huge listenerships and potential audiences who resonate with your music. Spotify and YouTube are two of the lowest returning platforms, whereas Tidal and Apple Music are reportedly paying out more per stream. Making sure your music is present on all these platforms is the best approach we’ve found.
Furthermore, the dance & electronic music community is unique in that it still values sales in the sense of downloads. This is a result of large portions of the community being DJs or artists themselves so I think that sense of comradery is still very much active and true and why we see platforms such as Beatport & Traxsource still going strong even amongst an avalanche of digital streaming platforms like Spotify and others.
Donald: Trying to think of the positives of Spotify… I agree with Suze, that while not great, we definitely have to play the game. I would say it’s good for exposure, considering everyone and their granny has Spotify. It will reach people that perhaps are not willing to download and pay for individual tracks. Maybe some people have heard some tracks on Spotify and then purchased them on Traxsource or Bandcamp. Maybe.
Let’s get real, Spotify has decimated the financial stability that a career in music would previously bring. You could be outwith the mainstream, release a couple albums and through the sales, be quite comfortable, you could live. Now you need to be a stratospheric success to recoup any type of monetary reward, to pay your rent, to eat, and you also need to tour constantly. (Don’t get me started on the live music scene in the UK.) Ourselves and most of the artists we champion on DWR, need to subsidise their music careers with 9-5’s. Spotify’s owner is worth 4.8 BILLION dollars while artists get paid $0.003 per stream. Reform is needed.
Q: If you’re looking for new music, what are the key elements and factors you’re looking for, apart from the fact that it’s obviously a great track?
Donald: Goosebumps. I know it’s good when I get goosebumps and a tingly feeling on my scalp. Either I’m having a stroke or a physical reaction to the music. Hopefully the latter.
Susan: That’s a great question. Aside from it being a great track, I think I’m always on the lookout for something unique in terms of production. Something that makes your head turn like… ‘Okayyyyy’. Cool melodies, instrumentation, quirky beats or an interesting collaboration. Anything that is evenly remotely jazz-inspired I am an absolute sucker for (it takes me back to my teenage years when — for a brief moment in time — I was running in the circles of the Scottish National Youth Jazz Orchestra).
Q: How would you describe the label’s style and vision?
Donald: To commemorate our 5 year anniversary of the label we had decided on a rebrand. Up until then, we were using a DIY logo made on Canva. Looking at how amateurish it clearly is, is funny now. I read somewhere that if a project does not embarrass you how it looked in the early days – you started too late. And the next best time to start is now! Big props to the brains behind the rebrand, Jonny.
You can’t just have good music, these days you have to have a professional look. You eat with your eyes!
Susan: Our label has recently had a re-brand which Donald did an incredible job on facilitating with a Scottish graphic designer Jonny Bell.
Personally, I’ve really loved the likes of Toytonics and Shall Not Fade and what they’ve achieved in their years of existence. Having global recognition for the music you’re releasing is the ultimate goal and I think if we can have a small margin of the success of the likes of those labels alongside Freerange, Heist, Razor-N-Tape we’d be super happy.
Q: For the producers out there who send their demos via email, what tips would you give them if they send their tracks?
Donald: I know you are sending to as many labels as possible, hoping to get a bite, that’s expected. If you are able to spend the time and personalise a submission then go for it.
Also, if you submit something to our label or any label for that matter, give it some time, don’t rush to accept the first label that offers you a contract. Think about; What will they do for you? What’s the strategy with the release? What are the contract details?
With us at DWR, it’s far more personal. You’re gaining a couple of new, like-minded friends that love your music and are now fans for life. There is nothing greater than seeing artists we’ve worked with flourish, we released LF SYSTEM’s first ever EP, Weekend In Berlin, then they went on to sign with a mega label and had a no.1 hit in the UK for 6 weeks in a row with Afraid To Feel. You’ll find them now touring the world constantly, USA now I think.
Susan: Send us your demos and a little bit about yourself. Tell us why you think DWR is the right home for your records. I look forward to an influx of amazing music to listen to once this interview goes live!
DEALT WITH RECORDS LATEST RELEASE:
Kilogram & KIDPLUGG – Your Luv
Dealt With Records: https://linktr.ee/dealtwithrecords
