Vinyl in the Sun: Inside the First Solar-Powered Record Pressing Plant in the U.S.

At the crossroads of an intense creative period and a personal tragedy, Dave Newell found himself stuck with an idea he couldn’t shake: What if he opened a record pressing plant?

This was back in 2021. Newell was grieving the death of his father, pondering what the next few decades of his own life might look like, and trying to figure out what to do with the tons of music he’d made over the past year. Since the early 2000s, Newell had traversed the rap underground, releasing music under the moniker Enoch with the Florida group CYNE. Fiercely independent, his desire to self-release a new solo record eventually dovetailed with an even bolder idea to manufacture it himself, too. 

“There were a variety of factors that all fell into place,” Newell tells Rolling Stone. “It just dawned on me that this might be the perfect thing for me to pursue.”

Three years later, Newell and his wife Betsy Bemis have realized that vision with Audiodrome Record Pressing, which officially opens today, April 22 (and you can check out Enoch’s album, which came out last month). It’s a boutique shop in Gainesville, Florida that aims to serve smaller artists and labels left in the lurch by the continued growth of vinyl, especially among pop stars whose massive manufacturing needs have created industry-wide backlogs. But it’s also a revolutionary kind of pressing plant: One powered completely by solar energy. 

Leave a Comment