Optimo Music

Optimo Music was founded in Glasgow in 2009 by Keith McIvor, the DJ and promoter better known as JD Twitch. The label grew from the wider Optimo world, whose Sunday-night club, Optimo Espacio, had become a Glasgow institution at the Sub Club on Jamaica Street. Founded by McIvor and Jonnie Wilkes, aka JG Wilkes, in 1997, the club took its name from Liquid Liquid’s “Optimo” and was known for an adventurous, wide-ranging musical policy.

Although the weekly Optimo Espacio night ended in April 2010, McIvor and Wilkes continued to tour, promote and release music as Optimo. Their work as a DJ duo took them across Europe, America, Australia and Japan, and to China for the inaugural Black Rabbit festival in 2011. They had also appeared on BBC Radio 1’s Essential Mix in 2006. Pitchfork called them “one of the best DJ duos going right now,” while The Skinny praised the pair’s ability to mix “every genre under the sun.”

Optimo Music sits within that history of restless record selection and club culture. Its releases include work by artists such as O Yuki Conjugate, Keita Sano, D. Tiffany, GǼG, Natural Magic, Open Yellow Circle, MONKEY TIMERS and Kelvyn Munzon. The label’s Glasgow base links it directly to a club tradition that hosted artists ranging from Liquid Liquid and LCD Soundsystem to Peaches, Hot Chip, Richie Hawtin, Cut Copy and TV on the Radio, while retaining an identity rooted in the eclectic approach of Optimo itself.