UK label set up by Nick Halkes in 1993, after being approached by EMI due to his success at XL Recordings. Other staff included Jason Ellis as director, Dave Lambert (8) working in A&R and Kevin Robinson in promotions.
Initially established as a house label, later focussing on more mainstream dance output.
The Positiva label now operates under Virgin EMI Records as of 2012 with the acquisition of EMI by Universal Music.
The Positiva trademark as of 2017 is immediately owned by EMI (IP) Ltd., an intellectual property holding company under the direct control of EMI Group Ltd.
I'm an oldschool breakbeat fan that always loved quite a bit of trance. Especially female vocals. found the label now because of Alice Deejay - The Lonely One which I love. Will anyone that is well versed with this label point out some great songs [the more obsure the better] with or without female vox that might not of had mass appeal but still noteworthy? No need to mention super popular stuff like "better off alone".. I'm looking for hidden gems., thanks.. Heck, from any label if anyone is willing to discuss it. I loved a lot of trance from the late 90's/ to early 2000's. Fell into an a love affair with Warp, Planet Mu, IDM stuff from there. Now as I get older, i've been backtracking my steps and finding there were all kinds of things I missed.I really just love electronic music in every form for almost 20 something years. I just love a mix of dark/ spacey, broken beats/ unbroken if there was some substance. Atmospheres, beautiful female vox. The new stuff is so hard to listen too. I really want to dig in with like minded people, it's like we need a team to find recently released gems in all these hours of sifting through beatport top whatever. Props to the educated listeners/ feelers.
Positiva is one of the greatest dance labels ever. Yes it released a lot of cheesy rubbish but that's what it always stood for, backing the most popular kind of credible dance music.... until Ben Cherril jumped ship from Manifesto and took the label into the abyss.
I agree with Kal. It is true: Positiva released a lot of sub-pop crap (and I mean "sub-pop" because, in my books, pop, per se, is not synonymous with crap). But they also put their big money to good value: Joe T. Vannelli, Trisco, Judy Cheeks, Boris Dglosch, Barbara Tucker, Tru Faith, The Ones, Kid Crème, Room 5, George Morel and The Scumfrog can be counted in the "good pop stuff" category. And then, some classics: The Bucketheads, Shy FX & T-Power, Black Magic and Ragga Twins. And yes, they released a lot of bullshit too! But one can't deny the fact that this label is, for better and for worse, one of the most important labels in dance music.
Positiva WAS a great label. Their earlier releases were fantastic but like other members have commented, they went through a stage of releasing crap. That bein said, some of their earlier releases were total shite (I'm refering to Amos for example.) Still I rank these guys up there with the likes of deConstruction Records. Both of these labels gave us some of the finest moments in dance history, and then again, they both gave us some horrors as well.
mattcymru2021
April 12, 2021