Do As You Please launches Records & Arts House from the heart of Manchester’s underground
Manchester May 2026: For the past eight years, Do As You Please has existed largely through record bags, late night sets, vinyl drops and word of mouth. Now, the Manchester collective is formally stepping into its next chapter.
Founded in 2018 by DJ, promoter and creative director Niall Roche (pka Joe Roche), DAYP Records & Arts House brings together an independent record label, online vinyl store, DJ talent collective and events platform under one identity, shaped around contemporary electronic music, art, fashion and nightlife.
What makes DAYP feel distinct is not simply the breadth of the project, but the way each part feeds the other. The label releases the music. The artists play the events. The record store distributes the culture physically. The agency develops the talent. The community sustains the entire thing.
In its own words, the collective exists to create “an authentic, high quality creative ecosystem” built around authenticity, independence, innovation, expression and legacy. Alongside its formal mission statement sits another guiding principle that perhaps says even more about the spirit of the project itself: “Don’t be a dick.”
At the centre of the operation sits DAYP Records, the label division focused on house, techno, acid, electro and leftfield club music. Without major label backing, the collective has quietly accumulated more than 10.3 million streams, sold out its first 300 press vinyl release and built a catalogue that has attracted attention from titles including Mixmag.
There is a deliberate emphasis throughout the project on longevity over hype. The collective speaks openly about wanting to build “a label discography with intergenerational appeal and residual admiration”, a philosophy increasingly rare within modern dance music culture.
Alongside the label sits the DAYP Store, an online vinyl platform specialising in short run and difficult to source electronic records from European, US and Japanese labels & distributors. The collective describes itself as one of the few regular Manchester stockist for its primary distributor, giving its community access to records rarely available elsewhere in the city.
Initially operating from 2018-2022 with a 100 percent five star feedback rating on Discogs, the store has this year reopened and developed a loyal following among DJs, collectors and selectors looking beyond algorithm driven music discovery and back towards physical culture, record digging and community.
That same philosophy runs through DAYP Collective, the project’s non exclusive artist network and DJ platform representing a new generation of Manchester connected talent including Joe Roche, Egg On Toast, Lily C-D, Shimrise, Urbi, SUI 13, Jordan Villa, Zac Stanton and Marlon Baleci.
Collectively, the roster has amassed more than 23,000 followers alongside appearances linked to MTV, the BRIT Awards and the MOBO Awards, while increasingly appearing across clubs, festivals and underground parties throughout the UK and Europe.
Internally, DAYP describes its “special sauce” as the fluid relationship between artists, releases, events and collaborations. Artists move between parties, visual projects, vinyl releases and creative partnerships within one connected underground network rather than existing as isolated acts.
Beyond music itself, the wider DAYP structure increasingly resembles a multidisciplinary creative studio. The extended team spans graphic design, videography, photography, motion graphics, social strategy, merchandise, streaming and artistic direction, operating through a collaborative freelance model that reflects the realities of contemporary independent culture.
For Roche, the launch of DAYP Records & Arts House is less about reinvention and more about formalising something that has already existed organically inside Manchester nightlife for years.
“DAYP was never built to fit neatly into the music industry,” he says.
“It came from Manchester nightlife, record digging, friendship groups and people wanting to create their own world around music. Everything has grown organically through parties, artists and community. Now we’re at a point where the culture, the people and the platform all exist together under one roof and are ready for the world.”
Roche himself has spent more than twelve years working across DJing, producing, talent booking, events and artist development, while performing up to 150 gigs annually across the UK and internationally.
In many respects, this relaunch sequence feels less like the arrival of a new project and more like the moment an existing underground movement formally introduces itself.
Words by Antoni Heatley
