| Darla Records | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Founded | 1993 |
| Founder | James Agren |
| Genre | Indie pop, indie rock, electronica, ambient, Americana |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Location | New York |
| Official website | darla |
Darla Records is an independent record label founded by James Agren in October 1993 while he was in New York. Darla's first release was a 7-inch by Grifters, an indie rock/lo-fi band from Memphis.
The music of the artists on the label includes indie pop, indie rock, electronica, ambient, and Americana. Darla is a label, distributor, and online retailer. Darla Records is home to over 200 exclusively distributed labels including Ad Noiseam, Audio Dregs Recordings, Ici d'Ailleurs, Elefant, LTM, Le Grand Magistery, Matinee, Ohm Resistance, Siesta, and Words On Music.
The label created a series, known as Bliss Out in 1996. The series focused on ambient, electronic, and instrumental music. The moniker for the series is a reference to Blissed Out: The Rapture of Rock — a tome authored by Simon Reynolds, a notable rock music critic based in Britain. The Little Darla Has A Treat For You semi-quarterly compilation series features artists and labels Darla Records works with closely, and is very popular. This series was named after the Little Debbie snack treats.
The label's moniker is not a reference to Darla Hood, the little girl from the Our Gang comedies (known as The Little Rascals on television), but comes from a yet-to-be-acknowledged bit of Americana. James noted while record collecting that many regional independent labels in the 1950s had women's names and national hits: Laurie, Paula, Sue, Tamla, etc. In the 1980s and 1990s there were popular indie-pop labels Sarah and Harriet.
Since 1993, Darla has been a label and distributor. Darla started selling music online in 1996. In February 2007, American webzine Somewhere Cold voted Darla record label of the year on their 2006 Somewhere Cold Awards Hall of Fame. [1] in 2009, Darla began offering digital downloads from their own website. James Agren and Chandra Tobey run Darla Records from a 1,250 sq ft (116 m2) barn on their avocado and cherimoya farm in the hills of north San Diego county.
In 1996, Darla Records asked for contributions to a double album featuring music on the calmer, "sleepier" side of music, such as shoegaze and ambient music. They would receive a submission from New Jersey band Flowchart. The label liked the track they sent so much that, instead of creating a double album, they would instead ask contributing bands to create EPs/albums of these tracks. Flowchart sent three more tracks, and the resulting collection of songs would be Tenjira, the first album in the "Bliss Out" series. The series would end in 2004, after 20 releases, with the release of Manual's The North Shore. Every release in this series is meant to invoke peacefulness and "bliss". The releases in this series are:
Since its inception, Darla has been host to several notable acts. Musical outfits whose recordings have been released by this label include:
Before long, Darla outgrew its one-bedroom apartment and 350 sq ft (33 m2). ground floor office space in San Francisco. James and Chandra relocated Darla to Sacramento, California in October 2000. Darla moved in October 2002 to Vista, California.
Space rock is a music genre characterized by loose and lengthy song structures centered on instrumental textures that typically produce a hypnotic, otherworldly sound. It may feature distorted and reverberation-laden guitars, minimal drumming, languid vocals, synthesizers, and lyrical themes of outer space and science fiction.
Füxa is an American rock band.
Trespassers William was an American indie rock band formed in 1997 from Orange County, California. The band released three albums from 1997 to 2006, relocating to the SoDo/Capitol Hill area of Seattle, Washington before their third album Having. Trespassers William disbanded in 2012, reuniting in 2020 for the release of a non-album single.
Kranky is an American independent record label in Chicago, Illinois. It was started in 1993 by Bruce Adams and Joel Leoschke. It houses predominantly experimental music artists, often branching into or inspired by ambient, rock, electronic or psychedelic music. Their first release was Labradford's 1993 debut album Prazision. Adams left the label in 2006, after which Leoschke continued running it, with the help of Brian Foote of Kranky band Nudge.
Windy & Carl is an American ambient duo based in Dearborn, Michigan, United States.
Japancakes is an American indie rock group, based in Athens, Georgia, United States.
Mahogany are an electric music-based multidisciplinary media ensemble formed in Michigan in 1995 and currently working in Philadelphia, New York City, Chicago, and other locations. The band's sound combines vocals, cello, massed guitars, pianos, melodicas, sequencers, synthesizers, samplers, tape, percussion, and other instruments. Mahogany also use film, video, animation, cinema, graphic design, photography, typography and other realization and rendering techniques for a cumulative effect that the band refers to as the "Hypercube".
Sweet Trip was an American electronic/experimental rock act formed in 1993 in the Bay Area of California by musicians Valerie Cooper and Roberto Burgos. They are known for their dreamy soundscapes and dense production techniques, often blending alternative rock subgenres with intelligent dance music.
Halica:Bliss Out v.11, often referred to as just Halica is the debut album from experimental pop group Sweet Trip, and was released by Darla Records in November 1998. It was the eleventh entry in the label's Bliss Out series of ambient-style records.
Hammock is an American ambient post-rock duo formed in Nashville, Tennessee in 2005 by Marc Byrd and Andrew Thompson.
Burnt Hair Records was a record label involved with Michigan's space rock alternative music scene in the 1990s. The label is said to have been most responsible for cultivating the Detroit sound of this period. Burnt Hair recorded artists in various experimental genres also known by appellations such as indie pop, indie rock, ambient music, drone music, dream pop and electronica. The label was founded by Larry Hofmann in Dearborn. Burnt Hair released recordings by artists and bands including Windy & Carl, Hopewell, Mahogany, Ten Second Dynasty, Miss Bliss, Tomorrowland, DELTA WAVES, Starphase 23, Füxa, Auburn Lull, Monaural (Band), Gravity Wax, Asha Vida, Flowchart and Alison's Halo.
New Radiant Storm King was an American indie rock band formed in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1990. The group released nine studio albums over its 20-year existence.
Desario is an American indie rock band based in Sacramento, California.
Sleepyard is a psychedelic band from Norway formed by Oliver and Svein Kersbergen in 1994.
Rocket Girl is a London-based independent record label. It has released records by Robin Guthrie, Pieter Nooten, God Is an Astronaut, Ulrich Schnauss, A Place to Bury Strangers, Bell Gardens among others, including many artists associated with ambient music.
Bvdub is an American electronic music producer originally from the San Francisco Bay Area. Since 2007 he has released more than 50 albums and EPs under this name and other pseudonyms including his birth name, Brock Van Wey. Residing in Shaoxing, China, he produces ambient and ambient techno music that has received critical acclaim from the likes of online magazines Resident Advisor, Headphone Commute and Gridface. His first release as Brock Van Wey, White Clouds Drift On And On, was included in RA's Top 20 Albums of 2009.
Maybe They Will Sing for Us Tomorrow is the third studio album by American ambient/post-rock band Hammock. It was released on May 6, 2008 on Darla Records and was reissued in 2013 by the band's own label, Hammock Music.
Raising Your Voice...Trying to Stop an Echo is the second studio album by American ambient/post-rock band Hammock. It was released on November 21, 2006 on Darla Records. It was reissued in 2011 by the band's own label, Hammock Music.
Antarctica: The Bliss Out, Vol. 2 is the third studio album by American musical duo Windy & Carl. It was released in February 1997 by Darla Records as the second entry in the label's Bliss Out series of ambient records.
Somewherecold Records is an American independent record label established in late 2004 by Jason T. Lamoreaux. The record company was founded in Lexington, Kentucky, but is currently headquartered in Shelbyville, Kentucky. It releases ambient, shoegaze, dream pop, slowcore, post-rock, space rock and drone music, with an international roster of artists spanning from the early 2000s to the present. Somewherecold Records has released music on vinyl records, compact discs, compact cassettes and digital audio formats, with global distribution through The Business.
