Rough Trade Records | |
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Parent company | Beggars Group |
Founded | 1976 |
Founder | Geoff Travis |
Distributor(s) | Beggars Group |
Genre | Indie rock, rock |
Country of origin | U.K. |
Location | London, England |
Official website | www |
Rough Trade Records is an independent record label based in London, England. It was formed in 1976 by Geoff Travis who had opened a record store off Ladbroke Grove. It is currently run by co-managing directors Travis and Jeannette Lee and is affiliated to Beggars Group.
Having successfully promoted and sold records by punk rock and early post-punk and indie pop bands such as the Normal and Desperate Bicycles, Travis began to manage acts and distribute bands such as Scritti Politti and began the label, which was informed by left-wing politics and structured as a co-operative. Label activities began in 1978.[ citation needed ] Soon after, Rough Trade also set up a distribution arm that serviced independent retail outlets across Britain, a network that became known as the Cartel. In 1983, Rough Trade signed the Smiths.[ citation needed ]
Interest and investment of major labels in the UK indie scene in the late 1980s, as well as overtrading on behalf of Rough Trade's distribution wing, led to cash flow problems, and eventually to bankruptcy, forcing the label into receivership.
However, Travis resurrected the label in the late 1990s partnering with Lee, finding success with the Libertines, the Strokes, Antony and the Johnsons and more. The roster is diverse, with Sleaford Mods, Dead Blunt, black midi, Jarvis Cocker, Special Interest, Jockstrap and Lankum among those signed to the label, which has ranged stylistically through alternative rock, post-punk and new wave, garage rock, and psychedelic rock, but also art pop, folk, electronic, and soul.
Rough Trade began as a record shop, opened by Geoff Travis on Kensington Park Road, West London, in February 1976, with Travis reportedly taking the shop name from the Canadian art punk/new wave band Rough Trade. [1] It was inspired by what Travis has described as the "community-based environment" of the City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco, and specialised in garage rock and reggae. Steve Montgomery, initially a customer of the shop, was offered a job soon after it opened and became its effective co-manager. Travis and Montgomery were joined by a further employee, Richard Scott, in June 1977. [2] [3]
Rough Trade produced its own record for the first time after French punk band Métal Urbain came into the shop asking for assistance in publicising their music. [3] In 1978, the shop began organising a record distribution network, dubbed "The Cartel", in collaboration with other independent record stores in the UK. This network enabled small record labels such as Factory Records and 2 Tone Records to sell their releases nationally. It specialised primarily in European post-punk and other alternative rock of the late 1970s and early 1980s. It also distributed & sold a range of contemporary British fanzines such as Sniffin' Glue , No Cure , Vague , Acts of Defiance , Love and Molotov Cocktails , Attack on Bzag , Ded Yampy and Alternative Sounds .[ citation needed ]
The Rough Trade label subsequently issued a single by Jamaican reggae singer Augustus Pablo, the debut EP by Sheffield band Cabaret Voltaire and the second Stiff Little Fingers single, "Alternative Ulster". During 1978, the label released singles by the Monochrome Set, Subway Sect, Swell Maps, Electric Eels, Spizzoil and Kleenex. [4] In 1979, Rough Trade's first album, Inflammable Material by Stiff Little Fingers, reached number 14 in the UK charts and became the first independently released album to sell over 100,000 copies in the UK. [5] Rough Trade's significance by this time was such that it was made the subject of a South Bank Show documentary. [6]
In 1982, the retail outlets broke with the A&R and distribution divisions, after a decision to allow the shop staff buy out. [7] The distribution wing found itself overtrading by 1991 and shortages of cash flow led to a filing for bankruptcy. The entire company ended up in receivership.
Rough Trade Records was relaunched in 2000 as an independently owned entity, a partnership between Travis, Jeannette Lee (a former member of Public Image Ltd.), and minority partners Sanctuary Records, as a part of the Zomba Group until 11 June 2002 when BMG bought out this business. Prior to the BMG buyout, Rough Trade Records released the Strokes' debut EP The Modern Age in the spring of 2001. [8] In July 2007 Sanctuary Records then sold its stake in Rough Trade to the Beggars Group for £800,000 making Rough Trade independent once again. [9] However, it can be argued that Rough Trade is not truly independent as it is owned by another company. Rough Trade is more accurately a subsidiary [10] that is owed by Beggars Group, which in turn is a privately held company not publicly traded on the stock market. [11] Throughout this period, and continuing under Beggars, the label has been co-managed by Lee and Travis. [12]
Since its return and partnership with the Beggars Group, Rough Trade has continued to release records by alternative artists such as Warpaint, Pantha Du Prince, Emiliana Torrini, Dean Blunt, Belle and Sebastian, Amy and the Sniffers, ANOHNI, Lisa O'Neill, JARV IS..., Gruff Rhys, This Is The Kit, Alabama Shakes, Parquet Courts, Gilla Band and more.
In addition, Rough Trade Records has a sister label River Lea Records which focuses on folk artists and includes Ye Vagabonds and John Francis Flynn among its signings, while the label also operates a management wing led by Lee and Travis. [13]
Wiiija was a British independent record label founded in 1988 by staff from the Rough Trade Shop in Notting Hill, London. The name Wiiija is a corruption of W11 1JA, the postcode of the Rough Trade Shop in Talbot Street.
The Raincoats are a British experimental post-punk band. Ana da Silva and Gina Birch formed the group in 1977 while they were students at Hornsey College of Art in London.
Beggars Group is a British record company that owns or distributes several other labels, including 4AD, Rough Trade Records, Matador Records, XL Recordings and Young.
Inflammable Material is the debut album by the Northern Irish punk band Stiff Little Fingers, released in 1979. Most of the album's tracks are about the "Troubles" and the grim reality of life in Northern Ireland with the songs containing themes of teenage boredom, sectarian violence, RUC (police) oppression, etc., urging people to "grab it and change it, it's yours" in what became their signature song "Alternative Ulster". The song "Rough Trade" is about the band's view of the music business as being dishonest, but they have since claimed it is not about their record label which happens to have the same name.
The Raincoats is the debut studio album by English rock band The Raincoats. It was released on 21 November 1979 as one of the first records issued by the London-based independent label Rough Trade. The album is perhaps best known for its off-kilter cover of "Lola" by the Kinks. The album's sixth track, "The Void", was covered by Hole in 1994.
Post-punk revival is a genre or movement of indie rock that emerged in the early 2000s as musicians started to play a stripped down and back-to-basics version of guitar rock inspired by the original sounds and aesthetics of garage rock, new wave, and post-punk.
Rough Trade is a retail chain of record shops in the United Kingdom and the United States with headquarters in London.
Daniel Otto Joachim Miller is an English music producer and founder of Mute Records.
Geoff Travis is the founder of both Rough Trade Records and the Rough Trade chain of record shops. A former drama teacher and owner of a punk record shop, Travis founded the Rough Trade label in 1978.
Acme Attractions was a London clothing store on Kings Road, Chelsea, London, that in the early 1970s provided a place for many punk and reggae musicians and scenesters to hang out. Shop assistant and manager Don Letts described Acme Attraction as a place "where the interaction between the different factions became more important than selling merchandise, even though at that age it was a deadly combination."
Jeannette Lee is a British music record executive, music manager, filmmaker and former musician. A retail worker at the Acme Attractions store that, along with the SEX boutique run by Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood, was instrumental in spawning punk in the UK, she went on to become a member of post-punk band Public Image Ltd (PiL). Lee is currently co-owner of the independent record label Rough Trade Records.
The Cartel was a co-operative record distribution organisation in the United Kingdom, set up by a number of small independent record labels to handle their distribution to record shops. Pooling their resources in this way allowed them to compete with the larger distribution operations of the major record labels, and also to gain access to the larger shop chains.
Post-punk is a broad genre of rock music that emerged in the late 1970s in the wake of punk rock. Post-punk musicians departed from punk's traditional elements and raw simplicity, instead adopting a broader, more experimental approach that encompassed a variety of avant-garde sensibilities and non-rock influences. Inspired by punk's energy and do it yourself ethic but determined to break from rock cliches, artists experimented with styles like funk, electronic music, jazz, and dance music; the production techniques of dub and disco; and ideas from art and politics, including critical theory, modernist art, cinema and literature. These communities produced independent record labels, visual art, multimedia performances and fanzines.
Post-Britpop is an alternative rock subgenre and is the period in the late 1990s and early 2000s, following Britpop, when the media were identifying a "new generation" or "second wave" of guitar bands influenced by acts like Oasis and Blur, but with less overt British concerns in their lyrics and making more use of American rock and indie influences, as well as experimental music. Bands in the post-Britpop era that had been established acts, but gained greater prominence after the decline of Britpop, such as Radiohead and the Verve, and new acts such as Travis, Keane, Snow Patrol, Stereophonics, Feeder, and particularly Coldplay, achieved much wider international success than most of the Britpop groups that had preceded them, and were some of the most commercially successful acts of the late 1990s and early 2000s.
Sleaford Mods are an English post-punk music duo, formed in 2007 in Nottingham. The band features vocalist Jason Williamson and, since 2012, musician Andrew Fearn. They are known for their abrasive, minimalist musical style and embittered explorations of austerity-era Britain, culture, and working class life, delivered in Williamson's East Midlands accent. The duo have released several albums to critical praise.
Key Markets is the eighth studio album by British post-punk duo Sleaford Mods. It was released on 24 July 2015, through Harbinger Sound. The tracks are critical of the UK government.
An independent record label is a record label that operates without the funding or distribution of major record labels; they are a type of small- to medium-sized enterprise, or SME. The labels and artists are often represented by trade associations in their country or region, which in turn are represented by the international trade body, the Worldwide Independent Network (WIN).
English Tapas is the ninth studio album by English post-punk duo Sleaford Mods. Recorded at Steve Mackey's West Heath Garage studios in London, it was released via Rough Trade Records on 3 March 2017. It debuted at number 12 on the UK Albums Chart.
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