| Bloodshot Records | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Founded | 1993 |
| Founder | Nan Warshaw Rob Miller Eric Babcock (former partner from 1993–1997) |
| Distributor(s) | ADA |
| Genre | |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Location | Chicago, Illinois |
| Official website | BloodshotRecords.com |
Bloodshot Records is an independent record label based in Chicago, Illinois, which specializes in alternative country music. [1] [2]
Bloodshot Records was founded in 1994 by Nan Warshaw, [3] Rob Miller, [4] and Eric Babcock, [5] [6] who knew each other from jobs in the music industry and from being active in was then a burgeoning underground country-roots music scene.
Warshaw had been promoting, booking, and managing bands for years and also worked as a publicist for the band Killbilly, which released a record on Flying Fish Records, where Babcock worked. [7] She was well known around Chicago as a punk raconteur. Her reputation was confirmed when Kurt Cobain's diaries were posthumously published in 2002 included this mention: "Call Nan Warshaw" appears on his to-do list. [8]
Miller moved to Chicago in 1991 from Ann Arbor, Michigan where he helped to produce shows for a local promoter and DJed on a local radio station. [7] He met Warshaw in 1993 at Crash Palace (now Delilah's), a local punk bar where Warshaw was a DJ spinning country records on Wednesday nights. [7]
While having drinks at a bar, Warshaw, Miller, and Babcock made a wish-list on a cocktail napkin of unheralded Chicago bands and musicians they loved [9] — who all had a thread of old school country running through their music. That cocktail napkin list became 17 songs from 16 bands recorded for a self-funded first release in 1994 under the Bloodshot Records label titled For A Life of Sin: A Compilation of Insurgent Chicago Country. [10] The album included artists such as The Bottle Rockets, Freakwater, The Handsome Family, and Robbie Fulks, as well as The Sundowners, [6] a country music trio that started in the 1950s. The record was self-distributed and sold on consignment in stores and, selling out its initial pressing of 1,000 copies. [7] [11] The success of the record left funds to do another compilation. [7] [12] [13]
Bloodshot Records was initially run out of Warshaw's apartment in the Lakeview neighborhood of Chicago and later the business moved into her Warshaw's basement. In 1997, singer and Bloodshot Records artist, Kelly Hogan was the first paid employee, working as the label's publicist. [14] [7] In 1999, the label moved to its current location on West Irving Park Road. [15] Both Warshaw and Miller worked supplemental jobs to keep afloat. Miller was a carpenter painting houses and Warshaw was doing publicity work. [4]
Following the compilation format of the initial album release, Bloodshot organized record release shows in multiple cities with four or five bands on each night's line-up. The shows drew press coverage for the new label and the bands/artists, which for some was their first recording and opportunity to play multiple-band shows. [7]
A year later, in 1995, the label released their second compilation album Hell Bent: Insurgent Country Volume 2. The album included bands from all over the country, and Bloodshot continued to put on events showcasing the bands involved with the making of the record. [7] Although well received by critics, Bloodshot had very tight financial constraints, and worked under the model of not starting a new project until the prior project had paid for itself. Also challenging was establishing Bloodshot's brand, a mixture of country, punk, and folk that had no precedent. [16] [17] The name of the music genre was a point of contention, with some grouping the unique, hard-to-classify singer-songwriter music under the alternative country and some grouping it under the Americana label. [18]
In 1997, co-founder Babcock left Bloodshot, eventually relocating to Nashville, where he founded Catamount Records. [19] After Babcock left, ownership of Bloodshot was split fifty/fifty between the two other founding partners, Warshaw and Miller.
By 1999, its fifth year in business, Bloodshot had released 60 records. That year, the label released another compilation, Down to the Promised Land, with 40 unreleased track on two CD that included every artist and band on the label. [20]
In 2000, Bloodshot released Ryan Adams' record Heartbreaker , and the popularity of the record created a more stable financial base for the label. allowed Warshaw and Miller to dedicate themselves full-time to running the label, move to a bigger office space in the northwest side of Chicago, and begin to hire employees. The full-time Bloodshot staff eventually grew to six. [1] Singer Kelly Hogan was the first paid employee, working as the label's publicist. The Chicago twang, country, and punk scene, often described as a sort of an anti-Nashville, continued to expand, often led by various projects involving The Mekons' Jon Langford. [21]
In 2014, Bloodshot released their 20th-anniversary album, While No One Was Looking: Toasting 20 Years of Bloodshot Records. [15] The album is a two-CD set with 38 artists that include Andrew Bird, Blitzen Trapper, Superchunk, and Diarrhea Planet covering songs by some of Bloodshot's stable of artists (i.e., Ryan Adams, Old 97's, Cory Branan, and Justin Townes Earle). [22] Bloodshot spent the year celebrating their success at surviving during a period when most independent record labels were going out of business. [7]
In November 2019, Bloodshot celebrated its 25th anniversary by holding a concert/party and issuing another compilation album. [23]
Bloodshot had close ties to the Chicago community [24] and particularly to the Hideout, a bar and music venue. [25]
Starting in the mid 1990s, Bloodshot hosted a free barbecue-and-music day-long showcase at both Austin, Texas' SXSW and New York City's CMJ music festivals. [26] [27] The annual SXSW shows have often been anchored by performances by The Waco Brothers. [28]
In January 2019, Bloodshot artist, Lydia Loveless, accused Warshaw of attempting to cover up sexual harassment by Warshaw's long-term domestic partner, Mark Panick. [29] Warshaw issued a public apology to Loveless, while also announcing she was stepping away from the label. A month later she announced that she was not just stepping away, but resigning, with Miller to continue the work of running the label with Warshaw still retaining 50% ownership. [30] In mid-July 2020, after an internal audit, Bloodshot Records staff issued a statement further accusing Warshaw of long-term negligence in regard to royalty payments and accounting. [30] [31]
On October 19, 2021, Miller posted a message on the Bloodshot website saying that the office is permanently closed, and said "Regrettably, it is time for this phase of Bloodshot Records to come to an end". [32] Just three days later, on October 22, 2021, Exceleration Music announced that it had purchased Bloodshot from Miller and Warshaw. [33] [34]
With the sale of Bloodshot, Dave Hansen, a principal with Exceleration said "Bloodshot is a vitally important part of American music history, a genre-defining label founded on passion and vision, dedicated to bringing a unique set of artists from its musical orbit to the world." Warshaw said, "This passing of the torch ensures that the legacy of nurturing and celebrating unique indie music will live on." [33]
In early 2023, Bloodshot, under Exceleration, announced that it had signed new contracts with several artists, including three who had previously worked with Bloodshot, and would shortly start releasing new recordings again. [35]
Some of the early artists who started out on Bloodshot went on to sign with larger major record labels, specifically Old 97's and Ryan Adams. [36] Ryan Adams had one of the label's best-selling albums with the 2000 release Heartbreaker, having sold almost 500,000 copies. [9] Neko Case had a licensing deal with Bloodshot Records in the United States and Mint Records in Canada before she signed with ANTI-. [37]
Under Miller and Warshaw, Bloodshot included a diverse roster of artists, including the late Andre Williams, who wrote "Shake a Tail Feather," faced challenges, and then had a career renaissance making records at Bloodshot. [38] Bloodshot includes bands and projects by several members of The Mekons, including Jon Langford, Sally Timms, and Rico Bell.
‡ denotes active Bloodshot artists[ when? ]
Bloodshot Records began its life as a label by releasing compilations of tracks not released elsewhere. [39]
Bloodshot Revival/Soundies: A series of historic transcription acetate recordings that were leased to radio stations for airplay but never sold at the time of recording. [41]
The label planned to release a 10th anniversary DVD (Bloodied But Unbowed: Bloodshot Records' Life In The Trenches) in 2004, but it was not released until late 2006. [42] [43]
Neko Richelle Case is an American singer-songwriter and member of the Canadian indie rock group the New Pornographers. Case has a powerful, untrained contralto voice, which has been described by contemporaries and critics as a "flamethrower", "a powerhouse [which] seems like it might level buildings," "a 120-mph fastball," and a "vocal tornado". Critics also note her idiosyncratic, "cryptic," "imagistic" lyrics, and credit her as a significant figure in the early 21st-century American revival of the tenor guitar. Case's body of work has spanned and drawn on a range of traditions including country, folk, art rock, indie rock, and pop and is frequently described as defying or avoiding easy generic classification.
Alligator Records is an American, Chicago-based independent blues record label founded by Bruce Iglauer in 1971. Iglauer was also one of the founders of the Living Blues magazine in Chicago in 1970.
Jonathan Denis Langford is a Welsh musician and artist based in Chicago, Illinois, United States.
Nan Warshaw is the Co-Founder of Bloodshot Records, an independent record label based out of Chicago.
Freakwater is an American alternative country band from Louisville, Kentucky, with one co-founding member living in Chicago. Freakwater is known for the lead vocals of Janet Bean and Catherine Irwin, who mix harmony and melody in idiosyncratic dissonant country-folk that is reminiscent of the Carter Family.
Wreck Your Life is the second studio album by American country/rock band Old 97's, first released on October 3, 1995. The album's title comes from a Texas Department of Transportation bumper sticker with the slogan, "Don't Wreck Your Life". Drummer Philip Peeples removed the first word and applied the sticker to the band's touring van.
Robert William "Robbie" Fulks is an American alternative country singer-songwriter, instrumentalist and long-time Chicago, Illinois resident. He has released 15 albums over a career spanning more than 30 years. His 2016 record Upland Stories was nominated for a Grammy for Best Folk Album and the song "Alabama at Night" was nominated for a Grammy for Best American Roots Song.
Nora O’Connor is an American, Chicago-based musician. Though primarily known for her vocals, O'Connor also plays guitar and bass. For much of 2013, O'Connor toured internationally as a singer in Iron and Wine. She also records and performs with longtime collaborator, Andrew Bird. O'Connor plays bass and sings back-up for Kelly Hogan and in 2010, Wilco's Jeff Tweedy enlisted O'Connor and Hogan as primary vocalists on gospel legend Mavis Staples’ Grammy Award-winning album You Are Not Alone. In the studio and on the stage, O'Connor has backed Neko Case, Jakob Dylan, The New Pornographers, The Decemberists, Archer Prewitt, John Wesley Harding, Hushdrops, Justin Roberts and Robbie Fulks.
Cory Dale Branan is an American singer-songwriter from Mississippi.
Sally Ann Timms is an English singer and lyricist. Timms is best known for her long involvement with The Mekons whom she joined in 1985.
The Waco Brothers are an American alternative country, or country-punk rock, band based in Chicago, Illinois, United States.
Pine Valley Cosmonauts (PVC) are a musical ensemble from Chicago, Illinois.
David Trumfio is an American record producer, mixer, engineer and musician, best known for his production work with artists such as Wilco and his recordings with his own band The Pulsars.
Kelly Hogan is an American singer-songwriter, often known for her work as a member of Neko Case's backing band, as well as for her solo work.
The Mekons are a British band formed in the late 1970s as an art collective. They are one of the longest-running and most prolific of the first-wave British punk rock bands.
Rico Bell is a UK and California based artist and musician best known for his work as a member of the British punk rock band the Mekons which he joined in 1983. A singer and multi-instrumentalist with the Mekons, Bell has also released three well-received solo recordings with the Chicago-based alternative country label, Bloodshot Records: The Return of Rico Bell (1995), Dark Side of the Mersey (1999) and Been a Long Time (2002).
Lydia Loveless is an American alternative country singer-songwriter from Columbus, Ohio. Her music combines pop music, classic country, honky tonk, and punk rock.
Checkered Past Records is an American indie music record label established in May 1997 in Chicago.
This is the Bloodshot Records discography, albums released on the Bloodshot Records label from 1994 until the present, ordered by catalog number.
Mark Panick is an American musician, bandleader and songwriter best known for fronting the underground rock groups Bonemen of Barumba and Razorhouse.
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