A label that began in a kitchen, a cassette series and a six-day convention. How K Records turned Olympia, Washington into an indie scene with its own rules.
A cassette that sounded terrible, a TB-303 used as a funk bass and a Glasgow techno label with doubts about the tempo. How Da Funk was ignored in 1995 and then carried by DJs into a major-label deal.
Big Star recorded Third at Ardent in 1974, saw it rejected, and watched it appear in 1978 in several versions. Here is why no definitive copy exists.
How Planet Rock rebuilt Kraftwerk's Numbers and Trans-Europe Express, hedged with a B-side, and settled for a dollar a record.
The Electric Eels played five shows in Cleveland, lost their last venue to a lawnmower, and became a legend through one Rough Trade single and decades of archival releases.
How Jim Jupp and Julian House built Ghost Box as a parallel Britain, from two 2004 releases to a Penguin-style grid and a hauntological catalogue.
In 1968 the BBC Radiophonic Workshop existed to score continuity idents, radio drama and the odd Doctor Who cue, not to make records. It had no mandate to release music and no budget line for a pop album. That did not stop two of its staff engineers from making one anyway, after the building emptied […]
Released 21 September 1979, Wire's 154 was named after a gig tally, lost its producer mid-mix, hid a solo EP in the first 20,000 copies and ended the band at UK number 39.
Chill Out was released on 5 February 1990 on the band’s own KLF Communications imprint, and it remains one of the strangest origin stories in electronic music. The record that gave a whole genre its name was not built in a studio full of gear. It was, according to its sleeve, recorded “live on location” […]
Montreal post-rock is usually explained as a sound. It is better explained as real estate: an Anglo exodus, a loft above a garage, 500 hand-glued LPs, and two venues opened by a bass player. How Mile End built the infrastructure first.
