SF0195 Merge Record Label

SF0195 Merge Record Label

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In think I came across Merge Records when I was looking through a copy of Spin magazine’s 1994 “Best Of Year” round up in the Tower Records that used to be on the ground floor of Whiteleys in Bayswater. (I assume it’s not there any more.) The musically inclined among us would often wander down there on our lunch break from the agency where I worked on Bishops’ Bridge Road in Paddington.

Featured in the round up were albums by both Superchunk and The Magnetic Fields which I proceeded to invest in, based on the reviews. Both, I noticed, were on the Merge label with which I was then unfamiliar. Over the next few years I was to become better acquainted.

So, some history. Merge is an indie record label, based in Durham, North Carolina. Doug  Evans on our FOSF forum recently posted a shot of the offices on a pilgrimage thither. It was founded in 1989 by Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan of Superchunk, as an outlet for music from their band and friends. It’s since expanded to include artists from around the world, with records reaching the top of the Billboard charts.

“People ask the question a lot: Why did you decide to put out your own records? But it’s not like there was anyone else asking to put them out,” said McCaughan. His partner Laura came up with the name Merge Records, based on the merge traffic signs she saw while driving through Colorado. After releasing a number of 7″ records and cassettes, the first Merge Records full-length CD release came on April 1, 1992, with Tossing Seeds, Superchunk’s first collection of singles.

Then things took off. Early successes included much-loved SF favourites such as Neutral Milk Hotel‘s In the Aeroplane over the Sea, The Magnetic Fields‘ 69 Love Songs, Camera Obscura‘s Let’s Get Out of This Country and Arcade Fire’s Funeral. Putting this tracklist together has very much been an exercise in sacrifice. There is so much quality material from which to choose.

I finally got to see Superchunk when they supported Neutral Milk Hotel at the Forum in Melbourne during the latter’s reunion tour. It was obvious the respect in which the NMH crew held Mac and Laura from their comments, and the fact they may not have been able to release their music at all without them.

Now, a sombre note. One of Mac’s friends in the UK was Sean Tracey, a fellow Guerilla Cricket commentator of mine. They’d known each other since the early days of the label. Tragically, while I was putting this podcast together, news came through that Sean had died over the weekend. I know no more than that. It’s fair to say the news has devastated our little community. There was no more popular member of it than Sean or ‘Nestlers’, as he was known. We frequently corresponded on the subject of music: he revealed he nearly became a member of The Fall one time when he danced with Mark E Smith’s mum to Mr Pharmacist.