Seed Records - Dagger Brothers - Space Trumpet

A BRIEF HISTORY

Seed are an independent record label based in London, UK, with non genre specific tastes and who are interested in releasing the freshest sounds on the planet.

At the end of 1999 we all moved down to London and started hosting parties at the now defunct NuBar on Essex Road. The purpose of these free events was to promote new artists alongside more established talent. The night was called 'Seed Showcases.' Quickly, it garnered a reputation for being the place to hang out before heading off to the clubs that night, not least because of a rather lax bar policy never mind the hot bed of talent that was rapidly beginning to accumulate at the venue! This pre-club meeting place went from strength to strength and as a result we forged many new friendships with people such as Cursor Miner, Digitonal, Ardisson and Kansas City Prophets. When the place shut down (nothing to do with us we may add) we decided it was time to establish Seed Records as an outlet for all the music we were coming into contact with thanks to our showcase evenings. The first release was the monumental 'The Uncertainty Of the Monkey' by Posthuman, in September 2001.

Not content with just starting a label we also made a foray into arranging bigger and more elaborate parties in the country's capital and settled upon the spectacular Aldwych disused tube station in all its unspoilt 1950's glory. For our first party in the Summer of 2001 we had a huge 10k rig installed and brought together our own acts as well as outfits from Skam. We named this night 'UnderLondonground.'

Over the next 4 years we staged sporadic raves in this beautiful subterranean complex putting on everyone from Aphex Twin to Alison Goldfrapp, Plaid to T.Rauschmeire, Mark Moore to Richard X. The line-ups just kept getting better and better. Then one day we bit off slightly more than we could chew. (this wouldn't be the last time either). In honor of our 4th birthday party we decided to have a double nighter in November 2004. It was going to be massive. We had picked up some top notch press in The Guide, The Independent and The Metro in the run up to this multi media extravaganza because the line-up was so vast and eclectic. We had managed to book Coil, John Peel, The Orb and new kids on the block and old friends Maximo Park, amongst a myriad of others, to come on down and join in the celebration. Then, a fortnight before the event tragedy struck. The great John Peel sadly passed away and in the days leading up to the show, London Underground Limited stopped us from using the venue because damage had been done the week before at a private party and despite our track record with them they couldn't risk it happening again. We fought up until the Friday morning of the first night then began the horrible task of cancelling the show. The trouble was we couldn't get word out quick enough and for the next two evenings the city's finest had to be dispatched to the tube station to disperse the crowds who had gathered for the hottest tickets in town. The chaos wasn't to end there though. That Saturday morning, John Balance of Coil fell to his death at his home. Devastated by the deaths and financially near ruin, two releases, Digitonal's neo-classical masterpiece 'The Centre Cannot Hold,' and the dancefloor blitzkrieg 12" split between Kansascityprophets and Vlad/Ardisson that we'd already pressed up met with little fanfare due to a lack of support by our dejected selves despite splendid reviews.

We were down but not out.

In 2005 we built up our strength and started to tour our artists about Europe, from Numusic in an old brewery in Norway to disused mine shafts in Norberg via ex-brothels in the CZ Republic and park attractions in Paris, all to tremendous response.

Then, in 2006 we re-launched the label with a brilliant run of cd's, each hand numbered and entitled the Seed 5x5 Series in honor of our 5th birthday. 5 cd's with 5 artists on each, from Cristian Vogel to Goodiepal, Jazzfinger to The B12 plus a who's who in between including Plaid, Andreas Tilliander and Milanese. In addition to this the startling third album by Posthuman, 'The People's Republic,' was rocketed into the music world with guest slots from Lukas Wooller of Maximo Park, ..s and Tom Brady on guitar. Another bit of good news was that our own Libby Floyd aka The Doubtful Guest was signed to Planet Mu. On top of all this we even managed to host a decent bash back in March in our new home, The Coronet Theatre, with Modeselektor, B12 and Neil Landstrumm. The night was called Soviet. We were on fire, but had we learnt our lesson?

NO!

On Saturday Oct 21st 2006 after months of planning we hatched Soviet 2, a three floor all night mega rave plus cinema that would see The Grid play their first live show since 94' alongside Orbital's Phil Hartnoll, Detroit legend, Kenny Larkin, The British Murder Boys, dDamage, Cristian Vogel, Neil Landstrumm, B12, our Swedish pals Qualia Systems and Ola Bergman plus our whole Seed roster not forgetting the legendary Matkore plus many, many more. It was quite frankly a ridiculous line-up. Again, the press was good but not good enough and we'd already sunk thousands into the show when we found out about the other big (non-independent) nights happening that weekend that would eek away at some of our potential audience possibly too stuck in their ways to risk a jaunt into deepest, darkest Elephant and Castle to what was - quite simply - the best rave in London since our tube parties.

The result? We lost more cash than the great depression...but, by god was it a brilliant party! A brilliant party, with an ambiance second only to a night in heaven with your favourite thing, be it man, woman, dog or all three. The joint was pumping to the most diverse electronic noises the world has ever had the pleasure of hearing and everyone was smiling, even us, through the insanity. So have we learnt our lesson? Hell no.



..

OK, so what happened in 2007? Well, by the power of Grayskull and under the cover of darkness we released the stunning debut album by Sancho which gained rave reviews from the people at Rock A Rolla no less, along with 3 MP3 Bleep exclusives from [snyzch]'s own screwball imprint Fruitbat and the the long awaited Suicide Bomber 7" from our man in Hungary, Cursor Miner who also played a storming dance floor set at Sonar alongside the brutal analogue and haunting soundscapes of Jazzfinger. Then, we went to sleep for a bit...

Coming right back at you in 2008, our first release came out at the end of June and was the highly anticipated and long awaited Seed Records Volume 2. For this record we changed the roster around to encompass an even greater musical variety than ever before with the usual high standard of techno and electronica now sharing the bed with Italo, punk, folk, dub and noise. [s]! and The Doubtful Guest appeared alongside the awesome Zombi with further cracking musical contributions from artists such as Alexander Robotnick, Legowelt, Tobias Schmidt, Mark Verbos, EYES and Skitanja to name but a few. The whole release was a massive 15 tracks in length and of ultra limited edition. In addition to this we were also pleased to announce that Maiovvi and Fortuna joined the fold plus the very special 'Sleeps In Oysters', both of whose debut albums were released at the end of November/early December. Check them out.

Photo courtesy of Paul at Lustrous Chemistry

In 2009 we returned with the debut album 'Night Eyes' from East Moline's psyche-R+B punksters Eyes, and Maiovvi's synthsexual 'Shadow of the Bloodstained Kiss', taking both him and Sleeps In Oysters to the fantastic Incubate festival in Tilburg, Holland, where giant ice-cream cones, graveyards and other stimuli were put to very good and improper use.

2010 and we are 10 years young!

Seed X Part I-III hit the shelves with notable contributions from 30 global electronic artists inc. Tobias Schmidt, Unit Black Flight, Andreas Tilliander and CxFx. Skitanja released their debut album 'Zombie Tonic' and so to did The Dagger Brothers with 'Space Trumpet.' 8Bitch dropped her first 12" 'Equinox' and Sleeps in Oysters returned with 'The Brambles in Starlight' - a lovely little 3" wrapped in hand spun wool. Finally, the elusive Frenchbloke & Son unleashed ‘Societe de Radiodiffusion de l'homme et du fils Francais - Bruit dans l'interet de Musique' on cassette and USB. Each release was hand numbered and highly limited, as per usual.

2011 will see Sleeps in Oysters second album, Lo! a 12" EP by Antoni Maiovvi called 'Trial By Bullet' and a 12" EP from Tobias Schmidt/DaveTarrida/Ben Pest + Debasser.

Night, night.

DEMO POLICY

We're always looking out for new music & visual artists! Currently, we're especially interested in film-makers, live bands on the experimental tip and wonky techno/electronic producers...

When listening to music, however, we like to do it with a beer and over a proper soundsystem, so please submit your wares (cd's, dvd's, vinyls) to the below address: