Have you ever wondered what (if anything) do Greenwich Village, New York in the 1970s, the soundtracks of Tarantino’s films, Andy Warhol’s sources of inspiration and America’s and Great Britain’s ‘60s and 70’s music scenes have in common? One of the many answers, should be Stereogram Recordings. And just before your imagination starts to race let me say that there are many ‘umbrella’ labels in the indie genre and very few manage to unveil a true character through the artists they represent. Most record labels in the indie genre share a love and passion for music, yet it is evident that not all of them manage to avoid representing a very specific sub-genre of a very specific style. Stereogram Recordings is one of the labels that we have been following for a while now and we have noticed that Jeremy Thoms, the founder of the label seems to have found not one, but many complementary denominators in the music of the bands that are represented in the label. Since the internet era has cast a heavy shadow to both the independent and the mainstream scene it’s all about how much one adheres to the idea that ‘God is in the details’ that differentiates one ‘umbrella’ label from the other. I think that Jeremy Thoms keeps an eye on the ‘big picture’ that the sound of Stereogram likes to draw, a picture of 1000 pieces created on the axes that the music scenes of some parts of America and some parts of Great Britain were developed.
Based in Edinburgh, Stereogram Recordings has so far released the albums of 9 bands, none of which fits in any of the once clearly defined music genres. The bands by descending order of number of releases are: Band of Holy Joy, James King and The Lonewolves, Roy Moller, The Cathode Ray, The Fabulous Artisans, New Leaf, Milton Star, Lola in Slacks, St Christopher Medal. Some of these bands might even be inspired by the same musician yet none delivers a similar or even comparable result. There is one thing that one has no doubt about, the passion for music and the commitment of musicians to release music of such a quality that nothing less than our full attention can grasp it. None of Stereogram’s bands play ‘easy to digest’ music and none of the musicians rely on simplistic melodies or ideas. This is apparent in all of the lyrics of all of their songs and can also be noticed through the multitude of social, artistic references that are being made in their videos.
Should it be ignored that Jeremy Thoms (The Cathode Ray, New Leaf, The Fabulous Artisans), Johny Brown (Band Of Holy Joy) and Roy Moller, all consider that music, spoken word, theatre and the space in between are inseparable elements ? I don’t think so. In different ways and intensities, these three musicians have incorporated both the theatrical and the surreal aspect of poetry in their performances throughout the years and this is another strong element in the sound of Stereogram.
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The year was 1975 and there appeared a band whose sound cut through the Mississippi blues and the country songs of Missouri, putting keyboards, string instruments and astonishing vocals in the middle of a guitar based music industry. Pavlov’s Dog is a band whose name drew attention to the controversial experiment that helped (?) understand the relationship between a stimulus and the reaction to it. The release of the band’s debut album entitled ‘Pampered Menial’ in 1975 featured at the cover, an almost hypnotized and agitated dog alluding to Ivan Pavlov’s experiment. The vocals and the mind-numbing delivery of the lyrics left a permanent mark on everyone who listened to this album. It is one thing to expect a great debut album from a band but it’s quite another to be hit with the melody of ‘Julia’, the very first track of the debut album and David Skurkamp’s voice which has this admirable and other-worldly tremble! 41 years have passed and this song’ s impact has not lessened. Let’s not forget that 1975 was the middle of the glam rock, progressive rock and punk frenzy. It was the time of early experimentation with electronic music and the period when designing an album’s artwork was equally important and time consuming as recording and producing the music of this album.
