Chapter Music | |
---|---|
Founded | June 1992 |
Founder | Guy Blackman |
Genre | various |
Country of origin | Australia |
Location | Northcote, Victoria |
Official website | Chapter Music |
Chapter Music is one of Australia's longest-running independent record labels. Chapter Music has worked with a broad range of mostly Australian artists, in genres such as rock and roll, indie pop, post punk, country and western and folk. Between 1992 and 2013, the label released around 45 titles, including several compilation albums, such as Can't Stop It! Australian Post-Punk 1978-82 and Songs For Nao. The label's 2014 roster features bands such as Dick Diver, Beaches and Twerps.
The label was founded by Guy Blackman in Perth, Western Australia in June 1992, after he released several issues of a Syd Barrett-inspired fanzine called Chapter 24, started in October 1990, when Blackman was seventeen. Initially, Blackman released compilation cassettes of local Perth underground bands, the first of which was Bright Lights, Small City in July 1992. A Sonic Youth tribute tape called Kill Yr Idols! was the label's next release, followed by a new fanzine called Salty & Delicious. The label released a further eight cassettes (mostly compilations), one CD, and four issues of the fanzine prior to Blackman's relocation to Melbourne, Australia. Blackman explained in 2012: "When I sold out of the first Chapter Music cassette on the night of the show, that was a huge success for me, as a 17-year-old boy."
Blackman relocated to Melbourne in mid-1995, where he released Chapter Music's first seven-inch vinyl single, pressed at Corduroy Records, a new pressing plant in Australia at the time. The single, a Molasses/Minimum Chips split single—Blackman is a member of the latter band—was released in September 1995. This was followed by a seven-inch single by Perth band Sulk, with a third release, a split single for Sleepy Township/Cannanes released in October 1996.