Dashboard Hula Girl Records

Dashboard Hulagirl Records is a Seattle-based independent American record label founded in 1989 by Trev Dellinger and Chris Swenson. The label released several LPs, EPs, and singles before folding in 1992. The label's most influential release was an all-local Seattle covers compilation tribute to punk rock group The Damned, Another Damned Seattle Compilation.

Co-founders Trev Dellinger and Chris Swenson met in 1989 while working at a metal fabrication shop in South Park, Seattle, Washington. The two discovered common interests in the local Seattle independent music community, self-deprecating humor, and expendable incomes. The idea of starting a record label was jokingly discussed for several months, with "Business End First", "Shop Boner", and "Fertility Weasel" considered as operating titles.

With the dissolution of Dellinger's band "Toad Hell", the duo decided to release a 7" EP by Swenson's band Big Satan, Inc. (BSI) as the label's first offering. The name Dashboard Hula Girl Records was agreed on after the decision to release that EP was made, when Dellinger produced an 8" plastic Mickey Mouse doll that had been mutilated, painted, and wore a makeshift hula skirt. The BSI EP, titled Force Fed, was pressed three times and sold nearly 1,500 copies, primarily in Germany, Spain, and the West Coast of the United States. The cover of the EP, featuring a "NEW SHIT FROM SEATTLE" sticker, was featured in Doug Pray's 1996 film Hype!

In 1990, power pop punk band Flop's "Drugs/Action" 7" single was the labels second release. The relationship between the label and band began after Swenson, childhood friends with Flop bassist Paul Schurr and a longtime fan of Flop songwriter/singer Rusty Willoughby (Pure Joy, The Dwindles), heard final cassette mixes of the songs on Schurr's bedroom boombox. Both songs, plus several others, were recorded by Chris Hanzsek at Reciprocal Recording in Seattle. Swenson asked to release them all, but reduced the release to 7" vinyl because of budget issues. The band and label agreed to include only two songs on the 7" citing a mutual desire to keep as much quality of the recording as possible, since squeezing more than one song per side would compress the vinyl groove depth and width thus producing lower quality audio. Side A is "Drugs", an original Flop composition, Side B is a cover version of "Action" by Sweet. The sleeve art of the 7" contains two photos of cadavers in mid-autopsy, taken from one of Schurr's pre-med manuals.

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