Cold Spring (label)

Cold Spring
Founded 1990
Founder Justin Mitchell
Genre Various
Country of origin England
Location Northamptonshire
Official website www.coldspring.co.uk

Cold Spring is an independent record label based in Northamptonshire, England, specialising in "all forms of extreme media, but particularly: black/dark Ambient, Neo-classical/Neo-folk, Orchestral, Power Electronics/Noise, Japanese Noise, Minimal, Death Industrial, Dark Soundtracks, Experimental, obscure electronics from Russia, China, Japan, Poland and others."[1]

History

Beginnings

The label is owned, and run, by Justin Mitchell who had been working for "Thee Temple Ov Psychic Youth", a radical occult group from the 1980s.[2] Mitchell had started out listening to early electronic music around the late 1970s, early 1980s.[3] This included bands like Soft Cell and The Human League.[3] From listening to this genre of music Mitchell progressed into the different fields of electronic and experimental music including artists like Genesis P-Orridge.[3] Mitchell began getting involved in the music industry after be involved in re-issuing some cassette releases form his project Satori. These releases originated from around 1984 and were released by another label.[3]

1990-1999

Cold Spring began releasing recordings in 1988 by mail order, then in 1997 began selling and distributing releases on the internet.[3] After releasing a handful of cassette releases by artists such as The Grey Wolves and Genesis P-Orridge. Cold Spring released their first vinyl compilation album "...And the Wolf Shall Lick The Jewels From Your Belly" (CSR 1LP). This was in 1990 and featured artists such as The Grey Wolves, Crash Worship and The Hafler Trio.[4] The next planned release, (CSR 2LP) would have been a split album between Alan Moore and Psychic TV but was withdrawn due to major label pressure.[5] It wasn’t until 1992 that Cold Spring released their next release Asesinos by Crash Worship. This would be the first CD release by the label.[5] In 1999 Cold Spring released the Genesis P-Orridge / Merzbow project titled A Perfect Pain. The album was an enormous success for Cold Spring, and one of the label’s most requested titles.[6]

2000 – present

An untitled collaboration between American artists Boyd Rice and Z'EV produced a two track vinyl release in September 2008.[7] The following year, EV released an album titled Sum Things. It consisted of archive material reflecting his take on the dark ambient genre of music. The tracks were recorded between December 2005 and March 2006.[8] 2009 also saw Cold Spring re-release Anni Hogans Kickabye. The original EP was re-packaged including ten extra tracks; Kickabye featured artists such as Marc Almond and Nick Cave.[9] In 2010 former Siouxsie and the Banshees member, Steven Severin released his debut album for Cold Spring titled Blood of a Poet. The album is a recording of his soundtrack for a 1930 silent movie by Jean Cocteau.[10]

Record label Principles

Cold Spring carefully listen to every release they distribute. They believe that every release should have a strong philosophy, or manifesto. They also believe that there should be more to a band than just their music.[3]

Cold Spring Artists

External links

Footnotes

  1. ↑ Cold Spring Records: What we are
  2. ↑ "Justin Mitchell Interview" Dagaz Music, accessed 8 May 2009
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "An Interview with Justin" Last Sigh, accessed 27 September 2009
  4. ↑ "Discogs", accessed 27 September 2009
  5. 1 2 "Discogs", accessed 27 September 2009
  6. ↑ "Degaz Music" , accessed 27 September 2009
  7. ↑ Boyd Rice & Z'EV Discography, accessed 21 October 2010
  8. ↑ Z'EV Discography, accessed 21 October 2010
  9. ↑ "Cold Spring Discography", accessed 21 October 2010
  10. ↑ Cold Spring Records Retrieved on 20 October 2010
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