Falling A Records is a British

Essex, England Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and Gre ...

-based

independent record label An independent record label (or indie label) is a record label that operates without the funding or distribution of major record labels; they are a type of small- to medium-sized enterprise, or SME. The labels and artists are often represented ...

, founded in the late 1970s by Barry Lamb and Peter Ashby.,''Record Collector'', October 2011, no 393, page 54 born out of the

D.I.Y cassette movement The cassette culture (also known as the tape/cassette scene or cassette underground) refers to the practices associated with amateur production and distribution of music and sound art on compact cassette that emerged in the mid-1970s. The casset ...

. It owned a shop in

Clacton-on-Sea Clacton-on-Sea is a seaside town in the Tendring District in the county of Essex, England. It is located on the Tendring Peninsula and is the largest settlement in the Tendring District with a population of 56,874 (2016). The town is situated ...

which sold new and second hand records, distributed

fanzine A fanzine (blend of '' fan'' and ''magazine'' or ''-zine'') is a non-professional and non-official publication produced by enthusiasts of a particular cultural phenomenon (such as a literary or musical genre) for the pleasure of others who share t ...

s such as

New Crimes New is an adjective referring to something recently made, discovered, or created. New or NEW may refer to: Music * New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz Albums and EPs * ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013 * ''New'' (EP), by Regurgitator, ...

Vague In linguistics and philosophy, a vague predicate is one which gives rise to borderline cases. For example, the English adjective "tall" is vague since it is not clearly true or false for someone of middling height. By contrast, the word "prime" i ...

, Vox, Flipside, Juniper beri-beri, Blam!, and D.I.Y magazines/ comics including the very first copies of ''

Viz Viz may refer to: *''viz.'', a synonym for “namely” * ''Viz'' (comics), a British adult comic magazine **'' Viz: The Game'', a computer game based on the comic *Viz Media, an American manga and anime distribution and entertainment company *"V ...

''. It also distributed leaflets for various causes such as "anti-

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

" and "anti-

vivisection Vivisection () is surgery conducted for experimental purposes on a living organism, typically animals with a central nervous system, to view living internal structure. The word is, more broadly, used as a pejorative catch-all term for experimen ...

", music and politics being interlinked at the time. It had a roster of several bands on its own label, such as the insane picnic ''(sic)'', Standing Ovation and Spasmodic Caress, as well as cassettes and some vinyl it distributed for other D.I.Y cassette labels including

Cause for Concern William Patrick Spencer Gold (born 14 September 1996), known professionally as Wilbur Soot, is a British Twitch streamer, YouTuber, and musician. He first became known in 2017 for his work with the group comedy YouTube channel SootHouse, where ...

, Subway,

Adventures in Reality An adventure is an exciting experience or undertaking that is typically bold, sometimes risky. Adventures may be activities with danger such as traveling, exploring, skydiving, mountain climbing, scuba diving, river rafting, or other extreme ...

, Music for Midgets,

Third Mind Third or 3rd may refer to: Numbers * 3rd, the ordinal form of the cardinal number 3 * , a fraction of one third * 1⁄60 of a ''second'', or 1⁄3600 of a ''minute'' Places * 3rd Street (disambiguation) * Third Avenue (disambiguation) * High ...

and Colortapes. Many notable bands were distributed by Falling A, including

The Cleaners from Venus Martin Newell (born 4 March 1953) is an English singer-songwriter, poet, columnist and author who leads the Cleaners from Venus, a guitar pop band with jangly, upbeat arrangements. He is also regarded as a significant figure in the history of ...

featuring

Martin Newell Martin Newell may refer to: *Martin Newell (computer scientist), British computer scientist, creator of the Utah teapot *Martin Newell (musician) (born 1953), British singer-songwriter, poet and author * Martin Newell (priest) (born 1967), English ...

the Modern Art The Modern Art (sometimes spelled Mødern Art) was a psychedelic rock band formed by Gary Ramon in the 1980s. It had a loose lineup that never played gigs but did see the release of two studio albums and a number of self-produced cassettes. Ramo ...

, Attrition,

The Pastels The Pastels are an indie rock group from Glasgow formed in 1981. They were a key act of the Scottish and British independent music scenes of the 1980s, and are specifically credited for the development of an independent and confident music scen ...

The Membranes The Membranes are an English post-punk band formed in Blackpool, Lancashire in 1977, the initial line-up being John Robb (bass guitar), Mark Tilton (guitar), Martyn Critchley (vocals) and Martin Kelly (drums).Larkin, Colin: ''The Guinness W ...

and Wavis O'Shave (also known as Foffo Spearjig). Some exclusive material was recorded for Falling A by The Cleaners from Venus and Foffo Spearjig among others. In 1985, the

cassette culture The cassette culture (also known as the tape/cassette scene or cassette underground) refers to the practices associated with amateur production and distribution of music and sound art on compact cassette that emerged in the mid-1970s. The casset ...

was threatening the fabric of the established music industry, and Falling A's profile was such that it received the largest write up in the annual ''Music Week'' directory of UK record labels,''Music Week'' directory of UK record labels 1985 even more words than

EMI EMI Group Limited (originally an initialism for Electric and Musical Industries, also referred to as EMI Records Ltd. or simply EMI) was a British transnational conglomerate founded in March 1931 in London. At the time of its break-up in 2012, ...

. The label is still in existence as of July 2021. It is currently reissuing back catalogue on CD while releasing new music and creating a vast archival resource from all the memorabilia, ephemera and past product in its vaults.

References

External links

Official site
{{Authority control Cassette culture 1970s–1990s British independent record labels

See also

References

External links