Rough Trade Records
From Free net encyclopedia
Rough Trade Records is a British independent record label. It grew out of the Rough Trade Shop, founded by Geoff Travis in West London in 1976. The record label was set up in 1978. It became independent from the shop in 1982. It then folded in 1991, but was relaunched in 2000.
Rough Trade specialised primarily in European post-punk and otherwise alternative rock of the late 1970s and early 1980s. In the late 1980s Rough Trade branched out by issuing an (eponymous) album by Lucinda Williams. Other early signings included Young Marble Giants and Scritti Politti. Geoff Travis later launched Blanco y Negro Records in partnership with Warner Brothers Records.
Rough Trade is currently an independently owned entity -a partnership between Mr. Travis, Jeanette Lee, (a former member of PiL), and minority partners, Sanctuary Records.
Rough Trade kickstarted the career of The Smiths, who subsequently inspired a mass indie movement in the late 1980s, and then Britpop in the 1990s.