\u2018My eyes have started to fucking flicker because you just mentioned London Records,\u201d says Goldie, having an involuntary physical reaction at the mere thought of his old label. \u201cIf a nightclub could be a record company, it would have been London Records. It was the equivalent of Studio 54. It looked like a normal record company from the outside \u2013 shiny, lots of nice cars on the driveway \u2013 but it was the craziest, most hedonistic madness.\u201d<\/p>\n
A new six-part podcast, Hit That Perfect Beat \u2013 The London Records Story, is delving into its colourful history. The label was originally part of Decca Records, once home to the likes of the Rolling Stones, but when Decca was acquired by Polygram in 1980, London began a new chapter as an independent label operating with major label distribution. \u201cWe were put in there to develop it into a pop label,\u201d recalls ex-managing director Colin Bell, who was a pivotal figure alongside Roger Ames and Tracy Bennet. \u201cWe were obsessed with being cool. We wanted to be easily identifiable for a generation of young people. We wanted pop that had an edge.\u201d<\/p>\n
It also became known for its heavy-partying lifestyle. When I reach out to one artist who was on the label to ask about his memories, the email reply I get is: \u201cLondon Records in the 90s? COCAINE.\u201d<\/p>\n
Symbolically important \u2026 Bronski Beat in 1983, (from left) Jimmy Somerville, Larry Steinbachek and Steve Bronski. Photograph: Mike Prior\/Redferns<\/p>\n
London had early success with Blancmange and Bananarama but landing Bronski Beat in 1984 \u201cwas the moment where we became a real label\u201d says Bell. \u201cThey exploded right across the world.\u201d For Bell, who is gay, Bronski Beat was a symbolically important signing. \u201cWe were the only label in town prepared to market them exactly as they were,\u201d he says. \u201cWe were not going to try and tell them, \u2018Let\u2019s hide the gay thing.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
While many labels forge an identity around a genre, London was more hodgepodge. It had several imprints, most notably the dance label FFRR headed up by Pete Tong, and by the 1990s they were home to Orbital, East 17, All Saints, Menswear, Dani Minogue, Utah Saints and Shakespears Sister. So what joined all this together? \u201cHits,\u201d says Bell, bluntly. \u201cWe were a company of hits.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pete Tong echoes this. \u201cThe mentality was to sign cool records that you thought could be successful,\u201d he says. \u201cBut it was always left-leaning pop \u2013 pop with attitude. We didn\u2019t sign Take That, we signed East 17. We didn\u2019t sign Spice Girls, we signed All Saints. Not that we didn\u2019t try to sign the Spice Girls \u2026\u201d Aside from the girl band\u2019s weighty price tag, London\u2019s efforts weren\u2019t helped when the label took them out on a boat trip down the Thames and accidentally left their manager behind. But the broader point still stands: \u201cWe always ended up with the act that was slightly left of centre.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pop with attitude \u2026 East 17 in 1994, with Tony Mortimer, second from right. Photograph: Andre Csillag\/Rex\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n
For Tony Mortimer of East 17, being on a label that had both pop and dance music credentials meant they could enjoy the best of both worlds. \u201cWe were a boyband but we were still in NME and Melody Maker,\u201d he reflects. \u201cIt was a very cool label to be on. And we had access to these amazing mixes by people like [US house music legend] Danny Tenaglia.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the label was coming good on its hit-driven ethos, it got caught out in some illicit practices that helped generate that success. In 1991, London was fined \u00a350,000 by the British Phonographic Industry for chart hyping: sending people to go and buy records of their artists. Terry Farley, part of the acid house crew Boy\u2019s Own, who later got their own imprint on London, confirms this was happening a lot. \u201cMe and Andy Weatherall used to go out on record-hyping missions for them,\u201d he recalls. \u201cI remember buying Bananarama singles. But that wasn\u2019t unique to London, every record company was involved in it.\u201d<\/p>\n
After Factory records went bust in 1992, London hoovered up their catalogue, such as New Order and Happy Mondays, adding to a weighty and even more eclectic roster. And during the peak of the CD sales era, money was pouring in, and the atmosphere around London Records became more and more hedonistic.<\/p>\n
\u2018I was simultaneously fascinated and horrified\u2019 \u2026 John Niven in 2017. Photograph: Murdo Macleod\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
The author John Niven worked there from 1994 to 1997 and the culture he witnessed \u2013 cutthroat ruthlessness, ego and excess \u2013 proved inspiration for his debut novel, Kill Your Friends, a dark satire of the music industry (later adapted into a film of the same name). \u201cI was simultaneously fascinated and horrified by it,\u201d recalls Niven of his time there. \u201cTo come into this culture, where the artists were, at best, tolerated, and at worst regarded as an impediment, was a real eye opener.\u201d (Former London Records bosses did not respond to questions about Niven\u2019s description of the company culture, nor about alleged drug use at the label in the 1990s.)<\/p>\n
When Niven left to go and work at another label, it hit home just how wild London had been. \u201cHaving meetings at other companies was like doing cannabis and mushrooms in a summer meadow compared to the crack den that was London Records,\u201d he says. \u201cIf you didn\u2019t know your shit, you would get crucified in a London meeting. It was a very extreme, but kind of fun, grounding.\u201d<\/p>\n
Goldie signed to FFRR to release his breakthrough album Timeless in 1995, and recalls his first ever meeting there. \u201cI turned up and parked my car sideways in two parking bays,\u201d he says. \u201cI was with my Pitbull terrier and I bowled into Pete Tong\u2019s office. The dog went in first and got up on the chair and then I sat next to him. I threw the cassette on the table and said, \u2018You need to sign that.\u2019\u201d But Goldie was paying close attention to Tong\u2019s response as he played him the album\u2019s sprawling title track. \u201cThe fact that Pete sat there for 21 minutes without murmuring, that was why I signed,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
\u2018They made things happen\u2019 \u2026 Siobhan Fahey and Marcella Detroit, AKA Shakespears Sister, in 1992. Photograph: Gie Knaeps\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
Many people speak of a label that was hard-working and generous despite being rabidly hungry for success. \u201cThey got things done,\u201d says Marcella Detroit, from Shakepears Sister. \u201cThey worked us very hard but they made things happen.\u201d Similarly, Paul Hartnoll of Orbital \u2013 who signed a whopping seven album deal \u2013 recalls it being a haven. \u201cIt was a dream,\u201d he says. \u201cFor a band like us, who were making neurodivergent music for neurodivergent people within dance music, to be left to do what the hell you want, was incredible.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sara Dallin of Bananarama says her pop trio also had proper autonomy: \u201cPeople probably thought, \u2018Oh there\u2019s three girls, so you\u2019ve probably got some svengali behind them.\u2019 But we knew what we wanted, and we pushed to get what we wanted. It was very much: this is what we\u2019re doing, this is what we\u2019re wearing, this is who we want to work with.\u201d<\/p>\n
If there\u2019s one artist that defines being given extended creative licence on the label, it\u2019s Goldie. On his 1998 follow-up album Saturnz Return, the opening track, Mother, was an hour long. The unveiling of said track at the label offices ended up as a scene in Kill Your Friends: \u201cPeople cross and recross their legs, sip their wine and pray for it to end. But it doesn\u2019t.\u201d While reading that scene Goldie was almost thrown off a British Airways flight because he was laughing maniacally so much. \u201cWas it the most criticised work I\u2019ve ever done? Yes. Was he right? Yes. But did I make my opus? I did. When I read Niven\u2019s book, it just reminded me of how egotistical anyone that works in a record company is, and how artists believe that their cause is the only one that exists.\u201d<\/p>\n
Extended creative licence \u2026 Goldie in 1997. Photograph: Martyn Goodacre\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
Perhaps those big egos led to the company becoming blinkered. Niven recalls \u201csome guys coming into the office in 1994 trying to talk to us about how the internet was going to change our business but we couldn\u2019t comprehend it, thought this guy was out of his mind, and we kicked them out\u201d. It turns out those people were looking to generate money for a recent internet startup. \u201cWe found out later, over redundancy drinks, that it was Yahoo,\u201d says Niven. \u201cHad we put 50 grand into Yahoo in 1994 rather than making the second Menswear album, well, we wouldn\u2019t be having this conversation. I\u2019d be swimming with dolphins on my own private island. Mistakes were made in terms of seeing what was coming down the pipeline.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the end of the 1990s, London\u2019s parent company Polygram was sold, some key staff left and despite continuing for a while Bell recalls that \u201cthe magic had gone\u201d. The label dried up in the 2000s, and despite reissuing anniversary releases by the likes of Goldie, Bananarama and Happy Mondays, the 90s very much remain London\u2019s peak years. \u201cA golden age,\u201d says Tong. \u201cGetting a job in the record business was like getting a job in Hollywood.\u201d<\/p>\n
Goldie, who by now has stopped twitching, echoes this. \u201cAs a record company, it was positioned at a time when everything was happening at a crossroads,\u201d he reflects. \u201cEngland was exploding musically in a way it hadn\u2019t since punk. It really was the stuff of legend.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hit That Perfect Beat \u2013 The London Records Podcast is out now<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u2018My eyes have started to fucking flicker because you just mentioned London Records,\u201d says Goldie, having an involuntary…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":683475,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[64,63,447,134],"class_list":["post-683474","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/683474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=683474"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/683474\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/683475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=683474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=683474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=683474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}