Blocks Recording Club was a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

co-operative A cooperative (also known as co-operative, co-op, or coop) is "an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democratically-control ...

of musicians, which served as both a collaborative artist community and a

record label A record label, or record company, is a brand or trademark of music recordings and music videos, or the company that owns it. Sometimes, a record label is also a publishing company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the produ ...

for its member artists."Blocks Recording Club: more innovative than Beck, Lady GaGa, Sweden"
'' Eye Weekly'', August 5, 2009. The label's name may also be cited graphically as □□□□□□ rather than the word "Blocks". Although this is in fact the label's official name, the word "Blocks" is used where it is not typographically possible to use the graphical series of blocks.

History

The □□□□□□ Recording Club was founded by Steve Kado and Mark McLean in 2003 as a tapes and mini-cd only label. Shortly afterward, McLean left for Ottawa. Steve Kado ran □□□□□□ with Liisa K. Graham until 2005 when the club incorporated as a worker's co-operative. Since then the club has been run by an elected board of directors. The first board of directors was James Anderson, Steve Kado and Matt McDonough. The second board comprised Katarina Gligorijevic,

Bob Wiseman Robert Neil "Bob" Wiseman (born 1962) is a film composer, songwriter, author and music teacher. Wiseman discovered or produced many artists including Ron Sexsmith, The Lowest of the Low, Bruce McCulloch of Kids in the Hall, Anhai, and former ...

, John Caffery &

Brian Joseph Davis Brian Joseph Davis is a Canadian-born filmmaker and digital artist.Kado, Steve (2007-12-22). Megatron: team interview with Brian Joseph Davis & Steve Kado. "C: International Contemporary Art", 22 December 2007. Retrieved from http://www.thefreeli ...

. Blocks' current board of directors is, Magali Meagher, Matt Smith and Patrick Borjal. In 2009, ''

NME ''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming, and culture website and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a 'rock inkie', the NME would become a magazine that ended up as a f ...

'' included the Blocks Recording Club in its annual Future 50 list. Blocks ceased operations in 2015 with a final concert at the Tranzac Club with performances by Austra, Bob Wiseman, Barcelona Pavilion, Nifty, Les Mouches, the Phonemes, Hank, Matias, and Ninja High School with DJ's Maya Postepski (of Austra) and John Caffrey (Kids on TV).

Artist roster

Artists who have released material through Blocks include

Final Fantasy is a Japanese video game, Japanese science fantasy anthology media franchise created by Hironobu Sakaguchi and developed and owned by Square Enix (formerly Square (video game company), Square). The franchise centers on a series of fantasy and ...

Fucked Up Fucked Up is a Canadian hardcore punk band from Toronto, Ontario, formed in 2001. The band consists of Damian Abraham (vocals), Mike Haliechuk (guitar, vocals), Josh Zucker (guitar), Sandy Miranda (bass), and Jonah Falco (drums, vocals). From ...

Katie Stelmanis Kaitlin "Katie" Austra Stelmanis ( lv, Keitlīna "Keitija" Austra Štēlmane, born 1985) is a Toronto-based Latvian Canadian musician, who has performed and recorded both as a solo artist and with the bands Galaxy and Austra. Stelmanis identifies ...

, Barcelona Pavilion, The Phonemes, Les Mouches,

Ninja High School ''Ninja High School'' (also known as ''NHS'') is a comic book series created, written, and illustrated by Ben Dunn, and published by Antarctic Press (at one point being published by Eternity Comics). On occasion other artists and writers have co ...

, The Blankket,

Hank Hank is a male given name. It may have been inspired by the Dutch name Henk,The Origins of 10 Nicknam ...

, PDF Format (the Band),

Kids on TV Kids on TV was a Canadian punk- house queercore band from Toronto, active from 2003 to 2013. The group consisted of John Caffery on bass and vocals, Minus Smile on drums, electronics and vocals, Chris 'Wolf' Mills on guitar and vocals, and Roxan ...

SS Cardiacs SS Cardiacs was a Canadian indie rock band, briefly active in the early 2000s.Sarah Liss"Cardiacs Attack" ''Now'', May 26, 2005. It consisted of Jessie Stein on vocals and guitar, Andy Lloyd on bass and Dana Snell on drums. History SS Cardiacs f ...

and The Creeping Nobodies. Final Fantasy's second album on Blocks, ''

He Poos Clouds ''He Poos Clouds'' is the second album by the Canadian indie rocker Owen Pallett, released on June 13, 2006, on Blocks Recording Club in Canada and Tomlab internationally. The songs on the album (excluding the fifth and tenth tracks) are loose ...

'', was named the winner of the inaugural

Polaris Music Prize The Polaris Music Prize is a music award annually given to the best full-length Canadian album based on artistic merit, regardless of genre, sales, or record label. The award was established in 2006 with a $20,000 cash prize; the prize was incr ...

in 2006."Building Blocks: a little Toronto music collective gets NME props"
cbc.ca, August 7, 2009. Owen Pallett, the artist behind the Final Fantasy project, announced that he would donate a portion of his prize money to the label to help other artists.

References

External links

Blocks Recording Club

Unofficial Blocks Recording Club Discography
{{Authority control Record labels established in 2003 Canadian independent record labels Indie rock record labels Alternative rock record labels Media cooperatives in Canada Musical collectives Organizations based in Toronto Musical groups established in 2003

History

Artist roster

See also

References

External links