No Colours Records is a German

mail order Mail order is the buying of goods or services by mail delivery. The buyer places an order for the desired products with the merchant through some remote methods such as: * Sending an order form in the mail * Placing a telephone call * Placing ...

and

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 ...

from

Mügeln Mügeln is a town in the district Nordsachsen, in Saxony, Germany. It is located 9 km southwest of Oschatz and 14 km northwest of Döbeln. The town has a population of approximately 4700 people. Geography Mügeln lies almost equidista ...

specialised in

black metal Black metal is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal music. Common traits include fast tempos, a shrieking vocal style, heavily distorted guitars played with tremolo picking, raw (lo-fi) recording, unconventional song structures, and an emp ...

Background

No Colours Records mostly releases black metal records, but has also released records related to other extreme metal genres such as

thrash Thrash may refer to: *Thrashing (computer science), where increasing resources are used to do a decreasing amount of work *Thrash (surname) * Thrash, mascot of the Atlanta Thrashers *'' Thrash Rally'', a top-down perspective rally racing video gam ...

and death metal. Most releases appear both on CDs and as limited vinyl editions. Furthermore, the label sells merchandising articles such as T-shirts and

embroidered patch An embroidered patch, also known as a cloth badge, is a piece of embroidery which is created by using a fabric backing and thread. The art of making embroidered patches is an old tradition and was originally done by hand. During the first half of ...

es. The label's most well-known bands are

Inquisition The Inquisition was a group of institutions within the Catholic Church whose aim was to combat heresy, conducting trials of suspected heretics. Studies of the records have found that the overwhelming majority of sentences consisted of penances, ...

Graveland Graveland are a Polish pagan black metal band which was formed in 1991 by Rob Darken (born Robert Fudali). They began as a black metal band before adopting a pagan and Viking metal style. The lyrics and imagery of Graveland are strongly inspi ...

and Nargaroth. No Colours has also released many of

Rob Darken Robert Fudali (born 13 December 1969), better known as Rob Darken, is a Polish musician and singer, best known for being the frontman for black metal band Graveland. He has also contributed to other local bands, such as Fullmoon, Veles, Infer ...

's side projects such as Lord Wind and Infernum. Besides neo-nazi bands such as Thor's Hammer from Poland, the label has also signed many apolitical bands like Wigrid and Suicidal Winds, so some are against an association to the far-right.

History

Steffen Zopf founded No Colours Records in 1993 as a label and mail order for black metal records and merchandise. Among his first releases are

Dimmu Borgir Dimmu Borgir () is a Norwegian symphonic black metal band from Jessheim, formed in 1993. The name is derived from Dimmuborgir, a volcanic formation in Iceland, the name of which means "dark cities" or "dark castles/fortresses" in Icelandic, ...

's first album ''

For all tid ''For all tid'' ("For All Time") is the debut studio album by Norwegian black metal band Dimmu Borgir. It was released in 1995 through No Colours. It was remastered and re-released in 1997 through their new label Nuclear Blast with the front co ...

'' and most releases by

after their departure from Lethal Records. In 1996, the label released both Absurd's and

Falkenbach Falkenbach () is a viking metal group from Germany that is signed to Prophecy Productions. The name means "Falconbrook" in German. They are one of the first viking metal bands, starting in 1989, with their first release that same year. The one ...

's debut albums. Absurd's ''Asgardsrei'' EP was also financed by Zopf but released under the name "IG Farben Production".Christian Dornbusch/Hans-Peter Killguss: ''Unheilige Allianzen. Black Metal zwischen Satanismus, Heidentum und Neonazismus'', rat (reihe antifaschistischer texte), Unrast Verlag, Hamburg/Münster 2005, p. 150 In 1999, Nargaroth, another controversial black metal band, was signed. On October 6, 1999, there was a raid by the German police.Searchlight Magazine: Nazi black metal leader arrested in the US
/ref> Besides No Colours label, Christhunt Productions, and Darker Than Black—the former label of Absurd members Hendrik and Ronald Möbus—were also raided. In 2003, Finnish black metal band Satanic Warmaster was signed to No Colours Records. The year 2004 witnessed the US/Colombian band

signing No Colours Records. Inquisition later parted ways with the label. Ukrainian pagan/National Socialist band

Nokturnal Mortum Nokturnal Mortum are a Ukrainian black metal band from Kharkiv. They were one of the founders of the Ukrainian black metal scene and pioneers in the early National Socialist black metal ("NSBM") scene. The band has claimed to have moved away f ...

was signed in 2005.

Reception

'' Rock Hard'' and ''

Searchlight A searchlight (or spotlight) is an apparatus that combines an extremely bright source (traditionally a carbon arc lamp) with a mirrored parabolic reflector to project a powerful beam of light of approximately parallel rays in a particular direc ...

'' magazines see No Colours as a company serving the NSBM scene. German media also reported about the label while reporting about the mob attacks that occurred on August 19, 2007. German newspaper TAZ reported the label was recommended as a "national mail order" in a Nazi internet forum. Nevertheless, the saxonian Verfassungsschutz does not agree with that classification and denies observation.

References

External links

Official homepage
{{Authority control Black metal record labels German record labels Record labels established in 1993 Satanism and Nazism National Socialist black metal