World Serpent Distribution was a

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

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 ...

and music distribution house formed in the 1990s by David Gibson, Alan Trench and Alison Webster.

Douglas Pearce Douglas Pearce, known professionally as Douglas P (born 27 April 1956), is an English folk musician, record label owner, photographer and actor who is best known for his neofolk project Death in June. Pearce was born in Sheerwater in Woking, Surr ...

Death In June Death in June are a neofolk group led by English musician Douglas P. (Douglas Pearce). The band was originally formed in the United Kingdom in 1981 as a trio, but after the other members left in 1984 and 1985 to work on other projects, the grou ...

coined the company name in 1991, ''World Serpent'' being another name for

Jörmungandr In Norse mythology, Jörmungandr ( non, Jǫrmungandr, lit=the Vast gand, see Etymology), also known as the Midgard Serpent or World Serpent ( non, Miðgarðsormr), is an unfathomably large sea serpent or worm who dwells in the world sea, encir ...

Founding

World Serpent was well known for distributing music by many post-industrial,

apocalyptic folk Neofolk, also known as apocalyptic folk, is a form of experimental music blending elements of folk and industrial music, which emerged in punk rock circles in the 1980s. Neofolk may either be solely acoustic or combine acoustic folk instrument ...

, neofolk,

avant-garde The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...

and otherwise esoteric or experimental artists, such as

through

NER NER may refer to: * New European Recordings, a record label * ISO 3166-1 three letter code for Niger * Named entity recognition, a text processing task that identifies certain words as belonging to one class or another * Northeast Regional, an Amt ...

Current 93 Current 93 are an English experimental music group, working since the early 1980s in folk-based musical forms. The band was founded in 1982 by David Tibet, who has been Current 93's only constant member. Background Tibet has been the only const ...

through

Durtro Durtro was a British independent record label established by the British poet, singer, songwriter, and visual artist David Tibet in 1988, to publish his own work and that of fellow friends and musicians. It was replaced by one of Tibet's earli ...

Sol Invictus Sol Invictus (, "Unconquered Sun"), sometimes simply known as Helios, was long considered to be the official sun god of the later Roman Empire. In recent years, however, the scholarly community has become divided on Sol between traditionalists ...

through Tursa, Coil through

Threshold House Threshold House is one of several record labels created by Coil to release their own work and that of affiliated projects. Associated labels include Eskaton and Chalice. It is also the name for the official Coil website. The label was initi ...

, Nurse With Wound through

United Dairies United Dairies is a former United Kingdom-based creamery, milk bottling and distribution company. The company was formed in 1915 and merged to form Unigate in 1959. During World War I, there were dire shortages of men, horses and vehicles com ...

Zone Zone or The Zone may refer to: Places Climate and altitude zones * Death zone (originally the lethal zone), altitudes above a certain point where the amount of oxygen is insufficient to sustain human life for an extended time span * Frigid zone, ...

through Potentia, Elijah's Mantle through De Nova Da Capo,

Orchis ''Orchis'' is a genus in the orchid family (Orchidaceae), occurring mainly in Europe and Northwest Africa, and ranging as far as Tibet, Mongolia, and Xinjiang. The name is from the Ancient Greek ὄρχις ''orchis'', meaning "testicle", from ...

through Cryptanthus,

Ozymandias "Ozymandias" ( ) is a sonnet written by the English Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822). It was first published in the 11 January 1818 issue of '' The Examiner'' of London. The poem was included the following year in Shelley's c ...

through Ramses Records and many others. Many of these artists also ended up collaborating with or being influenced by one another, causing the ''World Serpent'' name to become synonymous with many of the artists and labels distributed through the company during the early 1990s.

Bankruptcy

Following a long period of rumours,

Boyd Rice Boyd Blake Rice (born December 16, 1956) is an American experimental sound/noise musician using the name of NON since the mid-1970s, archivist, actor, photographer, author, member of the ''Partridge Family Temple'' religious group, co-founder of ...

left World Serpent Distribution. He was followed shortly thereafter by

, Richard Leviathan and Albin Martinek. Subsequently, fewer and fewer releases began to be distributed by World Serpent, leading to much fan speculation. In October 2002, a claim filed by Pearce in 2000 was successfully settled out of court, resulting in Pearce receiving unpaid royalties from the Court Funds Office. Pearce also gave back his shares in the company he had helped form, but was no longer interested in or affiliated to. Founder Alan Trench left World Serpent Distribution at the end of 2003. It was confirmed in August 2004 that World Serpent Distribution was no longer operating and had gone bankrupt. Many artists distributed through World Serpent, such as Chris and Cosey, had not been informed by the company and may still be owed past dues.

References

{{Authority control British record labels Record labels disestablished in 2004 Industrial record labels Experimental music record labels

Founding

Bankruptcy

See also

References