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SST Records is an American
independent record label An independent record label (or indie label) is a record label that operates without the funding or distribution of major record labels; they are a type of small- to medium-sized enterprise, or SME. The labels and artists are often represented ...
formed in 1978 in
Long Beach, California Long Beach is a city in Los Angeles County, California. It is the 42nd-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 466,742 as of 2020. A charter city, Long Beach is the seventh-most populous city in California. Incorporate ...
by musician
Greg Ginn Gregory Regis Ginn (born June 8, 1954) is an American guitarist, bassist, singer and songwriter, best known for being the leader, primary songwriter, and the only continuous member of the hardcore punk band Black Flag, which he founded and led ...
. The company was formed in 1966 by Ginn at age 12 as Solid State Tuners, a small business through which he sold electronics equipment. Ginn repurposed the company as a record label to release material by his band Black Flag. Music writer
Michael Azerrad Michael Azerrad is an American author, music journalist, editor, and musician. A graduate of Columbia University, he has written for publications such as '' Spin'', ''Rolling Stone'', and ''The New York Times''. Azerrad's 1993 biography '' Come ...
wrote, "Ginn took his label from a cash-strapped, cop-hassled store-front operation to easily the most influential and popular underground indie of the Eighties". Along with other independent American labels such as
Twin/Tone Twin/Tone Records was an independent record label based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, which operated from 1977 until 1994. It was the original home of influential Minnesota bands the Replacements and Soul Asylum and was instrumental in helping the ...
,
Touch and Go Records Touch and Go Records is an American independent record label based in Chicago, Illinois. After its genesis as a handmade fanzine in 1979, it grew into one of the key record labels in the American 1980s underground and alternative rock scenes. ...
,
Epitaph An epitaph (; ) is a short text honoring a deceased person. Strictly speaking, it refers to text that is inscribed on a tombstone or plaque, but it may also be used in a figurative sense. Some epitaphs are specified by the person themselves be ...
,
Alternative Tentacles Alternative Tentacles is an independent record label established in 1979 in San Francisco, California. It was used by Dead Kennedys for the self-produced single " California Über Alles". After realizing the potential for an independent label, ...
, and
Dischord Dischord Records is a Washington, D.C.-based independent record label specializing in punk rock. The label is co-owned by Ian MacKaye and Jeff Nelson, who founded Dischord in 1980 to release ''Minor Disturbance'' by their band The Teen Idles ...
, SST helped to spearhead the nationwide network of underground bands that formed the pre-
Nirvana ( , , ; sa, निर्वाण} ''nirvāṇa'' ; Pali: ''nibbāna''; Prakrit: ''ṇivvāṇa''; literally, "blown out", as in an oil lampRichard Gombrich, ''Theravada Buddhism: A Social History from Ancient Benāres to Modern Colombo.' ...
indie-rock scene. These labels presided over the shift from the
hardcore punk Hardcore punk (also known as simply hardcore) is a punk rock music genre and subculture that originated in the late 1970s. It is generally faster, harder, and more aggressive than other forms of punk rock. Its roots can be traced to earlier punk ...
that then dominated the American underground scene to the more diverse styles of alternative rock that were emerging. SST initially focused on releasing material by
hardcore punk Hardcore punk (also known as simply hardcore) is a punk rock music genre and subculture that originated in the late 1970s. It is generally faster, harder, and more aggressive than other forms of punk rock. Its roots can be traced to earlier punk ...
groups from
Southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and Cultural area, cultural region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. It includes the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the second most po ...
. As many of the bands on the label sought to expand beyond the limitations of the hardcore genre, SST released many key albums that were instrumental in the development of American
alternative rock Alternative rock, or alt-rock, is a category of rock music that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1970s and became widely popular in the 1990s. "Alternative" refers to the genre's distinction from Popular culture, mainstre ...
, including releases by the Minutemen,
Hüsker Dü Hüsker Dü () was an American punk rock band formed in Saint Paul, Minnesota, in 1979. The band's continual members were guitarist/vocalist Bob Mould, bassist/vocalist Greg Norton, and drummer/vocalist Grant Hart. They first gained notabili ...
, the
Meat Puppets Meat Puppets are an American rock band formed in January 1980 in Phoenix, Arizona. The group's original lineup was Curt Kirkwood (guitar/vocals), his brother Cris Kirkwood (bass guitar/vocals), and Derrick Bostrom (drums). The Kirkwood brothe ...
,
Soundgarden Soundgarden was an American rock band formed in Seattle, Washington, in 1984 by singer and drummer Chris Cornell, lead guitarist Kim Thayil (both of whom are the only members to appear in every incarnation of the band), and bassist Hiro Yamamo ...
,
Sonic Youth Sonic Youth was an American rock band based in New York City, formed in 1981. Founding members Thurston Moore (guitar, vocals), Kim Gordon (bass, vocals, guitar) and Lee Ranaldo (guitar, vocals) remained together for the entire history of the b ...
, and
Dinosaur Jr. Dinosaur Jr. is an American rock band formed in Amherst, Massachusetts, in 1984, originally simply called Dinosaur until legal issues forced a change in name. The band was founded by J Mascis (guitar, vocals, primary songwriter), Lou Barlo ...
After a peak release schedule in the late 1980s, SST began venturing into
jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...
releases. SST is now based in
Taylor, Texas Taylor is a city in Williamson County, Texas, United States. The population was 13,575 at the 2000 census; it was 15,191 at the 2010 census; it was 16,267 at the 2020 census. History In 1876, the Texas Land Company auctioned lots in anticipati ...
. Sonic Youth, Soundgarden, Dinosaur Jr., and the Meat Puppets have reclaimed the rights to their respective SST material after leaving the label.


History


Early years

Greg Ginn created Solid State Tuners (SST) at the age of 12. SST was a mail-order business that sold modified
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
surplus radio equipment. The business was small but thrived well into Ginn's early adulthood. In 1976 Ginn formed the punk rock band Panic. Panic recorded eight songs in January 1978, but no labels were interested in releasing the music aside from
Los Angeles, California Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
record label Bomp! Records. By late 1978 Bomp had still not formally agreed to release the music on record, so Ginn decided he had enough business experience with SST to release it himself. Pressing records turned out to be a simple matter; "I just looked in the phone book under record pressing plants and there was one there", Ginn recalled, "and so I just took it to them and I knew about printing because I had always done catalogs." SST Records released the music recorded by Ginn's band (now named Black Flag) as the ''
Nervous Breakdown A mental disorder, also referred to as a mental illness or psychiatric disorder, is a behavioral or mental pattern that causes significant distress or impairment of personal functioning. Such features may be persistent, relapsing and remitti ...
'' EP in January 1979. Many early Black Flag shows ended in violence, often involving the
Los Angeles Police Department The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), officially known as the City of Los Angeles Police Department, is the municipal police department of Los Angeles, California. With 9,974 police officers and 3,000 civilian staff, it is the third-large ...
. As a result, the police tapped the label's phones and kept the SST office under surveillance.Azerrad, p. 21 Ginn claims undercover police posing as homeless people sat close to SST's front door. The band were unable to hire a lawyer because of a lack of money; Ginn later explained: "I mean, we were thinking about skimping on our meals. … There was no place to go". By 1980, L.A. clubs had begun to ban hardcore punk shows, adding to SST's troubles. SST issued the Minutemen's debut EP ''
Paranoid Time ''Paranoid Time'' is the first EP by American hardcore punk band Minutemen. It is also the second ever release by the SST record label, founded by Black Flag's Greg Ginn and Chuck Dukowski. The album cover is a drawing by the American artist Ra ...
'' as its second release in 1980. The songs were recorded and mixed in a single night for $300. Minutemen bassist
Mike Watt Michael David Watt (born December 20, 1957) is an American bassist, vocalist and songwriter. Watt co-founded and played bass guitar for the rock bands Minutemen (1980–1985), Dos (1985–present), and Firehose (1986–1994). He began a solo ...
recalled, "It was at that point we realized all you had to do was pay for the pressings, that records weren't a gift from Mount Olympus . . . Maybe it was from Greg's experience with ham radios, but he believed if you try, you can get things beyond your little group." Facing hostility towards hardcore punk, SST groups like Black Flag and the Minutemen played wherever they could, mainly at house parties and in basements early on. Black Flag began traveling up the California coast to play
Mabuhay Gardens The Mabuhay Gardens, also known as The Fab Mab or The Mab, was a former San Francisco nightclub, located at 443 Broadway Street, in North Beach on the Broadway strip area best known for its striptease clubs. It closed in 1987. History The Ma ...
in
San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
, making seven trips in total. SST house
record producer A record producer is a recording project's creative and technical leader, commanding studio time and coaching artists, and in popular genres typically creates the song's very sound and structure.Virgil Moorefield"Introduction" ''The Producer as ...
Spot Spot or SPOT may refer to: Places * Spot, North Carolina, a community in the United States * The Spot, New South Wales, a locality in Sydney, Australia * South Pole Traverse, sometimes called the South Pole Overland Traverse People * Spot (prod ...
went along as sound-man and tour manager, a job he would perform for several years, along with helping to record much of the label's music. SST sold its releases to small distributors at a deliberately low price; however, since the distributors typically sold import records, the records usually ended up in specialty shops where they would sell for high prices. Ginn decided to release the first Black Flag album '' Damaged'' (1981) via a mainstream distributor. SST struck a deal with
MCA Records MCA Records was an American record label owned by MCA Inc., which later became part of Universal Music Group. Pre-history MCA Inc., a powerful talent agency and a television production company, entered the recorded music business in 1962 wit ...
to co-release ''Damaged'' on Unicorn Records, a smaller label distributed by MCA. Just prior to the album's release, MCA decided not to release ''Damaged,'' citing its "anti-parent" subject matter. SST sued Unicorn claiming the label did not pay rightful royalties and expenses for the album. Unicorn countersued and obtained an injunction preventing Black Flag from releasing further material until the case was settled. When SST released the Black Flag compilation ''
Everything Went Black ''Everything Went Black'' is a compilation album by the American hardcore punk band Black Flag. It was released in 1982 through SST Records SST Records is an American independent record label formed in 1978 in Long Beach, California by music ...
'', Unicorn took SST to court in July 1983. Ginn and Black Flag bassist Chuck Dukowski (who had become a co-owner of SST) were found in violation of the injunction and were sent to the Los Angeles County Jail for five days. Late in 1983 Unicorn went bankrupt and Black Flag was able to release records again.


Expansion and diversification

Despite its legal troubles, SST continued to release records by artists including Minutemen,
Saccharine Trust Saccharine Trust is an American punk rock band from Los Angeles, California, formed in 1980 by singer Jack Brewer and guitarist Joe Baiza. The band would frequently perform with SST labelmates Minutemen and Black Flag. However, Baiza descri ...
, and
Meat Puppets Meat Puppets are an American rock band formed in January 1980 in Phoenix, Arizona. The group's original lineup was Curt Kirkwood (guitar/vocals), his brother Cris Kirkwood (bass guitar/vocals), and Derrick Bostrom (drums). The Kirkwood brothe ...
. In 1982
Minneapolis Minneapolis () is the largest city in Minnesota, United States, and the county seat of Hennepin County. The city is abundant in water, with thirteen lakes, wetlands, the Mississippi River, creeks and waterfalls. Minneapolis has its origins ...
hardcore group
Hüsker Dü Hüsker Dü () was an American punk rock band formed in Saint Paul, Minnesota, in 1979. The band's continual members were guitarist/vocalist Bob Mould, bassist/vocalist Greg Norton, and drummer/vocalist Grant Hart. They first gained notabili ...
became the label's first non-West Coast signing. Following the resolution of the debacle with Unicorn Records, SST released four Black Flag albums in 1984. The multiple Black Flag albums, along with the
double album A double album (or double record) is an audio album that spans two units of the primary medium in which it is sold, typically either records or compact disc. A double album is usually, though not always, released as such because the recording i ...
releases ''
Zen Arcade ''Zen Arcade'' is the second studio album by American punk rock band Hüsker Dü, released in July 1984 on SST Records. Originally released as a double album on two vinyl LPs, ''Zen Arcade'' tells the story of a young boy who runs away from an unf ...
'' and ''
Double Nickels on the Dime ''Double Nickels on the Dime'' is the third album by American punk trio Minutemen, released on the California independent record label SST Records in 1984. A double album containing 45 songs, ''Double Nickels on the Dime'' combines elements of p ...
'' by Hüsker Dü and the Minutemen, respectively, stretched the label's resources. While SST believed ''Zen Arcade'' would be a sizable underground hit, pressings of over 5,000 copies were unknown territory for the label, so it erred on the side of caution and did not print over that number in its initial pressing. Awarded critical acclaim by several mainstream media outlets, ''Zen Arcade'' sold out quickly and remained out of print for months. Ginn decided to cut the promotional costs of the Black Flag albums by issuing them in quick succession and having the band tour solidly behind the releases. During the mid-1980s Hüsker Dü became SST's star attraction, their strong songwriting and increasingly melodic music becoming the key link between hardcore and the developing sound of
college rock College rock was the alternative rock music played on student-run university and college campus radio stations located in the United States and Canada in the 1980s. The stations' playlists were often created by students who avoided the mainstream ...
. The steady recording and release of records by the band (which released three albums over the course of 1984 and 1985) created an influx of income for the label and afforded it leverage to gather payment from distributors for other releases. However, the band felt that SST did not devote enough attention to its releases; Hüsker Dü drummer
Grant Hart Grantzberg Vernon Hart (March 18, 1961 – September 13, 2017) was an American musician, best known as the drummer and co-songwriter for the punk rock band Hüsker Dü. After the band's breakup in 1988, he released his first solo album '' ...
said after the band left the label, "I think there's a little reluctance on their part to let anything get a little more attention than Black Flag." In 1985, Hüsker Dü wanted to self-produce its third studio album, ''
New Day Rising ''New Day Rising'' is the third studio album by American punk rock band Hüsker Dü, released in 1985 on SST Records. The album continued the move away from the fast hardcore punk of the band's earliest releases toward slower, more melodic mat ...
''. Ignoring the band's wishes, SST assigned Spot to supervise the sessions. Grant Hart later explained: "We had no other choice but to work with him. SST ''made'' us work with him". Aware of the tension, Spot "had to do what the record company wanted".Azerrad, 2001. p. 186 ''New Day Rising'', as a result, became one of the last recordings Spot did for the label, and the band soon signed to major label
Warner Bros. Records Warner Records Inc. (formerly Warner Bros. Records Inc.) is an American record label. A subsidiary of the Warner Music Group, it is headquartered in Los Angeles, California. It was founded on March 19, 1958, as the recorded music division of the ...
. SST's roster was further diminished by the 1985 demise of the Minutemen (the result of the death of guitarist
D. Boon Dennes Dale Boon (April 1, 1958 – December 22, 1985) was an American musician, best known as the guitarist, singer and songwriter of the punk rock trio Minutemen. He was born on April 1, 1958 in San Pedro, California, and formed the Minuteme ...
) and the 1986 breakup of Black Flag. The label replaced these bands with new signings
Sonic Youth Sonic Youth was an American rock band based in New York City, formed in 1981. Founding members Thurston Moore (guitar, vocals), Kim Gordon (bass, vocals, guitar) and Lee Ranaldo (guitar, vocals) remained together for the entire history of the b ...
,
Dinosaur Jr Dinosaur Jr. is an American rock band formed in Amherst, Massachusetts, in 1984, originally simply called Dinosaur until legal issues forced a change in name. The band was founded by J Mascis (guitar, vocals, primary songwriter), Lou Barlow ...
, and
Bad Brains Bad Brains are an American rock band formed in Washington, D.C. in 1976. Originally a jazz fusion band under the name Mind Power, they are widely regarded as pioneers of hardcore punk, though the band's members have objected to the use of this ...
. Sonic Youth mentioned SST often in interviews and in music writer
Michael Azerrad Michael Azerrad is an American author, music journalist, editor, and musician. A graduate of Columbia University, he has written for publications such as '' Spin'', ''Rolling Stone'', and ''The New York Times''. Azerrad's 1993 biography '' Come ...
's estimation, "seemed to be actively campaigning to get signed to the indie powerhouse"; in turn, Sonic Youth was instrumental in getting SST to sign Dinosaur Jr. Gerard Cosloy, manager of Dinosaur Jr's previous label
Homestead Records Homestead Records was a Long Island, New York-based sublabel of music distributor Dutch East India Trading that operated from 1983 to 1996. The label was known for not paying its artists and not spending any money on promotion. History The l ...
, said, "SST was the label everyone wanted to be on . .Everyone's favorite bands were on the label; SST was funnier and cooler and it also had the machinery." In 1986, Ginn bought
New Alliance Records New Alliance Records was an independent record label founded by American musicians D. Boon and Mike Watt (of The Minutemen) and longtime friend and associate Martin Tamburovich. They were inspired by the example of their friends in southern Cali ...
from
Mike Watt Michael David Watt (born December 20, 1957) is an American bassist, vocalist and songwriter. Watt co-founded and played bass guitar for the rock bands Minutemen (1980–1985), Dos (1985–present), and Firehose (1986–1994). He began a solo ...
, who had founded the label with
D. Boon Dennes Dale Boon (April 1, 1958 – December 22, 1985) was an American musician, best known as the guitarist, singer and songwriter of the punk rock trio Minutemen. He was born on April 1, 1958 in San Pedro, California, and formed the Minuteme ...
. Ginn and SST proceeded to reissue some of New Alliance's key releases—albums by
Descendents The Descendents are an American punk rock band formed in 1977 in Manhattan Beach, California, by guitarist Frank Navetta, bassist Tony Lombardo and drummer Bill Stevenson. In 1979, they enlisted Stevenson's school friend Milo Aukerman as a s ...
, Hüsker Dü's ''
Land Speed Record The land speed record (or absolute land speed record) is the highest speed achieved by a person using a vehicle on land. There is no single body for validation and regulation; in practice the Category C ("Special Vehicles") flying start regula ...
'', and all of The Minutemen's non-SST releases—on SST. He then converted New Alliance to a label based around unusual jazz, rock, and spoken word releases. In the late '80s and early '90s, Ginn started two SST-distributed sub-labels. The first,
Cruz Records Cruz Records was an offshoot record label of SST Records, owned by the Black Flag guitarist Greg Ginn. The label was founded in 1987. Its roster consisted mainly of pop punk and grunge bands, along with Ginn's solo records. The label has rema ...
, which started in 1987, released three solo records by Ginn in the space of a year, and also released records by
ALL All or ALL may refer to: Language * All, an indefinite pronoun in English * All, one of the English determiners * Allar language (ISO 639-3 code) * Allative case (abbreviated ALL) Music * All (band), an American punk rock band * ''All'' (All al ...
,
Big Drill Car Big Drill Car is a punk rock group from Costa Mesa, California, formed in 1987. While the group never gained a mainstream audience, they provided an influence on their contemporaries – most notably ALL, Chemical People and Dag Nasty – alon ...
, and Chemical People. The second, the short-lived Issues Records, concentrated on spoken-word releases, including a double album by former
NBA The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United St ...
player
Bill Walton William Theodore Walton III (born November 5, 1952) is an American television sportscaster and former professional basketball player. He played college basketball for coach John Wooden and the UCLA Bruins, winning three consecutive national ...
with music by
Ray Manzarek Raymond Daniel Manzarek Jr. (né Manczarek; February 12, 1939 – May 20, 2013) was an American keyboardist. He is best known as a member of the Doors, co-founding the band with singer and lyricist Jim Morrison in 1965. Manzarek was induct ...
.


Decline in prominence

Several artists left SST in the late 1980s. By 1987, just a year after signing with the label, Sonic Youth had grown disenchanted with it. Guitarist
Thurston Moore Thurston Joseph Moore (born July 25, 1958) is an American musician best known as a member of Sonic Youth. He has also participated in many solo and group collaborations outside Sonic Youth, as well as running the Ecstatic Peace! record label. Moo ...
said, "SST's accounting was a bit suspect to us", and the group's other guitarist
Lee Ranaldo Lee Mark Ranaldo (born February 3, 1956) is an American musician, singer-songwriter, guitarist, writer, visual artist and record producer, best known as a co-founder of the alternative rock band Sonic Youth (guitar and vocals). In 2004, ''Rolling ...
criticized the label's "stoner administrative quality". The band was also dissatisfied with Ginn's newer signings. Unhappy that income from their records was ultimately helping to fund "lame-ass records", Sonic Youth acrimoniously left the label and signed with
Enigma Records Enigma Records (also known as Enigma Entertainment Corporation) was a popular rock and alternative American record label in the 1980s. History Enigma Records launched as a division of Greenworld Distribution, an independent music importer/dis ...
in 1988.Azerrad, p. 269 Dinosaur Jr left SST for
Blanco y Negro Records Blanco y Negro Records ( Spanish: "White and Black"), a subsidiary of WEA Records Ltd., was established in 1983 by Geoff Travis of Rough Trade Records and Mike Alway of él Records. Michel Duval of Les Disques du Crépuscule was also involv ...
in 1990. Frontman
J Mascis Joseph Donald Mascis Jr. ( ; born December 10, 1965), better known as J Mascis, is an American musician who is the singer, guitarist and main songwriter for the alternative rock band Dinosaur Jr. He has also released several albums as a solo art ...
said, "I like Greg Ginn and stuff, but they wouldn't pay you." In 1987 SST released over 80 titles, a "ridiculous amount even by major label standards", according to Azerrad. SST's prestige declined and by 1990
Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...
-based indie label
Sub Pop Sub Pop is a record label founded in 1986 by Bruce Pavitt and Jonathan Poneman. Sub Pop achieved fame in the early 1990s for signing Seattle bands such as Nirvana, Soundgarden, and Mudhoney, central players in the grunge movement. They are often ...
had upstaged SST. SST's reputation was damaged severely when sound collage group
Negativland Negativland is an American experimental music band which originated in the San Francisco Bay Area in the late 1970s. They took their name from a Neu! track, while their record label (Seeland Records) is named after another Neu! track. The co ...
fought a long legal battle with SST in the wake of its sampling lawsuit over their notorious "cover" of U2's hit "
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" is a song by Irish rock band U2. It is the second track from their 1987 album '' The Joshua Tree'' and was released as the album's second single in May 1987. The song was a hit, becoming the band's ...
", on the 1991 '' U2'' single. The case was settled when Ginn and SST agreed to fully release most of Negativland's masters (mainly their ''Over The Edge'' series of cassettes) in exchange for completing work on a live album that had been planned long before their legal battles began, as well as keeping Negativland's three SST releases on the label for a short period (the copyright in those has since reverted to Negativland). This entire battle was later the basis for Negativland's 1995 book/CD, '' Fair Use: The Story of the Letter U and the Numeral 2''. (One bit of detournement took the bumper sticker "SST: Corporate Rock Still Sucks" and made it into "Corporate SST Still Sucks Rock".) SST went into near-hibernation in the mid-90s, deleting much of its jazz output, and releasing little new material apart from Ginn's projects (including Confront James,
Mojack Mojack is an instrumental rock band, formed by ex-Black Flag (band), Black Flag guitarist Greg Ginn. The music of Mojack is similar to another one of Ginn's instrumental projects, Gone (band), Gone, however, it is much more jazz-oriented. Besides ...
), but still keeping the catalogs of Black Flag, The Minutemen, Firehose, Hüsker Dü, The Descendents, and Bad Brains in print. Several artists formerly on the label, including
Sonic Youth Sonic Youth was an American rock band based in New York City, formed in 1981. Founding members Thurston Moore (guitar, vocals), Kim Gordon (bass, vocals, guitar) and Lee Ranaldo (guitar, vocals) remained together for the entire history of the b ...
and the
Meat Puppets Meat Puppets are an American rock band formed in January 1980 in Phoenix, Arizona. The group's original lineup was Curt Kirkwood (guitar/vocals), his brother Cris Kirkwood (bass guitar/vocals), and Derrick Bostrom (drums). The Kirkwood brothe ...
, sued SST to reclaim their
master recording Mastering, a form of audio post production, is the process of preparing and transferring recorded audio from a source containing the final mix to a data storage device (the master), the source from which all copies will be produced (via met ...
s, claiming unpaid royalties. The label had ceased releasing any material by the end of the 1990s. Ginn blamed this on the bankruptcy of the label's distributor, DNA. The label eventually resumed releasing new material in the mid-2000s. However, these new releases have been restricted to Ginn-related projects like Gone, Hor, Jambang, and Greg Ginn and the Taylor Texas Corrugators. In 2002, Ginn signed a new distribution deal with
Koch Records MNRK Music Group (pronounced "monarch", formerly known as Koch Records and eOne Music) is a New York City-based independent record label and music management company. It was formed in 2009 from the music assets of Koch Entertainment, which had ...
and announced a series of new releases from his various projects. In 2006, independent digital music distributor The Orchard announced that 94 titles from SST's back catalog would become available on digital services like
eMusic eMusic is an online music and audiobook store that operates by subscription. In exchange for a monthly subscription eMusic users can download a fixed number of MP3 tracks per month. eMusic was established in 1998, is headquartered in New York C ...
and the
iTunes Music Store The iTunes Store is a digital media store operated by Apple Inc. It opened on April 28, 2003, as a result of Steve Jobs' push to open a digital marketplace for music. As of April 2020, iTunes offered 60 million songs, 2.2 million apps, 25,000 ...
.


Discography and roster

*
SST Records discography The discography of SST Records, an American punk rock independent record label formed in Long Beach, California, and based for years in nearby Lawndale, ranges from releases in 1979 to the present. Founded by Black Flag guitarist Greg Ginn, t ...
*
List of SST Records bands This list of SST Records bands includes several artists who have released music through the California independent record label SST Records SST Records is an American independent record label formed in 1978 in Long Beach, California by musician ...


Notes


References

* Azerrad, Michael. ''
Our Band Could Be Your Life ''Our Band Could Be Your Life: Scenes from the American Indie Underground, 1981–1991'' is a book by Michael Azerrad. It chronicles the careers of several underground rock bands who, while finding little or no mainstream success, were hugely ...
''. Little, Brown and Company, 2001. * Blush, Steven. '' American Hardcore: A Tribal History''. Feral House, 2001.


External links

* {{Authority control Alternative rock record labels Hardcore record labels American independent record labels Punk record labels Record labels established in 1978