Rough Trade celebrates its 30th anniversary

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Posted in music on September 11, 2006

"Thirty years ago, a young music junkie named Geoff Travis returned from a long trip hitchhiking across America. Spilling out of his luggage were 150 or so records by cult American artists including Tim Buckley, The Stooges and New York Dolls. Inspired by the City Lights bookshop in San Francisco, a former Beat haunt, and the music he had collected along the way, he took over a building on London's Kensington Park Road and set up the Rough Trade record shop.

Since then, Rough Trade has had many incarnations. After the shop opened in 1976, a distribution network followed and, two years later, a record label...." [The Independent]

posted at 1:35 PM on September 11, 2006 in music | Comments (1)

Comments (1)

I always remember my disappointment at how small the shop was, after I made my pilgrimage to visit it. But those first 50 singles from the label defined a new way of making music. The real gems like Swell Maps, Monochrome Set, and Electric Eels don't get a mention in the Indepenent's article though.

Posted by Cool Noise | September 12, 2006 5:11 PM