Touch and Go Records to Stop Releasing New Music, Shut Down Distribution
It's a very, very sad day for indie rock. One of America's foremost independent record labels,
Touch and Go Records, has announced that they will no longer release new music. They have also shuttered their distribution arm, which manufactured and brought to market releases for labels like Merge, Kill Rock Stars, Drag City, Suicide Squeeze, Flameshovel, Jade Tree, and Post Present Medium.
From Big Black and Shellac to Butthole Surfers and the Jesus Lizard, from Dirty Three and Pinback to Ted Leo and TV on the Radio, from Calexico to the Mekons to Slint, Touch and Go nurtured the careers of so many bands that served as backbones for indie rock. They even boasted a promising crop of new bands, with recent releases from Crystal Antlers, Mi Ami, All the Saints, and Sholi.
Crystal Antlers'
Tentacles, slated for release on April 7, will still come out. They also plan to go through with a series of Jesus Lizard reissues in August, as well as a Jesus Lizard 7" box set release for Record Store Day.
A statement from the label concluded, "It is the end of a grand chapter in Touch and Go's history, but we also know that good things can come from new beginnings."
It's impossible to calculate the importance Touch and Go had to the rock'n'roll landscape of the past three decades. Back in 2006, when the label celebrated its 25th anniversary, Pitchfork published a few features about the label's history. Read those now for just a small taste of what this remarkable institution accomplished: