Phantom Records
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Phantom Records | |
---|---|
Founded | 1979 |
Founder | Sydney, New South Wales |
Phantom Records was an Australian record store and independent record label established in 1978 on Pitt Street in Sydney. [1][2] Phantom Records was one of Australia's first indie labels, and the store was known for its guerilla marketing strategies.[3]
History
Phantom Records opened on 17 October 1978 as a
Normington returned to Australia on 9 July 1979 to join Jennings as a managing partner of the store, and Phantom became a specialist store in "punk, soul, surf, psychedelic, sixties garage and nothing else".[citation needed] The store also employed Steve Stavrakis, later the founder of Waterfront Records. In late 1979, Normington and Jennings decided to launch a Phantom record label. Around the same time, John Foy was expanding the store's T-shirt printing business with posters. He named his poster range Skull Printworks. After spending most of 1980 in the US, Foy returned to Phantom T-shirts and continued with Skull Printworks, producing posters for a number of Phantom Records releases. Foy eventually left Phantom to join Red Eye Records, where he established his own independent label of the same name.
On 30 April 1980, the Phantom label released its first single, "Face with No Name" by The Passengers, with "Cool in the Tube" by Surfside 6 following seven days later. Phantom Records went on to release the debut records of bands including the
Record covers from the label's releases often featured artwork by local artists such as Libby Blainey, John Foy, Paul Worstead, and Gerard Rouen. Normington and Jennings had plans to license releases from international artists, but only released one single by
The label's momentum slowed in the mid 1980s. During this period, Jennings began to focus on his 100% Mambo clothing company and gradually reduced his role with Phantom, and Normington was focused on the range of records and magazines available in the store.
In 1987, Normington renewed his interest in the label, with releases by
After several years, with Jennings leaving the company altogether, Sebastian Chase, formerly of
Eventually, Phantom was divided into three companies: the shop, the record labels, and a music collectibles arm.
Normington increasingly focused on Phantom Collectibles. Every three or four months, he published auction catalogues under the title: "Plunder The Vaults". Finally, the label declined in activity due to business differences between Chase and Normington, and the shop closed in April 1998. In 1999, Normington formed Laughing Outlaw Records with writer Stuart Coupe as a partner. Normington left Phantom in 2000 to run a music collectables business, cutting his ties with Laughing Outlaw two years later.
Notable artists
First phase (Jennings and Normington)
- Sunnyboys
- The Visitors
- Le Hoodoo Gurus
- Machinations
- The Cockroaches
- Sardine v
- The Rockmelons
Second phase (Normington only)
- Shrinking Violets
- The Hummingbirds
- Even As We Speak
- Vanilla Chainsaws
- The Mark of Cain
- Crow
Third phase (Normington and Chase)
See also
- List of record labels
References
- ^ "THE BIG BEAT IN THE HEART OF THE VINYL JUNGLE". NKVD Records. Archived from the original on 14 July 2010. Retrieved 10 February 2024.
- ^ "Sydney Music Ghosts and Phantoms". AMMP. 16 February 2019. Retrieved 10 February 2024.
- Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 10 February 2024.