ZTT Records
ZTT Zang Tumb Tuum | |
---|---|
Parent company | UMC (Universal Music catalogue) |
Founded | 1983 |
Founder | Jill Sinclair Trevor Horn Paul Morley |
Distributor(s) | Universal Music Operations |
Genre | Various |
Country of origin | United Kingdom |
Location | London |
Official website | ZTT.com |
ZTT Records is a British record label founded in 1983 by the record producer Trevor Horn, the businesswoman Jill Sinclair and the NME journalist Paul Morley.[1] They released music by acts including Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Grace Jones, the Art of Noise and Seal.
In December 2017, Universal Music Group (UMG) acquired ZTT Records, along with Stiff Records.[2] The ZTT and Stiff back catalogues were licensed to BMG Rights Management under Union Square Music until 2022, when Universal relaunched the label.
History
ZTT is an
The majority of the creative team[clarification needed] at ZTT had first assembled when Horn produced the album The Lexicon of Love for the British pop band ABC. A precursor to ZTT was the short-lived Perfect Recordings label, spun off from the newly founded Perfect Songs publishing subsidiary of Trevor Horn and Jill Sinclair's company. Perfect Recordings only released the Buggles' Adventures in Modern Recording, along with the singles derived from it.
In 1983, Horn, Sinclair and Morley founded ZTT Records.[1][5] Sinclair was ZTT's managing director, while Paul Morley concentrated on marketing.[3] In the same year, Sinclair and Horn acquired Basing Street Studios from Island Records in exchange for distributing the ZTT label.[6]
ZTT's first signing was
In 1984, the Horn-Sinclair family businesses were reorganised as SPZ Group, which then consisted of
By the late 1980s, ZTT began to focus on the emerging dance music scene. Manchester trance group 808 State[1] would reach the top 10 with Pacific State, and three other singles and one album during the early 1990s.[7] Seal[1] was the next major ZTT act to emerge in the 1990s, and the label also achieved hits with MC Tunes and Shades of Rhythm.[3]
ZTT Records have produced forty-five
In May 2022, UMG released the new album by Propaganda vocalists Claudia Brücken and Susanne Freytag on the reactivated ZTT Label. Credited to xPropaganda, the album was recorded with producer Stephen Lipson, titled The Heart Is Strange and received a generally positive reception. [10][11] [12]
Music videos and cover art
ZTT Records pioneered music video and cover art as forms of high art in their own right. Paul Morley commissioned videos from then-unknown directors, who would go on to become acclaimed in their field, such as Anton Corbijn, Godley & Creme, Zbigniew Rybczyński and Andy Morahan.
Morley also commissioned early ZTT sleeve design and photography to pioneers of the medium such as Malcolm Garrett, Anton Corbijn, Mark Farrow and Jean-Paul Goude.
The label's work in the visual field was profiled by Tony Enoch in Design Week, who positioned ZTT as "from a time when a record label meant something – a happening, a sense of belonging. Labels defined people's youth. Think Apple, Virgin, Beggar's Banquet, ZTT, and Stiff: small, independent British labels appearing to be able to do anything they wanted, reinventing the rules."[13]
In
Notable acts on the ZTT label
1980s | 1990s | 2000s | 2010s | 2020s |
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† as one-time UK distributor for Tommy Boy Records
Action Series
As part of ZTT internal cataloguing of releases, they maintained two series; the Action Series, and the Incidental Series. The Action Series was issued mainly to singles and albums by a majority of the labels artists. However to confuse matters, the series also contains a booklet and a concert.
The Action series paused in 1988,[17] and was restarted by record label manager Ian Peel in 2012.
Cat. No. |
Artist | Song |
---|---|---|
AS1 | Frankie Goes to Hollywood | Relax |
AS2 | Propaganda | Dr. Mabuse |
AS3 | Frankie Goes to Hollywood | Two Tribes/War |
AS4 | Frankie Goes to Hollywood | Welcome to the Pleasuredome (album) |
AS5 | Frankie Goes to Hollywood | The Power of Love |
AS6 | Frankie Goes to Hollywood | And Suddenly There Came A Bang! (booklet) |
AS7 | Frankie Goes to Hollywood | Welcome to the Pleasuredome (single) |
AS8 | Propaganda | Duel |
AS9 | Roy Orbison | Wild Hearts |
AS10 | Various | The Value Of Entertainment (concert) |
AS11 | Art of Noise | Who's Afraid of the Art of Noise? |
AS12 | Propaganda | p:Machinery |
AS13 | Propaganda | A Secret Wish |
AS14 | Various | The Shape of the Universe, Original Soundtrack |
AS15 | Claudia Brucken |
When Your Heart Runs Out of Time |
AS16 | Grace Jones | Slave to the Rhythm (A Biography) |
AS17 | Andrew Poppy | The Beating of Wings |
AS18 | Various | Zang Tuum Tumb Sampled |
AS19 | Anne Pigalle | Everything Could Be So Perfect... |
AS20 | Propaganda | Wishful Thinking |
AS21 | Propaganda | p:Machinery (Reactivated) |
AS22 | Frankie Goes to Hollywood | Rage Hard |
AS23 | Frankie Goes to Hollywood | Liverpool
|
AS24 | Das Psycho Rangers | Starve God There's Choice |
AS25 | Frankie Goes to Hollywood | Warriors of the Wasteland |
AS26 | Frankie Goes to Hollywood | Watching the Wildlife |
AS27 | Andrew Poppy | Alphabed (A Mystery Dance) |
AS28 | ACT | Snobbery and Decay |
See also
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o "Salvo – ZTT". Salvo-Music.co.uk. Archived from the original on 2 November 2019. Retrieved 10 November 2019.
- ^ "Universal Music acquires iconic British indie labels Stiff". Billboard. Archived from the original on 12 May 2018. Retrieved 19 December 2017.
- ^ a b c "The influence of ZTT Records". BBC.co.uk. United Kingdom: BBC News. Retrieved 25 December 2015.
- ^ Kristina Adolfsson (June 1990). "Latte Kronlund" (in Swedish). Slitz.
- ^ "Universal inks deal with ZTT Records". ZTT.com. ZTT Records. Archived from the original on 2 September 2016. Retrieved 24 December 2016.
- ^ "Our history". SarmMusicVillage.com. Archived from the original on 25 August 2017. Retrieved 10 November 2019.
- ^ ISBN 1-85227-969-9.
- ^ "FGTH Home Page". Frankie-say.net. Retrieved 24 March 2023.
- ^ Rayner, Gordon (25 March 2014). "Record company boss Jill Sinclair, wife of Trevor Horn, dies eight years after shooting accident". The Daily Telegraph. UK. Retrieved 25 December 2015.
- ^ "Propaganda / The Heart Is Strange. New album available on SDE-exclusive blu-ray audio". SuperDeluxeEdition.com. 15 February 2022. Retrieved 24 March 2023.
- ^ "Claudia Brücken, Susanne Freytag and Steve Lipson announce xPropaganda album". Loudersound.com. 15 February 2022.
- ^ "Review: xPropaganda - The Heart Is Strange - Classic Pop Magazine". Classicpopmag.com. Retrieved 24 March 2023.
- ^ Tony Enoch (13 February 2009). "ZTT in Design Week". ZTT.com. Retrieved 10 July 2017.
- ^ "The art of ZTT Records". ArtVinyl.com. 13 October 2008. Retrieved 10 July 2017.
- ^ "Album: Zang Tumb Tuum: The ZTT Box Set". Relayer35.com. 28 October 2008. Retrieved 10 July 2017.
- ^ "Spill News: Xpropaganda New Album 'The Heart is Strange' Coming May 20 Via ZTT Records". The Spill Magazine. 17 February 2022.
- ^ "BBC – h2g2 – ZTT Records 1983-1988". BBC.co.uk. BBC. Retrieved 19 August 2007.
External links
- "ZTT Records". Retrieved 19 August 2007.
- "The Alternate Boards – Index". Retrieved 19 August 2007.
- "Zang Tuum Tumb and all that – Home". Retrieved 19 August 2007.
- "ZTT". Discogs. Retrieved 19 August 2007.
- "ZTT Stuff". Retrieved 19 August 2007.