Fat Wreck Chords

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Fat Wreck Chords

Founded	1990
Founder(s)	Fat Mike
Genre(s)	Punk rock
Country of Origin	U.S.
Location	San Francisco, California
Website	Official site of Fat Wreck Chords

Fat Wreck Chords is a San Francisco, California based independent record label, focused on punk rock, which was started by Fat Mike the lead singer and bassist of the punk rock band NOFX and his wife Erin, in 1990. They have recorded bands such as Less Than Jake, Rise Against, Against Me!, Anti-Flag, Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, NOFX, Propagandhi and more.

One somewhat uniqe and defining characteristic of Fat Wreck Chords is that they only sign one-record deals with bands. This allows the bands working with Fat Wreck Chords to have a choice as to when and if they want to put a record out on the label. ^[1]

In some cases, bands will put out albums on Fat Wreck Chords but may also choose to release material for other labels as well. In a few cases bands with releases on Fat Wreck Chords have also released material for larger major record labels (ex: Less Than Jake/Sire, Rise Against/Geffen, Against Me!/Sire).

Many bands on this label participated in the campaign Punk Voter, which was started by Fat Mike and attempted to encourage the youth in the U.S. to vote against George W. Bush in the 2004 U.S. presidential election.

Despite many rumours to the contrary, the label is not, and never has been a member of the Recording Industry Association of America as indicated on the frequently-asked questions portion of the label's website: "Are we a member? Not only no, but FUCK NO!".^[2]