Heavenly Records

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Heavenly Records, aka Heavenly Recordings, is a London-based record label, distributed by EMI. Founded by Jeff Barrett, a former press officer for Creation Records and many successful indie bands of the time including Happy Mondays, Heavenly Recordings' first releases were 7" singles for bands Barrett had discovered. The label's early releases included singles and albums by acts such as Flowered Up, Saint Etienne, East Village and The Manic Street Preachers. Their most significant early release was Saint Etienne's Foxbase Alpha album, released in 1991 to widespread critical acclaim.

In 1992 Barrett partnered with former East Village lead singer/songwriter Martin Kelly who had given up making music to manage bands. Together they brokered a distribution deal with BMG which enabled them to sign Beth Orton, The Hybirds, Northern Uproar, Monkey Mafia, Dot Allison, Q-Tee and Espiritu. Beth Orton's first album Trailer Park was well received by critics and sold modestly well. It won her two Brit Award nominations and a Mercury Music Prize nomination. She won the Brit Award for Best British Female in 2000 for her second album, Central Reservation. In 2000 Heavenly Records sought a new distribution deal with EMI and soon signed Manchester band Doves and singer/songwriter Ed Harcourt. Beth Orton was dropped from the label in 2005 but continues to make records for EMI. Doves became a great success for the label, scoring three hit albums in a row with Lost Souls (2000), The Last Broadcast (2002) and Some Cities (2005). Some Cities gave the label its first #1 album. In 2004 the label signed brother/sister quartet The Magic Numbers. The Magic Numbers debut album went on to out-sell anything else the label had ever released, quickly becoming one of the biggest British bands of 2005 and earning them a Brit Award Nomination in 2006 for Best British Newcomer.

[edit] The Heavenly Social

The label created The Heavenly Social club in 1994. Initially a Sunday evening club in the basement of The Albany pub in Central London, it was created to showcase the talents of two young DJs the label was championing at the time- Tom Rowlands and Ed Simons, together known as The Dust Brothers and then - due to legal issues with another production team of the same name - The Chemical Brothers. The Heavenly Sunday Social was a pivotal moment in London club culture and the music created there by The Chemical Brothers spawned an entire genre known as Big Beat or Amyl House. The club was frequented by indie royalty of the era including Oasis, Primal Scream, Manic Street Preachers and The Charlatans. The club was closed when it began to draw too many people for its modest capacity. Barrett and Kelly, along with Heavenly Records press officer Robin Turner, launched further club nights at Turnmills and Smithfields in East London and at The Bomb in Barrett's home town of Nottingham. These club nights saw The Chemical Brothers grow from underground cult DJs to international rock stars, signing to Virgin Records and releasing a string of hit albums, many of them featuring guest vocals from recording artists they had encountered at The Heavenly Social - including Beth Orton, Tim Burgess of The Charlatans and Noel Gallagher of Oasis.

In 1999 Heavenly opened their first bar in Central London near Oxford Circus, The Social. It was soon followed by another restaurant/bar in Islington North London and a third in Nottingham. All three are known as The Social.

[edit] Artists

• The Rockingbirds
• Flowered Up
• East Village
• Espiritu
• Northern Uproar
• Q-Tee
• Saint Etienne
• Manic Street Preachers
• The Magic Numbers
• Beth Orton
• The Hybirds
• Doves
• Ed Harcourt
• 22-20s
• Pete Fowler
• The Vines
• Cherry Ghost
• A Beggar's Opera
• the Little Ones

[edit] The Fred EP

Similar to Food Records' Christmas EP of 1989, Heavenly Records released an EP in 1992. However, unlike the Food Christmas EP that featured the label's acts covering each others songs, Heavenly's EP featured Heavenly acts covering Right Said Fred songs for charity.

The artists and songs involved on The Fred EP were...

• The Rockingbirds - Deeply Dippy
• Flowered Up - Don't Talk Just Kiss
• Saint Etienne - I'm Too Sexy

The Saint Etienne version of I'm Too Sexy had different lyrics to the original, managing to reference both Right Said Fred and Jeff Barrett, the founder of Heavenly Records in the same sentence.

[edit] See also

• List of record labels
• Heavenly artists

[edit] External link

• Official site