Great Record Labels: Dead Reckoning Records

Ojai Sam

Staff member
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After the alt country revolution drizzled out it left behind two lasting legacies: No Depression magazine and Dead Reckoning Records. In 1994, artists outside the mainstream had a lot of trouble being taken seriously by the major record labels. Four such frustrated artists decided to go their own, less commercial way. Kevin Welch, Kieran Kane, Mike Henderson and Tammy Rogers each had an idiosyncratic musical vision, so in 1995 they decided to form a cooperative label together with producer Harry Stinson. Their focus was so intense that Dead Reckoning's roster was limited to its founders for five years before they finally branched out with other performers. The albums that resulted were uncompromising in their musical integrity.

Kieran Kane & The Dead Reckoners - Dead Rekoning (Dead Reckoning Records 0001, 1995)

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Remember The Yellow Balloon and their hippie hit "Yellow Balloon" (B-side "Noollab Wolley") which appeared on an album entitled The Yellow Balloon"? Well, Kieran took the same tack when he co-founded Dead Reckoning Records. Oh, and this, the label's first release, is a spectacular example of alt country at its best.
 
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Tammy Rogers & Don Heffington - In The Red (Dead Reckoning 0002, 1995)

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Tammy Rogers had worked as a fiddler in the bands of Patty Loveless and Trisha Yearwood before she recorded this album with ex-Lone Justice drummer Don Heffington. It's safe to sat that no major label would have touched this eclectic slice of acoustic Americana. Tammy plays mandolin, viola and violin as well as fiddle while Heffington joins her on jawbone, bones, pandeiro, bodhran and several other types of drum from all over the world. Each of them offers one raw vocal but the strings and percussion work together to create and sustain a mesmerizing mystic landscape.
 
Tammy Rogers & Don Heffington - In The Red (Dead Reckoning 0002, 1995)

Mi00MjE2LmpwZWc.jpeg


Tammy Rogers had worked as a fiddler in the bands of Patty Loveless and Trisha Yearwood before she recorded this album with ex-Lone Justice drummer Don Heffington. It's safe to sat that no major label would have touched this eclectic slice of acoustic Americana. Tammy plays mandolin, viola and violin as well as fiddle while Heffington joins her on jawbone, bones, pandeiro, bodhran and several other types of drum from all over the world. Each of them offers one raw vocal but the strings and percussion work together to create and sustain a mesmerizing mystic landscape.
I would listen to that.
 
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