Rioters v. Music

There have been a load of riots in England, starting in London. As well as throwing things at policemen, the rioters have done a fair bit of breaking into premises and stealing things. And burning places down. One place that was burned down was a warehouse holding the stock of PIAS, the UK's largest distributor of independent music. Many record labels will have seen their stock completely destroyed, leaving them in a legal quagmire as to where liability lies and whether anyone is going to stump up cash to cover the cost.

There is a list of the record labels affected here.

On Facebook, someone asked for recommendations of stuff from these various labels that someone might want to buy as a way of helping them out – or panic buy now because they may not be available again for some time when shop stocks run out. I seem to have acquired a load of records from the Finders Keepers label. Looking at their website, these are ones I recommend highly to discerning music aficionados:

Jane Weaver – The Fallen By Watch Bird (amazing contemporary avant folk)
v/a – The Sound of Wonder (Pakistani pop music. Like classic Bollywood tunes, only from Pakistan)
Ersen – Ersen (Turkish psych rock)
v/a – Welsh Rare Beat vol.2 (delightful Welsh eclectica, mostly of the psych rock and avant folk bent)
Selda – Selda (awesome Turkish folk electronic rock)
Lubos Fisher – Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (fascinating soundtrack to obscure Czech film)
v/a – B-Music Cross Continental Record Raid Road Trip (beat music and stuff from around the world)
Jean-Claude Vannier – L'Enfant Assassin des Mouches (weirdo French music from the guy who did Melody Nelson with Serge Gainsbourg)
v/a – Bearded Ladies vol. 1 (eclectic folk ladies old and new selection)
v/a - Welsh Rare Beat (see vol. 2)

Just in case you think I am one of those people who likes everything I hear, I do actually have several other Finders Keepers records that I feel are somewhat less than essential. I am not going to list them here, because for all that I am a bit underwhelmed by them they may well be other people's cup of tea.

More on that PIAS fire, including things you can do to help keep independent music alive

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