After 25 years and almost 700 albums, the taste makers who brought Belle and Sebastian and Arcade Fire to Australia are closing down
After 25 years of running the pivotal Australian indie label Spunk Records, Aaron Curnow has a lot of stories. Here’s one: in 2008, on the night Texan post-rock band Explosions in the Sky was playing in Sydney for the first time, Curnow’s wife was in labour with their first child. The baby was born and there was no room for Curnow to stay the night – so he raced to the gig, making it just in time. The band directed the crowd to vote on three potential baby names; Melody got the biggest cheer, and so the girl was named.
Last weekend, Explosions in the Sky played in Sydney again, this time over two nights with the New Zealand troubadour Aldous Harding and elusive Townsville folk collective The Middle East. It was a farewell to Curnow’s label which, since 1999, has released almost 700 albums in Australia from artists including Belle and Sebastian, Big Thief, The Shins, Spoon, Sufjan Stevens and Yeah Yeah Yeahs.
