Twenty Years Deep
Brownswood launches with Ben Westbeech’s So Good Today (BW001), and an album by SOIL & PIMP SESSIONS (BW001CD). The label is named after the road where Gilles as his studio. We also put a 50 piece orchestra into Abbey Road to record The Heritage Orchestra’s debut album. Our friend Robi Bear designs our logo and some T-shirts. We release the first Brownswood Bubblers compilation on CD, featuring Robi’s drawing of Brownswood RD and make bubbles to send to journalists. We sign a deal in Japan that pays for it all. We try and fail to sign Eska. We realise that the catalogue number BW is not original and switch to BWOOD.
The Brownswood Loves Jazz tour takes Jose James, SOIL & PIMP SESSIONS and Elan Mehler on the road. The first Worldwide Festival takes place. Ben Westbeech manages to get a slot on Jools Hollands show. We release Brownswood Bubblers Two which includes the debut release from Flying Lotus. We ask him to help us clear the John Coltrane covers that Jose has recorded and he tells us to just stick them out . When we put on Jose James’ first show at Cargo and press white labels of his two John Coltrane covers and give them away to the first people at the show. We try and fail to sign Tawiah. We do a “Brownswood Are One” party at The End and Moodyman plays.
Jose James releases The Dreamer, complete with a Chris Ofili print in the packaging, which we don’t mention in the marketing. We are close to going under when Saatchi and Saatchi call, inviting Gilles to Cuba to do some curation for Havana Club rum.
Gilles Peterson travels to Cuba to begin the Havana Cultura project, recording and collaborating with musicians across the island. The resulting albums introduce a new generation of Cuban artists to audiences around the world. José James releases a B-side produced by Flying Lotus called Visions of Violet. The kitchen ceiling leaks. Jay Electronica comes to visit and for some reason wants to sign to us.
Owiny Sigoma Band release their first music. Unfortunately, their name is spelled incorrectly on the label. The first volume of Brownswood Electrc* is released. Jose James releases BLACKMAGIC. The Brownswood team produce the Worldwide Awards at The Garage.
Ghostpoet’s Peanut Butter Blues & Melancholy Jam earns Brownswood its first Mercury Prize nomination. We sign Zara McFarlane and bring Joseph Nyamungo and Charles Owoko from Kenya to tour the UK. The team move temporarily to Du Bouvoir while while Brownswood Rd is renovated. We sign up to instagram. The Worldwide Awards moves to Koko where it stays for 10 years.
We move back to Brownswood Rd. We release Mala in Cuba. The Line up for the Worldwide Awards includes Thundercat & Austin Peralta, Michael Kiwanuka, The Pyramids, BADBADNOTGOOD, Hudson Mohawke and Jamie xx.
Brownswood celebrates its 100th release (approximately) with a remix compilation. We partner with Boiler Room on a series of basement broadcasts. Atoms for Peace take Owiny Sigoma Band on tour, and while in London they record their 2nd album Power Punch. They record a Boiler Room in our basement - it is literally boiling and they play their hearts out and somehow the broadcast doesn’t transmit.
Zara McFarlane wins Best Jazz Act at the MOBO Awards. We release Swindle’s Walter’s Call EP in partnership with Mala’s Deep Medi. Worldwide FM launches as a radio station on GTA V. We start broadcasting Boiler Room from our basement and somehow get away with Swindle & Lonnie Liston Smith and Haitus Kayote performing in the Garden. Virgin fund Gilles to go to Brasil to make an album under the name Sonzeira and he secures guest spots from Marcus Valle.
Lonnie Liston Smith and Swindle in the Brownswood Garden.
Daymé Arocena comes to London for a Havana Club event and records Nueva Era in London a matter of days. The album cover is photographed in the hallway outside the studio. NPR call it an album of the year. We also release LV’s Ancient Mechanisms featuring Tigran Hamasyan. Future Bubblers launches, beginning a talent development programme that would go on to support artists and industry talent across the UK for the next decade. Gilles launches the Steve Reid Foundation.
Yussef Kamaal play the worldwide awards and Gilles offers them a deal live on stage. As the world changes politically, and there is also a turning point for the label. By the end of the year Shabaka and the Ancestors’ Wisdom of Elders and Yussef Kamaal’s Black Focus. We partner with Havana Club to release a documentary about Cuban rumba and host screenings at the ICA. We record Dayme Arocena’s album in Havana. Worldwide FM does a launch party in LA “How We Do” sponsored by We Transfer. The Vinyl Factory includes us in a list of the best Record Label Instagrams to follow - we are gassed.
Brownswood team join millions of women around the world to protest Trump’s inauguration. Shabaka and the Ancestors support Pharoah Sanders in New York, and get poached by Impulse!. Yussef Kamaal win Best Newcomer at the Jazz FM Awards, do not attend, and announce their split on the day of their headline show. Worldwide FM broadcasts test transmissions from our basement. We Out Here is recorded over three days in August. Adama Jalloh takes pictures of all the band members in the hall outside the studio. Fabrice Bourgelle films the sessions. We celebrate our 10th birthday with a party in Tottenham despite actually being 11. The neighours get fed up with us and we move to The Pyramid, an office in Stoke Newington with the newly up and running Worldwide FM.
We Out Here is released. We do 2 nights at TRC with a film screening, bands and talks. We click publish on a basic packshot video of Kokoroko’s Abusey Junction and within weeks it’s gaining millions of streams a week. Brownswood joins a UK jazz delegation to Winter JazzFest in New York that includes Ezra Collective and Nubya Garcia. We are nominated for Independent Label of the Year at the AIM Awards and lose to Ninja Tune.
Swindle releases No More Normal and lands a major Apple TVC, and a televised slot at Glastonbury. Joe Armon-Jones releases Turn To Clear View. The team attends TGE for the first and only time. Kokoroko release their debut EP. Skinny Pelembe becomes the first Brownswood artist to perform on COLORS. We are nominated for Independent Label of the Year at the AIM Awards and lose again, this time to Partisan. Gilles wins best A&R at the MPG Awards. We Out Here festival launches with 5000 attendees. We try and fail to sign Nala Sinephro, which we never get over.
We release Kassa Overall’s I THINK I’M GOOD shortly before the entire world shuts down. Gilles and Bluey make STR4TA’s Aspects in a garden shed. We record Indaba Is in Johannesburg. We are nominated for Independent Label of the Year at the AIM Awards and lose to Jazz Refreshed. Tom Morgan and Sarah Jones who met interning at Brownswood get married. Kokoroko play a BBC prom to an empty venue
Indaba Is releases and appears on the cover of The Wire. STR4TA also release STRATASFEAR their second album. We Out Here goes ahead in a year when most festivals are cancelled. Gilles publishes Lockdown FM which includes contributions from many Brownswood team members and artists. Brownswood signs a new joint venture with Warner Music Group, and signs Yussef Dayes.
Kokoroko’s Could We Be More becomes Brownswood’s first UK Top 40 album. We partner with International Anthem on Tom Skinner’s Voices of Bishara. Brownswood Recordings get our own office space for the first time, although unfortunately it’s in Bermondsey.
Yussef Dayes’ Black Classical Music becomes Brownswood’s second UK Top 40 album. We also release the debut EP from Muva of Earth.
Yussef Dayes wins Best Album at the Ivor Novello Awards, and is nominated for 2 Brit Awards. Daymé Arocena receives a Latin Grammy nomination. In a full circle moment we release Galliano’s first album in 27 years and debut music from oreglo who are still at school. We move back to Hackney into the same building as Kokoroko, which makes approvals a bit easier.
We partner with Parlophone on Emma-Jean Thackray’s Weirdo, which is shortlisted for the Mercury Prize. Kokoroko release Tuff Times Never Last, tour the US and perform on NPR’s Tiny Desk. Gilles Peterson receives a Lifetime Achievement Award at the AIM Awards.
Brownswood is nominated for Best Small Label at the Libera Awards and celebrates its twentieth anniversary with Twenty Years Deep for Record Store Day. We continue looking forward with new releases from ZENA, Bel Cobain, IZCO, Isaiah Collier and Gary Bartz with Your Brother’s Keeper.
