What's New: Look 'Em Straight in the Ears
Updated: Apr 15, 2019
Lucy Jordan investigates the Danny Nedelko Community spawned within Balley Records, a collective revolving around the new breed of punk, mindful, manic and accomplished.
Balley Records is the home for the new, new wave of punk introducing the Danny Nedelko Community so - and I quote- ‘fuck you’ #dannynedelkocommunitysofuckyou.
Idles, Heavy Lungs and LICE are the Bristol grown faces redefining punk for a new generation with rainbows, colour and tattoos.
Punk has grown up since the late 70’s, it is no longer about smashing the shit out of a guitar on stage and screaming at the audience, its now got elegance and grace. The lyrics pinpoint everything wrong within this generation with the same passion and aggression as the Pistols or The Damned. Balley Records encompassess the whole new era of punk and they’re expanding the ‘Nedelko’ community with their latest signing, Crows from north London. Each band under the label brings their own slice of originality to the new punk scene- Crows bring their psychedelic aesthetic, Heavy Lungs incorporate the old indie appearance and LICE provide humour and copious amounts of sarcasm within their music videos, the Human Parasite Video in particular.
Although Idles are not on the Balley Records label anymore, they are involved in the community immensely, Due to Talbot. Recently Sleaford Mods shot at Idles, suggesting they were appropriating the working class to which Talbot responded, in a new interview with The Independent, saying “This idea that I can’t speak out against austerity or food banks – that I can’t think one of the richest economies in the world having fucking food banks is wrong – I can’t say that because I’m fortunate enough to be able to feed my child? What the fuck is wrong with this guy?”, and this is exactly what Balley records stands for, any artist from any social background can use the record label as a platform to release their music that criticises the exploitation of women across all media platform, social issues regarding the perfect appearance and everything else that’s wrong with the world in a mature, sarcastic approach.
Supporting indie record stores is something Balley Records works hard at doing, with their roster of artists playing a selection of stores on record store day. The label also distribute their vinyl and CD’s to many independent record shops, such as Crash Records, Rough Trade and Juno records, keeping the spirit of indie and DIY alive which is what punk has always stood for. The main focus is on limited edition 7” and 12” vinyl for every bands release, this is to create a relationship with their consumers and audience, vinyl resonates with certain groups of people, and one of those groups are indie punk lovers - it's the artwork, the connection to the band and they love to have a physical product to cradle and care for just like a child.