Our Noise: The Story of Merge Records, the Indie Label That Got Big and Stayed Small

About this book

Merge Records defies everything you've heard about the music business. Started by two twenty-year-old musicians, Merge is a lesson in how to make and market great music on a human scale. The fact that the company is prospering in a failing industry is something of a miracle. Yet two of their bands made the Billboard Top 10 list; more than 1 million copies of Arcade Fire's Neon Biblehave been sold; Spoon has appeared on Saturday Night Liveand The Tonight Show; and the Magnetic Fields' 69 Love Songsis a contemporary classic. In celebration of their twentieth anniversary, founders Mac and Laura offer first-person accounts--with the help of their colleagues and Merge artists--of their work, their lives, and the culture of making music. Our Noisealso tells the behind-the-scenes stories of Arcade Fire, Spoon, the Magnetic Fields, Superchunk, Lambchop, Neutral Milk Hotel, and Butterglory. Hundreds of personal photos of the bands, along with album cover art, concert posters, and other memorabilia are included.