Sonic Unyon Recording Company is an independent record label

Independent record label

An independent record label is a record label operating without the funding of or outside the organizations of the major record labels. A great number of bands and musical acts begin on independent labels.-Overview:...

 based in Hamilton

Hamilton, Ontario

Hamilton is a port city in the Canadian province of Ontario. Conceived by George Hamilton when he purchased the Durand farm shortly after the War of 1812, Hamilton has become the centre of a densely populated and industrialized region at the west end of Lake Ontario known as the Golden Horseshoe...

, Ontario

Ontario

Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....

, Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

. The retail store is located on Wilson Street

Wilson Street (Hamilton, Ontario)

Wilson Street is a Lower City collector road in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. It starts off at James Street North and works its way East and ends at Sherman Avenue North...

 near James Street North

James Street (Hamilton, Ontario)

James Street is a Lower City arterial road in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. It starts off at the base of the Niagara Escarpment from James Mountain Road, a mountain-access road in the city, originally was a one-way street going south throughout but now has sections of it that are two-way...

). They have put out releases by bands including Tristan Psionic

Tristan Psionic

Tristan Psionic was a Canadian indie rock band.Formed in the early 1990s in Hamilton, Ontario, the band consisted of vocalist Sandy McIntosh, guitarist Mark Milne, bassist Gary "Wool" McMaster and drummer Tim Potocic...

, Sianspheric

Sianspheric

SIANspheric , is a shoegaze/dream pop-oriented rock band from Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. They formed in 1994, and signed with the then-fledgling record label Sonic Unyon. The following year, Somnium, their debut album, was released...

, Shallow North Dakota

Shallow North Dakota

Shallow North Dakota is a three-piece noise rock/sludge metal band from Hamilton, Ontario. They have released several records on local label Sonic Unyon, and have toured with other notable Canadian acts such as Chore and Kittens...

, Eric's Trip

Eric's Trip

Eric's Trip is a Canadian indie rock band from Moncton, New Brunswick. Eric's Trip achieved prominence as the first Canadian band to be signed to Seattle's flagship grunge label Sub Pop in the early 1990s...

, Hayden

Hayden (musician)

Paul Hayden Desser who records as Hayden, is a Canadian singer-songwriter from Thornhill, Ontario.His early works are a largely eclectic mix of genres from grunge rock to alt country, as demonstrated by his first full album, Everything I Long For, released in 1995. Since then his work has become...

, Chore

Chore (band)

Chore were a Canadian alternative rock band that formed in January 1995. They released three albums on the Sonic Unyon indie label in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada: Another Plebeian in 1997, Take My Mask and Breathe in 1999, and The Coastaline Fire in 2002.Their video for the single "General Warning"...

, Frank Black and the Catholics, A Northern Chorus

A Northern Chorus

A Northern Chorus was a Canadian band from Hamilton, Ontario.-History:The band was formed in 1999 after the breakup of Stu Livingstone and Pete Hall's previous band, Datura Dream Defered. They have released four records on the Sonic Unyon label, Before We All Go To Pieces, Spirit Flags, Bitter...

, Raising the Fawn

Raising the Fawn

Raising the Fawn is a Canadian indie rock band, with its roots in Toronto. The band is composed of John Crossingham , Scott Remila and Dylan Green...

, Teenage Head

Teenage Head (band)

Teenage Head is a Canadian rock group from Hamilton, Ontario and was one of the most popular Canadian punk rock bands during the early 1980s....

 and Voivod

Voivod (band)

Voivod are a Canadian heavy metal band from Jonquière, Quebec, Canada. Their musical style has changed several times since the band's origin in the early 1980s...

.

Founded in 1992

1992 in music

This is a list of notable events in music that took place in the year 1992.-January–February:*January 11**Nirvana's Nevermind album goes to #1 in the US Billboard 200 chart, establishing the widespread popularity of the Grunge movement of the 1990s....

 by Mark Milne, Sandy McIntosh and Tim Potocic of the band Tristan Psionic

Tristan Psionic

Tristan Psionic was a Canadian indie rock band.Formed in the early 1990s in Hamilton, Ontario, the band consisted of vocalist Sandy McIntosh, guitarist Mark Milne, bassist Gary "Wool" McMaster and drummer Tim Potocic...

, Sonic Unyon is one of the largest independent labels in Canada. As of 2005, Sonic Unyon releases were distributed in the United States exclusively by Caroline Distribution

Caroline Distribution

Caroline Distribution, founded in 1983 as a unit of Virgin Records, has become one of the U.S. music industry’s largest third party distribution companies for the independent music sector....

.

Sonic Unyon Distribution is a branch of the record label and distributes releases in Canada from independent labels from around the world and select co-releases with other independent labels including Jagjaguwar

Jagjaguwar

Jagjaguwar is an indie rock record label based in Bloomington, Indiana.-History:In 1996, in Charlottesville, Virginia, friends of Darius Van Arman who performed in a band under the moniker The Curious Digit had just recorded a new album, but they were signed to no label...

, Nuclear Blast, WARP, Fearless

Fearless Records

Fearless Records is an alternative rock-oriented record label that has been signing artists since 1994. Fearless is based in Westminster, California and are best known for their early pop-punk moments captured in the Fearless Flush Sampler and Punk Bites releases, as well as additional releases by...

 and Plexifilm

Plexifilm

Plexifilm is an independent DVD label and film production company co-founded by Gary Hustwit and Sean Anderson in 2001...

 (including the Death Cab for Cutie

Death Cab for Cutie

Death Cab for Cutie is an American alternative rock band formed in Bellingham, Washington in 1997. The band consists of Ben Gibbard , Chris Walla , Nick Harmer and Jason McGerr ....

 tour DVD, Drive Well, Sleep Carefully

Drive Well, Sleep Carefully

Drive Well, Sleep Carefully – On the Road with Death Cab for Cutie is a live music DVD from the Seattle-based band Death Cab for Cutie. The DVD was filmed and directed by filmmaker Justin Mitchell during the band's Transatlanticism-tour in spring 2004 with a 16 mm film camera...

).

Selected artists

The following artists have made at least one release through Sonic Unyon.

• A Northern Chorus
  A Northern Chorus
  A Northern Chorus was a Canadian band from Hamilton, Ontario.-History:The band was formed in 1999 after the breakup of Stu Livingstone and Pete Hall's previous band, Datura Dream Defered. They have released four records on the Sonic Unyon label, Before We All Go To Pieces, Spirit Flags, Bitter...
  
  
• Ad Astra Per Aspera
  Ad Astra Per Aspera (band)
  Ad Astra Per Aspera is a Lawrence, Kansas-based indie rock and punk and tropical band formed in 2001 and currently releasing records through Sonic Unyon Records and Love Garden Records. Their experimental and eclectic noise rock sound has drawn comparisons to bands such as Sonic Youth and the...
  
  
• Aereogramme
  Aereogramme
  Aereogramme were a Scottish alternative/post-rock rock band from Glasgow, consisting of Craig B. , Iain Cook , Campbell McNeil and Martin Scott...
  
  
• Frank Black
  Frank Black
  Black Francis is an American singer, songwriter and guitarist. He is best known as the frontman of the influential alternative rock band Pixies, with whom he performs under the stage name Black Francis. Following the band's breakup in 1993, he embarked on a solo career under the name Frank Black...
  
   / Frank Black and the Catholics
• Chore
  Chore (band)
  Chore were a Canadian alternative rock band that formed in January 1995. They released three albums on the Sonic Unyon indie label in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada: Another Plebeian in 1997, Take My Mask and Breathe in 1999, and The Coastaline Fire in 2002.Their video for the single "General Warning"...
  
  
• Damon & Naomi
• Death Cab for Cutie
  Death Cab for Cutie
  Death Cab for Cutie is an American alternative rock band formed in Bellingham, Washington in 1997. The band consists of Ben Gibbard , Chris Walla , Nick Harmer and Jason McGerr ....
  
  
• Dinner Is Ruined / Dale Morningstar
  Dale Morningstar
  Dale Morningstar is a Toronto-based Canadian rock musician and recording engineer and producer, originally from Chippawa, Ontario.-History:Morningstar was the founding member of The Dinner Is Ruined, an avant-garde rock band based in Toronto in the early 1990s...
  
  
• Danko Jones
  Danko Jones
  Danko Jones is a Canadian rock band from Toronto, Ontario. The band consists of Danko Jones and JC...
  
  
• Elevator Through
  Elevator (band)
  Elevator is a band from Moncton, New Brunswick. Started in 1994 as Elevator To Hell, a solo outlet for Eric's Trip lead man Rick White, the project eventually grew to include Eric's Trip drummer Mark Gaudet and White's ex-wife Tara on bass and, for a short while, Ron Bates of Orange Glass as a...
  
  
• Eric's Trip
  Eric's Trip
  Eric's Trip is a Canadian indie rock band from Moncton, New Brunswick. Eric's Trip achieved prominence as the first Canadian band to be signed to Seattle's flagship grunge label Sub Pop in the early 1990s...
  
  
• Andre Ethier
  Andre Ethier (musician)
  Andre Ethier is a Canadian rock singer-songwriter and visual artist, who was formerly associated with the indie rock band The Deadly Snakes. He has also released three solo albums....
  
  
• The Ghost Is Dancing
  The Ghost Is Dancing
  The Ghost Is Dancing is a Canadian indie-pop band formed in 2002 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.-History:Their first show was performed in August 2004 to commemorate the end of their residency at 2 French Avenue, the student apartment at which the group started playing and improvising...
  
  
• Gorp
• Hayden
  Hayden (musician)
  Paul Hayden Desser who records as Hayden, is a Canadian singer-songwriter from Thornhill, Ontario.His early works are a largely eclectic mix of genres from grunge rock to alt country, as demonstrated by his first full album, Everything I Long For, released in 1995. Since then his work has become...
  
  
• The Kittens
  Kittens (band)
  The Kittens were a three piece noise rock band, with some country influences, from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Their albums were released on Sonic Unyon. After disbanding for almost eight years, they had a reunion show on News Years of 2007....
  
  
• Jens Lekman
  Jens Lekman
  Jens Martin Lekman is a Swedish musician. His music is guitar-based pop with heavy use of samples and strings, with lyrics that are often witty, romantic, and melancholic. The English lyrics reflect an advanced knowledge of the language and its idioms...
  
  
• The Jesus Lizard
  The Jesus Lizard
  The Jesus Lizard was an American alternative rock and noise rock band formed in 1987 in Austin, Texas. They were "a leading noise rock band in the American independent underground…[who] turned out a series of independent records filled with scathing, disembowelling, guitar-driven pseudo-industrial...
  
  
• Mayor McCA
  Mayor McCA
  Mayor McCa is a Canadian musician, writer, cartoonist, animator, actor and onetime mayoral candidate from Hamilton, Ontario. He mostly performs as a one-man band....
  
  
• The Nein
  The Nein
  The Nein is an indie rock band from Durham, North Carolina, and is composed of former members of The White Octave, Steel Pole Bath Tub, and Piedmont Charisma. The band is signed to the Canadian label Sonic Unyon.-Biography:...
  
  
• The New Grand
  The New Grand
  The New Grand is a Canadian indie rock band from London, Ontario, Canada. Known for their explosive live shows, they released two full-length albums on Sonic Unyon Records....
  
  
• Paley & Francis (Reid Paley
  Reid Paley
  Reid Paley is an American singer, songwriter, and musician who has been performing and recording both solo and with his trio since the mid 1990s.-Early career:...
  
   & Black Francis)
• Pixies
• Poledo
  Poledo
  Poledo was a Canadian alternative rock band, active in the 1990s. Consisting of vocalist and bassist Joshua Malinsky, vocalist and guitarist Mitch Roth and drummer Dave Capogna, the band formed in 1994 and released two independent cassettes, Buzz Muffin and Let Up, before signing to Sonic Unyon...
  
  
• Raising the Fawn
  Raising the Fawn
  Raising the Fawn is a Canadian indie rock band, with its roots in Toronto. The band is composed of John Crossingham , Scott Remila and Dylan Green...
  
  
• Ringo Deathstarr
  Ringo Deathstarr
  Ringo Deathstarr is a shoegaze band from Austin, Texas, which channels such diverse influences as Fugazi, The Cure, The Smiths, My Bloody Valentine, and The Velvet Underground into their own unique sonic fingerprint....
  
  
• Sacrifice
  Sacrifice
  Sacrifice is the offering of food, objects or the lives of animals or people to God or the gods as an act of propitiation or worship.While sacrifice often implies ritual killing, the term offering can be used for bloodless sacrifices of cereal food or artifacts...
  
  
• Shallow North Dakota
  Shallow North Dakota
  Shallow North Dakota is a three-piece noise rock/sludge metal band from Hamilton, Ontario. They have released several records on local label Sonic Unyon, and have toured with other notable Canadian acts such as Chore and Kittens...
  
  
• SIANspheric
  Sianspheric
  SIANspheric , is a shoegaze/dream pop-oriented rock band from Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. They formed in 1994, and signed with the then-fledgling record label Sonic Unyon. The following year, Somnium, their debut album, was released...
  
  
• Simply Saucer
  Simply Saucer
  Simply Saucer was a Canadian rock band, active in the 1970s. Based in Hamilton, Ontario, the band consisted of guitarist and vocalist Edgar Breau, keyboardist John LaPlante , bass guitarist Kevin Christoff and drummer Neil DeMarchant...
  
  
• Sleeper Set Sail
• Smoother
• Spookey Ruben
  Spookey Ruben
  Spookey Ruben is a Toronto-based musician, composer and video director. Due to his father's work as a space engineer Spookey grew up in Germany, Holland, and Washington, D.C. He spent his teenage years playing in array of hardcore and speed metal bands...
  
  
• Tangiers
  Tangiers (band)
  Tangiers are a Toronto-based indie rock band.Josh Reichmann and James Sayce resuscitated Tangiers after two band members left the band in 2003, adding ex-Guided by Voices drummer Jon McCann and keyboardist Shelton Deverell to the lineup.-Discography:*Hot New Spirits *Never Bring You Pleasure...
  
  
• Teenage Head
  Teenage Head (band)
  Teenage Head is a Canadian rock group from Hamilton, Ontario and was one of the most popular Canadian punk rock bands during the early 1980s....
  
  
• Thrush Hermit
  Thrush Hermit
  -History:Thrush Hermit was formed in Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1992 by Joel Plaskett , Rob Benvie , Ian McGettigan , and Michael Catano...
  
  
• Treble Charger
  Treble Charger
  Treble Charger was a Canadian rock group, consisting of vocalist Greig Nori, bassist Rosie Martin and drummer Trevor MacGregor. Guitarist Bill Priddle, a founding member of the band, left in 2003. They began with a melodic indie rock style, but evolved into more of a pop punk band after signing to...
  
   (under the name 'nc17')
• Tricky Woo
• Tristan Psionic
  Tristan Psionic
  Tristan Psionic was a Canadian indie rock band.Formed in the early 1990s in Hamilton, Ontario, the band consisted of vocalist Sandy McIntosh, guitarist Mark Milne, bassist Gary "Wool" McMaster and drummer Tim Potocic...
  
  
• Voivod
  Voivod (band)
  Voivod are a Canadian heavy metal band from Jonquière, Quebec, Canada. Their musical style has changed several times since the band's origin in the early 1980s...
  
  
• Wintersleep
  Wintersleep
  Wintersleep is a Canadian indie rock band from Halifax, Nova Scotia.-Background:Wintersleep formed in 2001 and released two albums with Dependent Music, a music label and artists' collective that began in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia in 1994....
  
  
• Wooden Stars
  Wooden Stars
  Wooden Stars are a Canadian indie rock band formed in the 1990s. The band, from Ottawa, consists of vocalist and guitarist Julien Beillard, guitarist Mike Feuerstack, bassists Josh Latour and Mathieu Beillard, and drummer Andrew McCormack.-Style:...
  
  
• Young Rival
  Young Rival
  Young Rival is a Canadian indie rock band from Hamilton, Ontario. The group consists of singer-guitarist Aron D’Alesio, bassist John Smith, and drummer Noah Fralick. Guitarist Kyle Kuchmey left the band at the end of 2009. In the early 2000s, the group was called The Ride Theory, and released two...
  
  

See also

• Now We Are 5
  Now We Are 5
  Now We Are 5 is a compilation album released in 1998 on Sonic Unyon Records, as a retrospective to mark the label's fifth anniversary.-Track listing:# Tricky Woo, "Teenage Hurricane"# The Mooney Suzuki, "Inspirational"...
  
  (1998), Sonic Unyon's fifth anniversary compilation album
  Compilation album
  A compilation album is an album featuring tracks from one or more performers, often culled from a variety of sources The tracks are usually collected according to a common characteristic, such as popularity, genre, source or subject matter...
  
  
• List of record labels

External links

• Sonic Unyon