(Digital) elbows deep in the depths of Wikipedia’s lists of record labels, I realised something rather intriguing that led to a few light bulb moments—truly a rare occurrence in exam season with my lack of thoughts regarding anything except when I’ll get to take a nap.
My research revealed that some (many) record labels borrow inspiration from existing songs and artists. For example, the name of Dead Oceans, the record label a number of my favourite artists (Mitski, Japanese Breakfast, Phoebe Bridgers, Slowdive, etc.) are signed to, is an allusion to a Bob Dylan song, particularly the lyrics of “A Hard Rain’s a-Gonna Fall” (1962):
“I’ve been out in front of a dozen dead oceans
I’ve been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard
And it’s a hard, and it’s a hard, it’s a hard, and it’s a hard
And it’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall.”
If I’ve learnt anything from typing “intertextuality” so many times that it has become the first word suggestion on my keyboard whenever I tap the letter “i”, it’s that referencing existing texts can have a huge impact on how people perceive it, particularly in terms of creating intrigue and an association with an already well-known and well-liked text that would add credibility to the new text.
With this in mind, I immediately scoured through my playlist of Bowie’s discography to look for an eye-catching word or two that we could use as our record label’s name. The most obvious choice was “Moonage Records,” considering the fact that Moonage Daydream is one of David Bowie’s most recognisable songs.
Although people may associate various different things with Bowie, a famously famous and controversial artist, his popularity in the mainstream media industry would lend our hypothetical record considerable credibility in my opinion.
The word “moonage” also has futuristic and speculative connotations in a way that is almost reminiscent of science fiction (unsurprising for a song from an album literally titled "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars") which would possibly help our audience associate the record label with unconventional and innovative music that they may be attracted to—this also immaculately coincides with our chosen genre of alternative/indie music.
Moreover, thanks to the presence of the terms “moon” and “age” in the name, we would not only get a chance to incorporate evocative imagery (that related to time/clocks and the moon) into the logo of the record label, but also not-so-subtly prompt the audience to think of the record label and its artists as out-of-this-world, something not bound by time and age, if you will. (No, this is not the beginning of a dramatic monologue by the villain in a Sci-fi movie.)
As a dedicated Google Docs enthusiast, I had already made and shared a Google document with Esha (prior to the epiphany detailed above) in which both of us could add all of our name ideas (for our artist, tracklist, album, record label, etc.). Shown below is a screenshot of the section of this document where we brainstormed potential record label names together until Esha agreed to my suggestion of “moonage.”
This list was truly very helpful because (spoilers) one of my initial name ideas for the record label ended up becoming the name of our album! What a glorious invention lists are.
And that's the epic tale behind how I came up with our very own record label. You can find the details of how Esha created our record label's logo on her separate blog post!
Comments