Indie label Tick Rock Records is moving forward and looking backward. Based out of Columbia and Brooklyn, the small outfit recently issued a stack of new albums and EPs on old-school formats, including cassette tapes and hand-cut flexi discs.
The City Paper‘s music room received two packages of new releases last week. Our old tape decks came alive. Our interns fled. Old ladies wept in the hallway. Teeth were gnashed. A limited-edition compilation titled Tick Tock Mixtape features 14 acts.
“Tick Tock is still going strong as ever,” says label co-manager Tobias Denney (also of Motormouth Mabel and Shanty Tramp), speaking from his new digs in Brooklyn. “We have lots of new releases this year. Sweet Tooth Nelson — our latest addition to the Tick Tock fam — is a Charleston native living up here. He plays solo and has a band called Hallelujah.”
Wild-eyed booze-punk band Motormouth Mabel’s full-length Catch the Fury comes in a yellow-shell cassette and hand-styled Xeroxed artwork (the track “PBR, Be My Valentine” is a winner — see review here). The acoustic-based Sweet Tooth Nelson’s EP Thank God for Satan rolls at a mellower pace.
Packaged as a 7-inch art book and EP, the Kevin E. Taylor release comes on two versions: a signed, 10-page, hand-bound and screened book of his artwork, and 200 copies that will include screen-printed loose sheets from the book.
Free mp3 downloads and digital versions of the albums from the label’s catalog are available at ticktockrecords.com. Love Best of Charleston? Help the Charleston City Paper keep Best of Charleston going every year with a donation. Or sign up to become a member of the Charleston City Paper club.