Secretly Melds With Merge
• Secretly Group announces a new partnership with Merge Records, with Secretly Co-Founders Ben Swanson, Chris Swanson, Darius Van Arman and Phil Waldorf acquiring a 50% stake in the company. Merge Co-Founder Mac McCaughan continues in his role as Label President and Head of A&R, while Co-Founder and Co-President Laura Ballance leaves the music business. Longtime Merge Label Director Christina Rentz maintains her role, overseeing the day-to-day operations of the label, as do Merge Marketing Director Jamie Beck and Head of Digital Wilson Fuller.
Merge Records was started in the summer of 1989 by Ballance and McCaughan, the same summer they formed the band Superchunk in Chapel Hill, NC. This dream expanded over the years to grow Merge Records into one of the most influential independent record labels in the world, the home to GRAMMY® Award-winning artists and a catalog of releases from Neutral Milk Hotel, Lambchop, The Magnetic Fields, The Clean, Waxahatchee and many more.
(Pictured, l-r): Secretly’s Phil Waldorf, Darius Van Arman, Ben Swanson & Chris Swanson [Photo by Anna Powell-Teeter]
“Our aim is to support Merge with the independent ecosystem we’ve built at Secretly, while preserving what’s truly special about what Mac and Laura have built over the past 36 years, such that we can support Merge’s growth in the decades to come,” said Ben Swanson.
“We continue to be inspired and amazed by the musicians we work with,” says McCaughan (left, with Rentz). “I have known many of the people in the Secretly world for decades, and I know that they share Merge’s dedication to artists and getting their music into the hands of as many people as possible. We have seen this in action working with Secretly Distribution’s international team since 2012, and are excited about what the future looks like with the strength and experience of Secretly Distribution working for Merge artists around the world, and now here at home. I know Laura has her own exciting future ahead, and I am excited to continue and expand upon the label we’ve run for 36 years.”
Merge will continue to run as a standalone label out of Durham, NC, while utilizing Secretly Distribution’s worldwide distribution arm. Superchunk’s forthcoming Songs in the Key of Yikes, out August 22, is the first new album to be distributed worldwide by Secretly, with much more TBA. [McCaughan & Rentz Photo by Colette Arrand]
