News

2013 has been an amazing year for us here at A Badge Of Friendship; we've worked with some amazing acts from loads of different countries and genres, giving us one of our most diverse rosters to date. We thought we'd summarise it all here in our final mailout of 2013. Below you'll be able to download and stream some of the great artists we've worked with in 2013.

We had some great electro artists on our roster this year, acts like Saturday Night Gym Club picked up some great press from publications such as Clash Magazine, who hailed their second EP, The Nowhere Team as "a mature, confident return".

Unmap impressed The Line Of Best Fit and Artrocker Magazine, among other publications, with their debut album, Pressures, dubbed "…an LP that demands your attention."

XFM's John Kennedy was blown away by Death Rattle's "Lynchian-grade dystopian opera", which is how The Line Of Best Fit described the duo's second EP, Fortress, while The/Das' debut EP, Speak Your Mind Speak caused a sensation with online publications such as The 405
and The Vinyl District.

Check out a selection of tracks below on our electro sampler compilation.



We also got the chance to work with some great labels from the UK and beyond. Berlin-based Sinnbus were responsible for a lot of our output this year (as you may have noticed), as they celebrated their 10th anniversary as well as co-ordinating releases for bands such as Rue Royale, Unmap, The/Das and Jan Roth. Check out their label sampler below.



Sonic Anhedonic was another label welcomed into the ABoF fold, bringing along massively talented artists Vincent Vocoder Voice, Chalk and The Lunchtime Sardine Club.

As always, Scotland featured massively in our roster, and we continued our relationship with former Idlewild guitarist, Rod Jones' band, The Birthday Suit, by promoting their latest single, A Bigger World, which gained great exposure over the airwaves, making the XFM evening playlist, and featuring heavily on Vic Galloway's show on BBC Radio Scotland, as well as Amazing Radio. The single is taken from their forthcoming album A Hollow Hole Of Riches out 3rd March 2014.

Algernon Doll's second album, Citalo-pop, once again showcased Ewan Grant's ability to find inspiration within the toils of his extreme anxiety disorder, picking up rave reviews from publications like Artrocker Magazine, and support from Vic Galloway on BBC Radio Scotland.

Flutes saw their cover of Haddaway's iconic, "What Is Love" picked up a ridiculous amount of attention over on Soundcloud, while Campfires In Winter released their latest EP Picture Of Health before embarking on a Scottish Tour, and This Silent Forest gave us a heartfelt, personal debut album with Indivision.

Perhaps the most surprising emerging act from Scotland this year was the balls-to-the-wall, hard edged and dirty rock pumped from the grunge-soaked amps of Dundee-trio Fat Goth. We weren't alone in our adoration of the band - Kerrang awarded their album, Stud 4 out of 5 Ks as well as a huge page feature in the mag, Rock Sound, Q, Terrorizer and Metal Hammer also gave the boys rave reviews plus they got to go on tour and support American alt-metal band Torche and play an array of festivals. With a new album dropping in May 2014, we'll be seeing plenty more from them next year.

Our 'Top of the Scots' playlist we created earlier this year is still available to stream on Soundcloud.



We're always on the look out for new and interesting experimental artists, and this year we hit the motherlode.

Atom Eye (aka Elsie Martins) followed up her critically acclaimed Trilogy120 EP with her long awaited debut album, The Otolith Sessions. It was extremely well received, with Prog Magazine calling it "…a classy sea of sound…" and Artrocker Magazine awarding it 3 out 5 stars.

We hooked up with emerging artist Pincers, and his debut EP Molt, alongside the mind-bending videos that accompanied satire laced tracks "A Sociopath To Flame" and "Loanshark" causing quite a stir in the music press form Notion to A New Band A Day and many more.

Another new addition to our roster of experimental artists was Sunset Graves, who released his debut album, Variant in September. The 405 called it "…an understated album that's undeniably impressive" and Artrocker Magazine awarded it 4 out of 5.

We once again got to work with the amazingly talented people at Believers Roast, with their latest offering, The Exquisite Corpse Game, a unique musical collaboration overseen by ABoF regular, Kavus Torabi (of Knifeworld and Cardiacs fame). Each artist on the recording was given only the last 20 seconds of the previous composition and had to continue by recording instrumental music in any way they saw fit. Whether they chose to develop themes or take an obtuse 90 degree turn was entirely up to them. It's a fascinating approach to composition, and proof that the concept album is by no means a dead art-form.

Check out our experimental sampler below.



Last, but by no means least, we got our rock on this year. We love music cranked up to 11 (we tried to find another metaphor, but this one just nailed it so well), and the chance to work on the aforementioned Vincent Vocoder Voice and his self-titled debut album, Fat Goth's breakthrough album Stud plus The Men That Will Not Be Blamed For Nothing's Steampunk "social commentary with a smile" The Gin Song/ Third Class Coffin, Atlas: Empire's Sonnus EP and One Unique Signal's Aether allowed us to cater to the heavier side of the music world, landing press from Rock Sound, Prog, Kerrang! and everything in between. Guitar music is alive and well!

Check out our rock sampler below.



We're sure there's lots of stuff we've missed out, as this has been one of our busiest years to date but we'll be back in 2014 with releases from clients both old and new, so keep your eyes peeled! And remember - have a fantastic Christmas, and a Happy New Year.

If there are any bands, musicians or labels out there wanting to find out more about what we do, please get in touch with us at info@abadgeoffriendship.com

Merry Christmas everyone - Claire, Paul & Ed, A Badge of Friendship xxx