About RZRecords
About RZRecords | An Unapologetically Independent Music Collective
RZRecords, formerly known simply as RZR and "ron_zed DIY records", was established late 2002 as an independent record label, but more so, as a home for a collective of outsider artists pushing the envelope of extreme music. There was no grand business plan. There was music that needed to exist, a group of people committed to making it exist, and the stubborn conviction that "too extreme for most audiences" was a recommendation, not a warning.
Origins: DIY Punk Ethics and Experimental Music
As a strictly non-profit, DIY oriented outlet, the label's early releases were mostly CD-R format, with xerox inserts, spray paint art, cut-out collages and lots of DIY punk attitude. Every copy was slightly different, not as a gimmick, but because that's what happens when you're making things by hand with no budget and more enthusiasm than resources. There was something right about that. The roughness was part of the point.
Other early artistic endeavors included impromptu public performances, posters, zines, flyers, sticker bombing and various types of guerrilla art projects. RZR was never purely a music operation, it was a creative posture, a way of insisting that extreme art belongs in public space whether or not anyone asked for it. Performances loudly happened in places that had no infrastructure for them. Zines got made and distributed. Stickers ended up on surfaces that were probably not suitable for stickers. This was all considered normal and correct. We had an itch we simply had to scratch.
Early releases were a low-means-maximum-exposure take on genres like noise, free jazz, punk, IDM and ambient music, with the label serving as a respectable front for publishing music too extreme or raw for most audiences. The "label" part was always somewhat of a polite fiction, a legitimate-sounding vessel for deeply illegitimate sounds. If giving it a name and a catalog number meant one more person would hear it, that's what we did. It helped us open doors, and it still does to this very day.
Formats: Cassettes, Floppy Disks, Vinyl and Beyond
While RZRecords currently focuses mainly on digital releases and small batches of vinyl and CD, in the past RZR released on cassette tapes (both compact and micro), 3.5" floppy disks, and minidisc. The floppy disk releases remain a source of both pride and mild embarrassment, a format that was already dying when we used it, which felt entirely appropriate. Some formats were chosen for practicality, some for aesthetics, and some simply because we could. The through-line was always the music, regardless of what it was pressed, burned, or formatted onto. If you're curious about what you can get your music distributed on, just walk into a promo product supply org, or a printing company, and ask then what they can do for you. Google custom and novelty USB sticks and prepare to be amazed.
Artist Services: Distribution, Booking, PR and More
Under the RZRecords umbrella, collective members and collaborating artists have access to event booking, PR, branding, design-to-print services and other types of support required by independent artists. The thinking was straightforward: interesting work deserves infrastructure, even when, especially when, the people making it don't have access to any. RZR was built to be that infrastructure, constructed from scratch and offered freely to artists whose work belonged in the conversations we were having.
RZR has also provided representation and served as an agent for roster artists pursuing festival bookings, live shows, gallery exhibitions, art biennials, compilation slots, high-profile collaborations, radio airplay, TV appearances, and label reprints. We've helped artists land in places they wouldn't have otherwise, not because we had industry connections, but because we were persistent, organized, and genuinely believed in what we were submitting. Confidence goes a long way.
RZRecords Today: International Experimental Music Distribution
As of 2020, RZRecords primarily serves as recording facilitator, digital distributor and online marketer for current roster artists. The shape of the operation has evolved, but the underlying logic hasn't: make sure the music gets out, make sure someone hears it, and make sure the artists making it have whatever support we're able to offer. The active personnel are currently scattered across several countries, giving RZR a genuine international reach into scenes and communities that a single-city operation never could. At any given moment, someone in the collective is awake and probably listening to something strange.
We have released and collaborated with artists from Ukraine, the Netherlands, Serbia, Canada, Russia, Japan, the Philippines, the Canary Islands, Israel, Poland, and basements everywhere that don't appear on maps.
We've been ruining perfectly good silence since the early 00s, one floppy disk, one CD-R, one ungovernable noise release at a time. Twenty-something years of music nobody asked for, made by people who couldn't help themselves, for audiences who wouldn't have it any other way. Still here. Still loud. Still non-profit.
