57 Drag City (record label) artists

Baby Dee is an American performance artist, multi-instrumentalist, and singer-songwriter from Cleveland, Ohio.

Meg Baird is an American musician based in San Francisco, California, United States, who, in addition to her solo career, is known as a founding member, lead vocalist, and drummer for Heron Oblivion, along with members from Assemble Head in Sunburst Sound and Comets on Fire. She was also a guitarist and the lead female vocalist in Philadelphia psychedelic folk rock band Espers, and played drums in Philadelphia punk band Watery Love. Baird frequently collaborates with the Los Angeles-based harpist Mary Lattimore.

Bastro was an American post-hardcore band which was active in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The band's main line-up consisted of David Grubbs on guitar, Clark Johnson on bass guitar, and John McEntire on drums. The band also experimented with use of piano, organ and musique concrète compositions, foreshadowing McEntire's and Grubbs' subsequent musical projects.

David Cloud Berman was an American musician, singer and poet. In 1989, he founded the indie rock band Silver Jews with Stephen Malkmus and Bob Nastanovich. He was the only constant member during the band's career which concluded in 2009 following their sixth and final album Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea (2008). He provided the band's characteristic lyricism and, with Malkmus, the simple country-rock sound they developed from their early lo-fi recordings.

Broadcast were an English electronic band formed in Birmingham in 1995 by Trish Keenan and James Cargill (bass). Their musical style blended elements of 1960s American psychedelia with experimental electronica, incorporating samples from various sources, and earned the band a cult following.

Bill Callahan is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist who has also recorded and performed under the band name Smog. Callahan began working in the lo-fi genre of underground rock, with home-made tape-albums recorded on four-track tape recorders. Later he began releasing albums with the label Drag City, to which he remains signed today.

Laura Cantrell is a country singer-songwriter and DJ from Nashville, Tennessee.

Ben Chasny is an American indie rock and psychedelic folk guitarist. His primary projects are Six Organs of Admittance and Comets on Fire.

Damon & Naomi are an American dream pop/indie folk duo, formed in 1991 by Damon Krukowski and Naomi Yang, formerly of Galaxie 500.

Dope Body is an American rock band from Baltimore, Maryland, United States. They formed in 2008 by vocalist Andrew Laumann, guitarist/bassist Zachary Utz, and drummer David Jacober. They released four albums in addition to a cassette tape and two split records. They expanded to a quartet, adding bassist Jesse Lyell in 2011, who was replaced by John Jones, late of local contemporaries Roomrunner, the next year.

Espers was an American psychedelic folk band from Philadelphia, United States, that was part of the emerging indie folk scene. They formed in 2002 as a trio of singer-songwriter Greg Weeks, Meg Baird and Brooke Sietinsons but later expanded to a sextet including Otto Hauser, Helena Espvall and Chris Smith. Their music is reminiscent of late-sixties British folk as well as many contemporary folk acts. Most of the band's members have also featured on recordings by a number of other folk artists such as Nick Castro and Vashti Bunyan and as a result have become an important part of the psychedelic folk revival.

Helena Espvall is a Swedish-American musician noted for her participation in the post-millennial psychedelic folk and free improv scenes. Her primary instruments are cello, guitar and voice.

John Aloysius Fahey was an American fingerstyle guitarist and composer who played the steel-string acoustic guitar as a solo instrument. His style has been enormously influential and has been described as the foundation of the genre of American primitive guitar, a term borrowed from painting and referring mainly to the self-taught nature of the music and its minimalist style. Fahey borrowed from the folk and blues traditions in American roots music, having compiled many forgotten early recordings in these genres. He would later incorporate 20th-century classical, Portuguese, Brazilian, and Indian influences into his work.

Faun Fables is an American band from Oakland, California. Faun Fables is a concept and vehicle for Dawn McCarthy, who was inspired to write the original material while traveling after leaving the New York City music scene in 1997. Faun Fables also covers 20th century compositions by other songwriters and traditional folk songs. The music on the first album is entirely by McCarthy, as are all lyrics and most of the music on Mother Twilight. All albums except for the first are collaborations with Nils Frykdahl, inspired by McCarthy's previous work and "Dawn the Faun" stage persona.

Christian Fennesz is an Austrian producer and guitarist active in electronic music since the 1990s, often credited simply by his last name. His work utilizes guitar and laptop computers to blend melody with treated samples and glitch production. He lives and works in Vienna, and currently records on the UK label Touch.

Flying Saucer Attack is an English experimental space rock band formed in Bristol in 1992, led by songwriter David Pearce. Rachel Brook of Movietone was a member during the band's early incarnation; other musicians contributing to the group's recordings and live performances included Rocker, Matt Elliott and Sam Jones.

The Frogs were an American rock music band founded in 1980, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, by brothers Jimmy and Dennis Flemion. The brothers mainly wrote and performed short, catchy pop songs, but they are also known for their improvised home recordings which are delivered in a comedic style, and often include controversial issues such as race, religion, and sexuality. A history of strife has hindered the band, although a devoted fan base that includes many well-known musicians has supported the group.

David Grubbs is an American composer, guitarist, pianist, and vocalist. He was a founding member of Squirrel Bait, Bastro, and Gastr del Sol. He has also played in Codeine, The Red Krayola, Bitch Magnet and The Wingdale Community Singers.

Half Japanese is an American art punk band formed by brothers Jad and David Fair around 1975, sometime after the family's relocation to Uniontown, Maryland. Their original instrumentation included a small drum set, which they took turns playing; vocals; and an out-of-tune, distorted guitar. Both Fair brothers sang, although over time Jad moved into the frontman role. As of the last several releases since the 1990s, according to the album and CD credits, the band composes and plays the entirety of the music while Fair, eschewing his role as guitarist from earlier albums, plays almost no guitar but is responsible for the vocals and lyrics, which typically divide into either "love songs or monster songs." The band members are John Sluggett (guitar), Gilles-Vincent Rieder (drums), Jason Willett (bass), Mick Hobbs (guitar), and Jad Fair.

Neil Hamburger is a fictional standup comedian and singer that was created by Australian-American entertainer Gregg Turkington. Distinguished for his misanthropic jokes and anti-comedy style, Turkington has released a number of albums as Hamburger and has appeared as the character in various films, television shows, and other media. In 2015, the act inspired the feature-length film Entertainment, which stars Turkington as a "variant" of the character.

The High Llamas are an Anglo-Irish avant-pop band formed in London circa 1991. They were founded by singer-songwriter Sean O'Hagan, formerly of Microdisney, with drummer Rob Allum and ex-Microdisney bassist Jon Fell. O'Hagan has led the group since its formation. Their music is often compared to the Beach Boys, a band he acknowledges as an influence, although more prominent influences were drawn from bossa nova and European film soundtracks.

The Howling Hex is an American rock band founded by guitarist Neil Hagerty.

Herbert Jansch was a Scottish folk musician and founding member of the band Pentangle. He was born in Glasgow and came to prominence in London in the 1960s as an acoustic guitarist and singer-songwriter. He recorded at least 25 albums and toured extensively from the 1960s to the 21st century.

Henry Kaiser is an American guitarist and composer, known as an idiosyncratic soloist, a sideman, an ethnomusicologist, and a film score composer. Recording and performing prolifically in many styles of music, Kaiser is a fixture on the San Francisco Bay Area music scene. He is considered a member of the "second generation" of American free improvisers. He is married to Canadian artist Brandy Gale. He is the son of Henry J. Kaiser Jr. and the grandson of industrialist Henry J. Kaiser.

Emmett Kelly is an American singer, songwriter and guitarist from Van Nuys, California. He is the primary songwriter and recording artist of The Cairo Gang, one half of The Double alongside drummer Jim White, one third of The CIA and a founding member of Clinamen. He has contributed vocal and instrumental work to a variety of international musical projects, appearing on recordings by the likes of Bonnie "Prince" Billy, Ty Segall, Angel Olsen, Azita, Joan of Arc, Edith Frost, Women and Children, John Webster Johns, Jeff Harms, Chicago poet/singer Marvin Tate, Matteah Baim, Japanese musician Takuma Watanabe, Earth Girl Helen Brown, Joshua Abrams and Rob Mazurek. Kelly has toured in several of the aforementioned acts in addition to with Baby Dee, CFM, Mikal Cronin, Sonny Smith, Beth Orton, and Terry Reid; and in other instances, performed live with Chan Marshall, Scott Tuma, Joan of Arc, and Pillars and Tongues. He is also one half of the band The Surf, The Sundried, and a founding member of Chicago's Psychojail.

Alan Licht is an American guitarist and composer, whose work combines elements of pop, noise, free jazz and minimalism. He is also a writer and journalist.

Stephen Joseph Malkmus is an American musician best known as the primary songwriter, lead singer and guitarist of the indie rock band Pavement. He currently performs with Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks and as a solo artist.

Merzbow is a Japanese noise project started in 1979 by Masami Akita . Merzbow is best known for a style of harsh, confrontational noise. Since 1980, Akita has released over 400 recordings and has collaborated with various artists.

Jason Andrew Molina was an American musician and singer-songwriter. Raised in northern Ohio, he came to prominence performing and recording as Songs: Ohia, both in solo projects and with a rotating cast of musicians in the late 1990s. Beginning in 2003, he would garner a further indie following for his releases with the band Magnolia Electric Co.

Monotonix were a garage rock band from Tel Aviv, Israel. The band — singer Ami Shalev, guitarist Yonatan Gat, and drummer Ran Shimoni — released their debut EP in 2008 and toured mostly in the United States and Europe, including notable appearances at SXSW. Monotonix subsequently released two full-length records: Where Were You When It Happened? and Not Yet. Over the span of five years, Monotonix played 1000 shows. They were famously dubbed, "the most exciting live band in rock 'n' roll" by Spin Magazine. The band is also noted as guitarist and co-founder Yonatan Gat's first band.

Movietone is an English post-rock band. They formed in Bristol, England in 1994. Core members are Kate Wright and Rachel Brook, with Wright being the main songwriter.

Joanna Caroline Newsom is an American multi-instrumentalist, singer-songwriter, and actress. Born in Northern California, Newsom was classically trained on the harp in her youth, and began her musical career as a keyboardist in the San Francisco–based indie band the Pleased.

Emma Louise Niblett, better known by the stage name Scout Niblett, is an English singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. Niblett debuted in 2001 with her first full-length studio album Sweet Heart Fever, and has gone on to release five more studio albums. In 2013, Niblett released her sixth studio album, It's Up to Emma, which she mixed and produced.

Joseph Will Oldham is an American singer-songwriter and actor. From 1993 to 1997, he performed and recorded in collaboration with dozens of other musicians under variations of Palace. After briefly publishing music under his own name, in 1998 he adopted Bonnie "Prince" Billy as the name for most of his work.

Om is an American doom metal band from San Francisco, California. Formed as a duo in 2003 by the rhythm section of the band Sleep, Om is currently a trio consisting of Cisneros, Emil Amos (drums), and Tyler Trotter (guitar).

Jim O'Rourke is an American musician and record producer. He was long associated with the Chicago experimental and improv scene. Around 2000, he relocated to New York City before moving to Japan, where he currently resides. O’Rourke is best known for his numerous solo and collaborative projects, many of which are entirely instrumental, and for his tenure as a member of Sonic Youth from 1999 to 2005. He has released albums across varied genres, including singer-songwriter music, post-rock, ambient, noise music, and tape experiments.

David Pajo is an American alternative rock musician. He has played a wide variety of music, loosely fitting into several other genres such as hardcore punk, math rock, post-rock, electronica, folk rock and indie pop. Though a multi-instrumentalist, he is best known for his guitar work.

Pavement was an American indie rock band that formed in Stockton, California, in 1989. For most of their career, the group consisted of Stephen Malkmus, Scott Kannberg, Mark Ibold (bass), Steve West (drums) and Bob Nastanovich. Initially conceived as a recording project, the band at first avoided press or live performances, while attracting considerable underground attention with their early releases. Gradually evolving into a more polished band, Pavement recorded five full-length albums and ten EPs over the course of their decade-long career, though they disbanded with some acrimony in 1999 as the members moved on to other projects. In 2010, they undertook a well-received reunion tour, with another reunion tour across Europe scheduled for 2022.

The Red Krayola is an American underground rock band from Houston, Texas, formed in 1966 by the original trio of singer/guitarist Mayo Thompson, drummer Frederick Barthelme, and bassist Steve Cunningham.

The Renderers are a New Zealand band from Christchurch formed in 1989 by Maryrose Crook and her husband Brian.

Alasdair Roberts is a Scottish folk musician. He released a number of albums under the name Appendix Out and, following the 2001 album The Night Is Advancing, under his own name. Roberts is also known for his frequent collaborations with other musicians and writers, as well as for being a member of the folk supergroup The Furrow Collective.

Royal Trux is an American alternative rock band active from 1987 to 2001, and which reunited in 2015. It was founded by Neil Hagerty and Jennifer Herrema (vocals).

Shellac is an American indie rock band from Chicago, Illinois, composed of Steve Albini, Bob Weston and Todd Trainer and formed in 1992. Their music genre has been classified as post-hardcore and noise rock but they describe themselves as a "minimalist rock trio."

Silver Jews were an American indie rock band from New York City, formed in 1989 by David Berman along with Pavement's Stephen Malkmus and Bob Nastanovich. Throughout, Berman was the only constant band member. During the last few albums, Cassie Berman became a regular member of the band. They disbanded in 2009.

Six Organs of Admittance is the primary musical project of American guitarist Ben Chasny. Chasny's music is largely guitar-based and is often considered new folk; however, it includes obvious influences, marked by the use of drones, chimes, and eclectic percussive elements. He records albums for Drag City and Holy Mountain, among other labels.

Squirrel Bait was an American punk rock band from Louisville, Kentucky active from 1983 to 1987. Squirrel Bait's dense, moody, melodic hardcore sound, featuring pronounced tempo shifts, foreshadowed the grunge sound of the late 1980s as well as math rock. Squirrel Bait, along with Hüsker Dü, are often noted as precursors to the emocore sound that arose from the D.C. hardcore punk scene with bands like Rites of Spring, Beefeater and Fugazi.Squirrel Bait signaled the second coming of American punk - bands of little brothers and sisters who got to grow up on Black Flag and Hüsker Dü without a preparatory course in Supertramp. ... Like a hundred other little Düs across the country, Squirrel Bait managed to make a couple of records before spintering off to form five more bands. Unlike most of that punk rock loam, the members of Squirrel Bait chewed up their legacy and shat out something curious and consequential.

Stereolab are an English-French avant-pop band formed in London in 1990. Led by the songwriting team of Tim Gane and Lætitia Sadier, the group's music combines influences from krautrock, lounge and 1960s pop music, often incorporating a repetitive motorik beat with heavy use of vintage electronic keyboards and female vocals sung in English and French. Their lyrics have political and philosophical themes influenced by the Surrealist and Situationist movements. On stage, they play in a more feedback-driven and guitar-oriented style. The band also draw from funk, jazz and Brazilian music, and were one of the first artists to be dubbed "post-rock". They are regarded among the most innovative and influential groups of the 1990s.

Ian F Svenonius is an American musician and singer of various Washington, D.C.-based punk bands including Nation of Ulysses, The Make-Up, Weird War, XYZ, Escape-ism, and Chain and The Gang. Between his numerous projects, Svenonius has released more than 22 full-length albums and over 20 singles, EPs, and splits. A published author and online talk show host, Svenonius' projects share a tongue-in-cheek, radical left political ideology.

Matt Sweeney is an American guitarist, vocalist, and producer best known known as a guitarist of Skunk, Chavez, and supergroup Zwan.

Mayo Thompson is an American musician and visual artist best known as the leader of the avant-garde rock band Red Krayola.

Jeffrey Scot Tweedy is an American songwriter, musician, author, and record producer best known as the singer and guitarist of the band Wilco. Tweedy, originally from Belleville, Illinois, started his music career in high school in his band The Plebes with Jay Farrar, which subsequently transitioned into the alternative country band Uncle Tupelo. After Uncle Tupelo broke up Tweedy formed Wilco which found critical and commercial success, most notably with Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and A Ghost Is Born, the latter of which received a Grammy for Best Alternative Album in 2005.

U.S. Maple was an American noise rock band. The group formed in Chicago in 1995. The band consists of Al Johnson, Mark Shippy (guitarist), Pat Samson (drummer), and Todd Rittmann (guitarist).

Noel Scott Engel better known by the stage name Scott Walker, was a British-American singer-songwriter, composer and record producer who resided in England. Walker was known for his baritone voice and an unorthodox career path which took him from 1960s teen pop icon to 21st-century avant-garde musician. Walker's success was largely in the United Kingdom, where his first four solo albums reached the top ten. He lived in the UK from 1965 and became a UK citizen in 1970.

Wand is an American psychedelic rock band from Los Angeles, California, United States, formed in 2013. The band consists of Cory Hanson, Sofia Arreguin, Robert Cody (guitar), Lee Landey (bass) and Evan Burrows (drums).

Weird War, briefly known as Scene Creamers, is an indie rock band based out of Washington, D.C.. The current lineup consists of Ian Svenonius on vocals, Michelle Mae on bass guitar, Alex Minoff on guitar, and Sebastian Thomson on drums.

White Magic is a psychedelic folk rock group formed in Brooklyn, New York City, and led by singer/guitarist/pianist/composer Mira Billotte. Billotte performs under this moniker both with accompaniment or solo, using a daf, shruti box, and singing a cappella. Invoking both traditional and experimental folk, White Magic's sound ranges from loud psychedelia to meditative trance.

Michael Yonkers is an American rock musician from Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. His work has been praised for its groundbreaking and highly experimental nature; Cole Alexander of psychedelic-rock band Black Lips said that Yonkers “kind of invented noise and drone guitar techniques," stating further that "when you think of how The Who, Jimi Hendrix and The Velvet Underground were pushing feedback at the time, he was more extreme than all three combined in terms of what he was doing.” However, his work did not reach a wide audience until decades after he began recording, due in part to a debilitating spinal injury that kept him in constant, lifelong pain.