If you are an avid guitar-shredder or at least enjoy the art of that genre, you may know who Shrapnel Records is, but for those who don’t, they’re a instrumental-oriented label established in the early 80’s that has guitar-centric artists like Jason Becker, Marty Friedman, Paul Gilbert, and many other shredders in their roster.
The legendary label just announced the acquisition of their entire catalog by the film, music and video distribution company, The Orchard, who will handle the distribution of over 3000 songs owned by the label in digital and physical form. The best part of the deal is that one third of the 322 records included on the deal will be made available in digital form for the first time like Chris Duarte (Lucky 13), Paul Gilbert (Stone Pushing Uphill Man), and Indigenous (Time Is Coming).
Shrapnel’s founder, Mike Varney, says about the acquisition:
The distribution landscape has changed dramatically in the last ten years, requiring greater staffing with expertise in digital distribution, Although the Shrapnel Label Group will continue making new records, the expanded distribution and accompanying administration of the back catalog was something we felt could be best served by a larger company. As a pioneer in digital distribution with a tremendous track record of more than fifteen years, The Orchard was in a stronger position to effectively realize this for our catalog.”
The deal only involves Shrapnel’s music catalog and the label will continue releasing music as they always have. The massive catalog is digitally available right now on your favorite steaming service (Spotify, Google Play, Apple Music etc.), so if you don’t want to bust out the good old CD’s out of your dusty boxes, head over your favorite service and start playing some shred.
