Prime Cuts: An Illustrated Barn Records Singles Discography

Chris Selby & Ian Edmundson

★★★★

Noize Books & Recordings, £39.99 ISBN 9798870783765, 343 pages Chas Chandler’s late

70s imprint in Barnstorming detail

There can be few ‘indie’ labels as unloved as Barn.

Set up by Chas Chandler as a publishing company in the early 70s, by 1976, Chandler’s dream of running his own record label came true, buoyed up by the commercial success of Slade. Like a working man’s Apple, Barn established itself at 35 Portland Place, the former

IBC studios in London. There were no grand illusions, however, just a desire to make hits. Distributed through Polydor, its tenure coincided with the commercial nosedive of

Slade, so there wasn’t even a cash cow to keep it afloat. Its mixture of seasoned old timers (Medicine Head, The Animals) were among new Chandler discoveries, such as Brian Parrish and Nick Van Eede. Barn even had the obligatory punk turn, The Depressions. Yet these tunes could not get arrested if they tried. Slade released some of the most interesting singles of their career on the label: Give Us A Goal – terrace rock; Rock’n’roll Bolero – Slade go disco; and the Elvis tribute My Baby Left Me, which at No 34 was the highest any Barn release got in the charts.

Barn ended as an independent through Pinnacle before dissolving in 1980. Chris Selby and Ian

Edmonson have produced another Noize publication full of label, sleeve and release info; creating the sort of book that the authors themselves want on their shelves. In the end, the true success of Barn was Nick Van Eede, who, within a decade, would be No 1 in America with his band Cutting Crew and

(I Just) Died In Your Arms. Daryl Easlea