Cockroach Media was started in January of 2009, by industry veteran Jimmy White. The company was created out of complete frustration and disgust with the state of the record business. After being laid off from Universal after 15 years of service, he had spent a good part of the early 2000’s bouncing around from indie to indie. In late 2008, Jimmy started to realize that his current employer, CBuJ Distribution was destined to fail. CBuJ had been created two years earlier out of the ashes of Bayside Distribution (Tower Records).
“Many of the artists got crushed and never recovered from the Bayside collapse,” said White. “It was these experiences that lead me to where I am today, and it all started with two label that I stole from CBuJs and a Duff McKagan LP. Some of Our first releases were from hardcore vets like JFA, Government Issue and TSOL. I also decided to launch my own vinyl label by licensing a recent Duff McKagan (Guns N Roses) release and pressing it up for the masses.”
Between April of 2009 and January 1st of 2010, the group had released over 150 titles and swelled to 20 or so labels. Many of the labels were artist owned. Keeping it small and manageable was officially out the window.
By 2011, the labels in the group started to attract upper level national artists like Fishbone, The Adicts, Hellbound Glory, Reno Divorce, Down By Law, and Richie Ramone. Last year CRM hit another mile stone with the addition of multiple Grammy winning artist Gordon Goodwin and his Music of Content label to the family. Gordon’s previous albums have SoundScans over 100k units.
Today there are over 25 labels and 250+ releases in the family.
FEATURED RELEASES (click below to see all):
