Backspace Records

It’s happening everywhere in the music industry these days. Eager to get their music out there to the masses, ambitious independent DIY artists are launching labels, finding their own distribution and are collectively establishing a new model by which everyone’s doing business in the latter Aligning with their business partner Mack Lindsey, the dynamic husband and wife team of Ben and Kimberly Rowell is leaping full force into the fray with their exciting and eclectic new Backspace Records, an Atlanta based indie label dedicated to, as their mission statement reads, developing artists musically while giving them the chance to succeed financially. Rather than growing Backspace as a niche label, their goal is to have a roster of diverse artists and niche each one of them. The twist is that Ben Rowell didn’t launch Backspace to help promote his own band—in fact, he did it in the aftermath of Big Sky’s breakup after 12 years as one of Gainesville, Florida’s most popular rock outfits. Big Sky sold over units while performing regularly everywhere from Miami to New Orleans to Boston. In later years, Rowell saw himself, his bandmates and too many other artists being abused by their labels and managers, and decided his two options were to either become jaded and quit music, or turn that anger and frustration into the next chapter in his unique career. The choice he and Kimberly made is great news for the indie music world in general and specifically for the handful of unique artists that Backspace is beginning to present to the world: rocker Mark Gaignard & The Also Ran, young Atlanta based singer/songwriter Brandon Swift, Kindie-rockers The Baby Grands and Guitar Red, a veteran bluesman who has made his living for years “busking” (the cool, British term for “street performing”) in and around downtown Atlanta.