Secretly Group Execs Acquire 50% of Merge Records from Co-Founder Laura Ballance

(l to r) Secretly Group co-founders Phil Waldorf, Darius Van Arman, Ben Swanson, and Chris Swanson. Photo Credit: Anna Powell Denton

Secretly Group execs have acquired 50% of indie label Merge Records, from which co-founder and co-president Laura Ballance is stepping away.Bloomington-based Secretly announced the investment and the related executive departure today. Beginning with the former, Secretly’s formal release indicates that the aforementioned execs and co-founders (Ben and Chris Swanson, Darius Van Arman, and Phil Waldorf), not the label group itself, took the Merge stake.

Also as laid out by Secretly, this stake represents one component of “a new partnership” with 36-year-old Merge, which has been utilizing Secretly Distribution outside North America for about 13 years.

Besides parting with a 50% Merge interest and stepping down from the label, Ballance is exiting the music business altogether.

“It was never my goal to start a record label when I was 21 and run it for the rest of my life,” the Superchunk founding member elaborated of the decision. “I have been doing this for 36 years now. Life is short. There are other things I have always wanted to do: make more art, travel for fun, volunteer more, write a book and lots of other things that being so entrenched in running a business does not allow me to do.

“Merge Records started as a literal bedroom label, in my bedroom, and lived there for a few years before we were able to give it some space of its own. It has always been a labor of love. I am going to miss it and all the people and bands tremendously,” she concluded.

Meanwhile, fellow co-founder and Superchunk member Mac McCaughan is expected to stay aboard as president and A&R head.So is longtime employee Christina Rentz (albeit as label director), with marketing director Jamie Beck and digital head Wilson Fuller likewise remaining in place.

Bearing those points in mind, Merge – the roster of which features Jade Hairpins, The Mountain Goats, Rosali, and Mary Timony, to name some – is poised to “continue to run as a standalone label out of Durham.”

With that said, Merge is also set to leverage not just Secretly Distribution, but the overarching Secretly’s accounting, royalty, business-affairs, licensing, IT, and HR capabilities, the involved parties communicated. Superchunk’s Songs in the Key of Yikes (teed up to release on August 22nd) will mark “the first new album to be distributed worldwide by Secretly.”

More immediately, the past two days have now delivered three high-profile label deals: Exceleration officially owns Cooking Vinyl, and Prosthetic Records is part of MNRK Music Group.