John Cook: Our Noise

When John Cook opens the 11th chapter in Our Noise, “If there is a quintessential Merge band aside from Superchunk, it is Lambchop,” it becomes instantly clear what this book is.

If the prior 226 pages hadn’t suggested as much, this is not a bloated account of Merge Records set to please Arcade Fire fans. This is the real history of Merge.

Released as part of the now Durham-based (yes, not Chapel Hill) label’s year-long 20th-anniversary celebration, Our Noise is an engaging look at one of the area’s and music industry’s most exciting ventures. Co-written with label (and Superchunk) founders/owners Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan, the book is more a transcription and compilation of interviews than a written history. Cook thoroughly researched Merge, accumulating a bevy of interviews ranging from artists like Britt Daniel and Claudia Gonson to Fugazi’s Ian MacKaye, and incorporating the occasional essay by the likes of Joshua Ferris. Sadly, if expectedly, the Jeff Mangum interview is nowhere to be found.

Cook spends the early chapters focusing on the founding of Merge and Superchunk, detailing McCaughan’s dreadlock-wearing year off from Columbia and Ballance’s Goth days as the apple of the Chapel Hill scene’s eye. Superchunk plays as big a role as Merge in the book, the band’s and the business’ histories intrinsically linked. This parallel creates some of Our Noise’s most interesting parts, including Ballance and McCaughan’s break-up that almost ended the band. Cook and his co-authors also don’t shy away from bad business moments like the label’s shaky dissolution with longtime ally Touch and Go Records. But it’s not all grit and dirty secrets. The book, subtitled The Indie Label That Got Big and Stayed Small, praises the label. As any other like-minded Chapel Hill resident would agree, all praise is due.

Interspersed between the pure history are profiles of essential Merge artists, from the Magnetic Fields and Arcade Fire to Butterglory and Lambchop—some more interesting than others. Spoon’s tale of major label demise turned indie sensation, for example, is nothing new, nor is Arcade Fire’s meteoric rise to fame that helped Merge become so viable. But the first-hand accounts from the label owners and artists are enjoyable reads, if only for the most dedicated fans. And profiles of lesser-knowns like Lambchop and Matt Suggs provide an interesting glimpse into the bands that helped define Merge.

Our Noise might only be for Merge “suckers” like Ryan Adams and myself, but for such people it’s required reading.