The ACC Records Project

Everyone remembers the first ACC record they heard

Note: I don’t think I’ve written much about this project on Substack or in my newsletter before, but I’ve shared it here and here on my blog. Some of that writing I’m bringing here, along with a bit more about the project more broadly.

An internet search won’t tell you much about ACC Records. It probably won’t even tell you what ACC stands for. Some sources claim it means Astral Cartographers Collective, others Acoustic Collage Club. I’ve also read that it stands for the initials of the founders, though who exactly they were is surprisingly hard to establish. What I can say, is that ACC Records was a wildly influential music label that only a fortunate few have heard of. The ACC Records Project seeks to change that, to bring, if not the music, at least the art of the album covers to a wider audience.

As far as we know, ACC‘s first pressings appeared in the early 60s when the label could be described as part vanity project and part social experiment. Liner notes mention chance meetings in art school, and encounters with what was at the time called „world music“, which was basically anything not from the US or UK. It can only be assumed that the liner notes, and everything around the LPs themselves was a bit of a prank. From one album to another it’s unclear what’s the name of the band and what’s the name of the record, or whether that was important at all.

What was important, in a time when browsing music meant flipping through hundreds of 12” square posters all stacked up in long rows, was that the LP caught your eye. The design of a record cover was serious business, and (good) labels encouraged groundbreaking, exciting work. Greats like Reid Miles, Peter Saville, and Alex Steinweiss (all pictured below) are responsible for covers that still resonate today.

The ACC Records covers resonate to modern eyes as well, though the story behind them is just beginning to be told.

I’ll continue showing pieces from my collection here and (in higher resolution) on my blog, aiming towards a publication of some sort, sometime after I finish the Kickstarter zine I mentioned in my last newsletter.

If anyone knows more about these records or ACC, drop me a line. Feel free to share the post & images widely (with attribution, please), so that the work of the ACC artists lives on, even as the label has faded into obscurity.