Rough Trade Publishing

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Rough Trade Publishing
Founded	1991
Founder	Peter Walmsley Cathi Gibson
Genre	Alternative
Country of origin	United Kingdom
Location	United Kingdom
Official website	http://www.rough-trade.com

Rough Trade Publishing is a UK based music publishing company, owned by Peter Walmsley and Cathi Gibson. Walmsley and Gibson originally ran Rough Trade Music, part of the Rough Trade Group, and set up on their own in June 1991 after Rough Trade Distribution went into liquidation and the Group split up. The company is totally separate from Rough Trade Records, although they share a musical ethos.

Gordon Gano of the Violent Femmes, originally signed to Rough Trade Music in 1986, followed Walmsley and Gibson to their new venture and has remained with them to this day, enriching their catalogue with the classic anthem Blister in the Sun. Their first new signing were Nottingham band Asphalt Ribbons, who became Tindersticks, and Peel favourites Trumans Water.

With a few notable exceptions in addition to Tindersticks (H2SO4, Meanwhile, back in Communist Russia...), Rough Trade Publishing's catalogue subsequently became an almost exclusively North American affair, melding some of the most innovative and acclaimed talents in independent music such as Rocket from the Crypt, Le Tigre, Tortoise, David Grubbs, Bill Callahan, Set Fire to Flames, Godspeed You! Black Emperor and more recently the Wrens and the Animal Collective, this slant making the company unique. They maintain a staunchly independent character, and believe in old-fashioned publishing values and personal relationships with all their writers.

In autumn 2006, Rough Trade released a commercial compilation album, Sweet Fifteen, to celebrate their fifteenth birthday. They show no sign of slowing down, recent signings demonstrating a bias towards the burgeoning talents emerging from Canada, such as Black Mountain, Owen Pallett (Final Fantasy) and Blood Meridian.