New Jersey Indie Rock label Mint 400 Records has never shy-ed away from trying out new things. Such as when they launched Mint 400 Books in 2016 and brought some amazing short form audio books to Spotify and other services. Titles like “Ballad Of The Small Talker” by Chris Churchill and Sam Carradori’s “Pocket Dive” were well received. The label also tried it’s hand at comedy with comedian Jamie Campbell’s release “Tell Me That You’re Proud Of Me”, which topped the iTunes comedy charts. Well now the label is once again branching out from the Indie Rock & Indie Folk world to bring fans something new, a sub-label of jazz and instrumental songs titled Raining Music. The label’s name was chosen by Sabatino’s 7 year old daughter Enid when asked what she would name her jazz record label and without hesitation she said “Raining Music”.
When we sat down with label owner Neil Sabatino he expressed that this is just a simple division like how there would be genre sections at your local record store. An easy way for fans of the label to distinguish releases that are indie based in one section and jazz leaning or cinematic instrumental music being the other section. This new sub-label as well will serve as an outlet for many of the bands already on the roster to release side-project and instrumental music all in one place, where as before it became cumbersome to include everyone’s releases under the main umbrella.
The Funky JC's
Why the division? Sabatino said succinctly mostly to create an outlet for musicians on the label, a handful of which, including his Fairmont band-mate Christian Kissala have jazz backgrounds and have created plenty of music that soon will see the light of day. As well the label is expected to search out specific sync licensing deals that are more aligned with this format of songwriting.
The label has already re-designated a handful of artists to be the face of the instrumental label like Tim Carman & The Street 45s, Defend The Rhino, The Mosquitos, r|verghxst and even Sabatino’s solo work. Much more is on the way soon including new signing The Funky JC’s, a band from Jersey City with a jazz funk swagger. Their newest EP named 07307 for the Jersey City zip code it was created in will head up this endeavor on February 5th. Right now you can enjoy the very first track from this EP below and a playlist of instrumental music for new sub-label Raining Music.
- Sam Lowry, BMN Contributor