Third Culture Entertainment launches Export Quality Records with a debut release from pelle

Just earlier this week, India’s reigning disco night Dynamite Disco Club announced its evolution into a record label that focuses on house and disco, making it a one of a kind imprint front the subcontinent.

Today, another beautiful silver lining of the pandemic is at play again. Also from India, Third Culture Entertainment has announced the birth of Export Quality Records which launched today.

Initially set up as an agency that managed, developed and toured artists in India — including Mura Masa, Kamasi Washington and Little Dragon — it only made sense for Tej Brar and his team at Third Culture Entertainment to take on a label operation.

The label intends to bare a wide space as an artist platform, and they’ll be reaching far outside of their own agency for the right artists to collaborate and release with. Tej breaks down the label’s focus, “Third Culture has always strived to enable the exchange of art across borders - whether through our management clients, the festivals we produce, as well as the international artists we've toured across India. Over the years, we've distributed countless records as an add-on service to our management clients. Now, with Export Quality Records, we enter our next chapter — attempting to build a vehicle for the export of contemporary Indian music, across genres to a much wider global audience.”

The first release comes from Adhityan R aka pelle from Chennai. Armed with an eclectic sound palette, the self-taught producer incorporates a multitude of soundscapes with his glitchy perception of electronica — it might be early days, but the label has already vouched for him as a prolific producer. Intelligent beat-driven music is something we simply can’t say no to — pelle hits the mark and Export Quality have more than suitably selected the right artist behind their debut release.

Export Quality Records has already secured an ongoing slew of releases, with pelle dropping in as the first. We can tell you that some of the other artists you can expect to hear from include Frame/Frame, Clifr and RANJ. Tej comments on the future of the roster, “I've been completely blown away by some of the demos we've received and the hope is that eventually, artists look forward to releasing on Export Quality just like they would with an international label. The label is open to all artists, not just Third Culture management clients.”

pelle’s first single ‘High Spirits’ will drop on August 20, ahead of the full-length album ‘The Rest is Noise’ a week later on August 27. Check out 'High Spirits' below.