Founded by producer Aaron Sixx, in 1978. Sixx had formed 'Rainbow Record Productions' towards the end of 1977 but it ran into legal difficulties during an attempt to issue records under the 'Rainbow' name, and managed only a couple of singles - see 'Rainbow (RAIS prefix)'. Aura appears to have been a relacement for that ill-fated label. 'Music Week' of the 29th of April 1978 reported that Sixx had formed another company, Aura, and that a distribution deal had been signed with Anchor Records (q.v.), who had been handling Rainbow. Product that had been intended for release on Rainbow eventually surfaced on Aura; records mentioned by 'Music Week' of the 4th of April 1978 as forthcoming Rainbows but which ended up on Aura included ones by Trapeze, the Beaver Brothers and Annette Peacock.
When Anchor closed down, in March 1979, Aura signed a licensing deal with Pye; the terms of the deal included it keeping its own label identity ('MW', 31st March). The company's products seem to have been Rock orientated; stalwarts such as Allan Clarke, Nico, and Steve Marriott all recorded for it, as did many lesser-known artists. Despite having a lot of talent on its books Aura never registered any Singles Chart successes, but it did well enough to survive into 1989. Singles were numbered in the AUS-100s; AUS-150 came out in 1986. Despite the evidence of the catalogue numbers of the scans, the brown label (1) was the earlier of the two; it seems to have been used on all the 1970s issues apart from the particular Annette Peacock single shown. The black label (2) was mainly used in the 1980s. The discography below only covers the 1970s.
Copyright 2006 Robert Lyons.