An independent company from the Punk / New Wave years, Parole was based in Newburgh Street, London W1 and was owned by Alan Hauser. Its first release was a four-track EP by Raped, 'Pretty Paedophiles', which came out in January 1978 and had a catalogue number of KNIT-1. KNIT-1 was followed in September by PURL-1, a single by Raped, 'Cheap Night Out' b/w 'Foreplay Foreground'. Singles by The Four Kings and Disturbed followed, again with PURL numbers, after which Parole forged close links with Alex Howe's 'Fresh' label (q.v.). Records which were co-operative ventures between the two companies were given labels with horizontal stripes and dual PURL-0 and FRESH-0 catalogue numbers (2); later releases were made in France and had injection moulded labels. Parole's solo issues had a design which featured arrows and mesh netting (1) and came in a different colour for each release. The covers of PURL-5 / FRESH-7 and PURL-8 / FRESH-11 said that Fresh had licensed the tracks and was responsible for distribution. The final record to come out of the Parole / Fresh link-up was FRESH-20 / PURL-9, 'Astral Joe' b/w 'Slow Down' by Cuddly Toys, which appears to have come out in the last quarter of 1980. Fresh continued to put records out after that but Parole seems to have played no more part in the record business. ZigZag's 'Small Labels Catalogue '78' gave the distributors of the two Raped records as Rough Trade and other independents. Thanks to John Timmis for the first scan and to Robert Bowes for the second.
Copyright 2006 Robert Lyons.