Morris Ballen, Who Helped Spread Indie Artists Music, Dies at 88

Morris Ballen, whose company, Disc Makers, manufactured small runs of high-quality vinyl records, cassettes and CDs, offering a critical service to countless punk rockers, rappers, church choirs and garage bands who made music without the backing of a major label, died on Sept.21 at his home in Philadelphia.

He was 88.His daughter Anne Ballen Ladenson confirmed the death.Especially in the days before digital music, independent artists faced a challenge: They needed to get physical copies of their music into the hands of their fans, but they couldn’t afford — and didn’t need — the massive production runs offered by major manufacturers.Enter Mr.Ballen and Disc Makers.

His one-stop shop, in a factory outside Philadelphia, provided everything a musician required, including mastering, graphic design and vinyl (and later cassette and CD) pressing, sometimes just a few hundred units at a time.He also offered free bar codes, so artists could sell their music in record stores, as well as marketing assistance like posters and fliers.“Disc Makers gave musicians agency to create something on their own, independently,” said Mick Chorba, the singer-songwriter for the New Jersey-based indie rock band the Successful Failures, who has been using Disc Makers for decades.The company and its predecessor, the Ballen Record Co., has been around since the 1940s.But it came into its own in the 1980s, as the declining cost of production equipment and the D.I.Y.

aesthetic of underground music made Disc Makers a favorite for punk and hip-hop artists.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe....