Alligator Records

When he couldn't get the boss interested, Iglauer used a $2,500 inheritance to finance the recording himself.

Then he founded a label to release it, Alligator Records, which is still in business.

Taylor's eponymous debut album became Alligator's first release in 1971.

From it, here's Give Me Back My Wig.

After I left that phase of the operation, I went into the shipping operation there and I was kind of running the warehouse and pick and pack.

And I inherited the Sugar Hill and the Alligator Records were two clients.

So, I mean, all the Sugar Hill bluegrass stuff, you know, Bill Monroe, Sam Grissman, you know, Ricky Skaggs.

This is I'm picking and packing this all day.

So curiosity, you're like, what's this? You know, what's that? You know, Alligator Records, all the old blue stuff.

So I don't know.

I feel like just kind of all those things and then, you know, mud kids and they all kind of just started to come together.

And that's what made me go out on the road.

All right, Ed, I was told I needed to ask you about your initial meeting with Alligator Records' Bruce Iglauer and how you came to work with the label.

The floor is yours.

Well, I was playing at a bar called Blues on Halstead.

So, you know, I always have that respect for him.

Yes, sir.

Speaking of Bruce and Alligator Records, word just came down a few weeks ago about the restructuring with Alligator and Acceleration Music.

How are you feeling about this move, Ed, and do you remain hopeful and dedicated to the label going forward?

So what other blues guys up in Chicago have you photographed?

Well, I work for a label called Alligator Records.

Sure.

Johnny Winter

So what other blues guys up in Chicago have you photographed?

Well, I work for a label called the Alligator Records.

Sure.

Johnny Winter

which was Peter Gabriel's label, and a really cool soundtrack called Lotto Land that came out on Stony Plain Records.

So I had those records, and then they switched to Alligator Records and put out a couple of records, a gospel album that Joe and Osborne produced on them, and an album called Speaking, well, that was called Speaking in Tongues.

And then they toured Europe frequently and I got to see him play in Zurich and I actually got to meet him and talk to them.

I still have the concert poster framed and signed in my office, which is kind of a... great and funny enough it kind of feels like a full circle moment now because everything that happened after meeting him that like kind of you

Here's, well, don't get mad at me, but this is the first one I grabbed.

It's the Alligator Records 50 Years of Music.

I got an old Luther Allison here, and I've got quite a collection.

Yeah.

And I always remember that day of meeting Bruce because he turned me on to that record, which is still one of my favorite records.

Well, I'm going to definitely look into that one.

But isn't it interesting, because I know that you had talked about this in an interview as well, and I know for a fact that Bruce Aglauer was working with Bob Kester for a while while he was starting Alligator Records.

Isn't it interesting that Bob never had a problem with people working for him and trying to start a label? Did he just feel like there was enough territory for everybody at that point?