one’s own room

OOR RECORDS was a cooperatively organized, collectively run record and art book shop at Anwandstrasse 30 in Zurich’s district 4. OOR RECORDS specialised in a predominantly experimental, contemporary vinyl and tape range, in editions and publications by independent labels and publishers, and was interested in the interface between discourse, art and experimental sound production, self-publishing and the practices and politics associated with it. OOR RECORDS aimed to question music categorisation and classification systems as hegemonic constructs and to think of the record shop in a more inclusive, poetic and permeable way. This was evident in the way the genre record shelves were handled. OOR Records deliberately dispensed with geographical classifications and abbreviated, essentialist categorizations, and attempted to make a different kind of searching and finding possible through fabulous, poetic categorization and multiple classifications, as well as through personal levels of mediation. The handling of the categories was a lively debate and was renegotiated, scrutinized and updated in the collective and with public discursive events. OOR RECORDS conceived of the record shop as a lively social space based on togetherness, as a place of mutual music and art mediation and a joyful, discursive exchange of knowledge. OOR RECORDS was a physical rehearsal space, a living, organic archive for the differentiated negotiations of hybrid sonic cultures.

Another part of OOR Records was the art bookshelf curated by edition fink/Georg Rutishauser, which continuously presented various art book publishers/self-publishing houses and their product ranges.

OOR Records would like to thank the diverse, interested and committed network that has grown over the years, the long-standing and loyal customers and the independent labels and self-publishers for their continuous support!