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Laura Ballance

Co-founder, Merge Records · 1 appearance on the record.

computed by AI from the episodes · how this works → · full disclaimer →

founderentertainerexecutiveauthor@lauramerge ↗mergerecords.com ↗Wikipedia ↗

In 1989, Ballance co-founded the independent label Merge Records, releasing albums for acts including Arcade Fire, Spoon, and Neutral Milk Hotel. She has played bass for Superchunk since its inception and co-authored the 2009 book Our Noise.

12statements → 2claims → 2claims resolved → 3.67/5average certainty → 1.42/5average debate potential →

2 supported 0 partly supported 0 contradicted how the 2 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

2 assertions · 1 opinion · 4 insights · 2 disclosures · 3 what ifs · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertions are the 2 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 2 are resolved. Everything else (opinions, insights, what ifs, disclosures) can never be settled by the record, so it carries no assessment.

The record, in short

What the tape says about how Laura argues and how the claims held up. Everything they said, and everything said about them, is in the tabs below.

Their most notable supported claim

Assertion Supported
Ballance: Vinyl resurgence heavily supports artists, labels, and record stores
“But, you know, I think something else that has helped in the last seven to 10 years has been vinyl coming back. I wonder how many of these vinyl records are actually being listened to sometimes, but like, that is helping a lot to support artists and record lab…”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 1:10:24 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan

Expressed certainty vs assessment result

none yet certainty 1
none yet certainty 2
100% certainty 3
100% certainty 4
none yet certainty 5

weighted support: a fully supported claim counts one, a partly supported claim counts half. Each filled bar is clickable and opens exactly those claims; "none yet" means nothing said at that certainty level has resolved yet

How they sound: not measured why? →

We measure speaking style by listening to the audio itself, and a fair number needs at least 2,000 words from one person on tape we have measured. There is too little of Laura Ballance on measured tape to publish a rate. This says nothing about how they speak.

Everything Laura Ballance said on How I Built This that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

What-if
Ballance: Merge Records could not have succeeded without Superchunk
“I think the success of both Superchunk and Merge, they're codependent. One fed the other. We couldn't have just started Merge by itself without Superchunk also. And be where we are now.”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 52:56 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan
Assertion Supported
Ballance: Vinyl resurgence heavily supports artists, labels, and record stores
“But, you know, I think something else that has helped in the last seven to 10 years has been vinyl coming back. I wonder how many of these vinyl records are actually being listened to sometimes, but like, that is helping a lot to support artists and record lab…”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 1:10:24 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan
Insight
Ballance: Merge Records survived by growing slowly and avoiding big goals
“I think that our strategy has always been to be careful and grow slowly, and we've never had big goals on the long term, and I think that has served us well in a way, because we, we've been cautious enough to avoid, in general, overextending ourselves.”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 1:13:17 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan
What-if
Ballance: Merge Records would not have survived with two Mac McCaughans
“We fulfill different parts of what the business needs to succeed, and I suspect if you had two Macs running Merge, Merge wouldn't have Kept going.”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 1:15:32 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan
Opinion
Ballance: Raleigh punk was hardcore while Chapel Hill was poppy punk
“The kids in Raleigh seemed, like, more serious and more into the kind of, like, more menacing side of punk rock or something, and the Chapel Hill kids seemed to be more goofy. Like, Raleigh was more hardcore to me, and Chapel Hill was more, like, poppy punk.”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 14:17 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan
Disclosure
Merge Records launched artist roster using handshake profit-split deals
“They were handshake deals. We didn't do agreements. We sort of based on, How we dealt with bands on how Touch and Go did. You know, what Corey did was a profit split, and so we thought that seemed fair, and so that's what we did with the bands that we started …”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 41:45 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan
Insight
Ballance: Fan attachment makes walking away from creative projects much harder
“Like, it's a responsibility that is hard to put down, you know? Once you start doing it, and you realize that other people are attached to it, it's harder to think about just deciding to do something else.”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 47:11 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan
Assertion Supported
Arcade Fire almost signed a Canadian record deal before choosing Merge
“When we finally reached out to the band, apparently they were on the verge of signing a contract with a Canadian label. And they got out of it and wound up on merge.”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 1:02:13 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan
Disclosure
Ballance: Merge initially expected Arcade Fire's 'Funeral' to sell 4,000 copies
“I think this is gonna, this record's gonna be really, it's gonna do really well. It's gonna sell at least 4000 copies.”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 1:03:40 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan
What-if
Ballance would have refused to start Merge if she knew its scale
“If I had thought that it was going to turn into what it is now, or that that was the goal, I would have said, no, I don't want to do that. That sounds like too much work. No way.”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 25:57 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan
Insight
Ballance: Naming a band or new project always sounds stupid initially
“Naming anything is terrible. It's hard, and when you first name it has the meaning of the word, and then over time, it loses the meaning of the word, and becomes just a word. It's the same with naming your band. Anything you say for a name for your band sounds…”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 28:38 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan
Insight
Ballance: Merge and Superchunk were bigger than their founders' romantic relationship
“I felt like what we had built with Superchunk and Merge was larger than us at the, at this moment when we were splitting up personally. You know, like, it was, it felt like it had, Merge and Superchunk both had a life of their own in a way, and like, us not be…”
Laura Ballance Dec 6, 2021 ▶ 44:15 Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan

Appearances (1)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
Merge Records: Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan Dec 6, 2021 18m
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