some smaller labels i ve been enjoying last couple of years:

kranky - deerhunter, starsof the lid, benoit pioulard, tim hecker

bpitch - ellen allien, modeselektor, apparat, muller

typerecords - helios, julien neto, xela

fatcat - animal collective, black dice, panda bear, mum, no age

XL - dizzee rascal, M I A, peaches, devendra barnhardt

soul jazz - a huge selection of music ranging from brazilian to funk, dub and jazz

and a huge lindstrom fan who has his own label

recommendations????

in the past couple years, the Secretly Canadian/Jagjaguwar/Dead Oceans family has been pretty impressive.

Beggars Banquet and 4AD are pretty consistently good too.

this year, Sub Pop's lineup is pretty awesome. Grand Archives, Ruby Suns, No Age and Fleet Foxes. I felt like they were slipping a little before, but now they're getting back to putting out some awesome stuff.

Arts & Crafts is another good one.

And I was thinking, overall, Kill Rock Stars has been one of my favorites for a long time. The Decemberists, Elliott Smith, Sleater-Kinney, Unwound, Xiu xiu, Deerhoof...so many good ones.

hydrahead, relapse, not not fun & holy mountain have been my favorites of late

All four of those labels automatically grab my attention whenever I see that they've released an album I'm considering checking out.

My favorites lately have been Soundway, Load and Elektra (for some of the older stuff they took a risk on initially and then dumped later cos they got cold feet, like the Stooges, for example).

Oh and I second Neptune's mentions of Stax and Frenchkiss.

Def Jux: Aesop Rock, El-P, Cannibal Ox, Dizee Rascal, Cage.

chillomrecords for the ethnic indian electronica
visit them at
htttp://www.myspace.com/chillomrecords