Electrecord is a Romania

Romania

Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...

n record label

Record label

In the music industry, a record label is a brand and a trademark associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. Most commonly, a record label is the company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing and promotion,...

 founded in 1932

1932 in music

-Events:*January 14 – Maurice Ravel's Piano Concerto is premièred in Paris.*May 1 – The music to John Alden Carpenter's ballet Skyscrapers is recorded by the Victor Symphony Orchestra, under the direction of Nathaniel Shilkret; in addition to be being issued as six sides on 78 rpm discs, the...

. It served as the only record label in Communist Romania

Communist Romania

Communist Romania was the period in Romanian history when that country was a Soviet-aligned communist state in the Eastern Bloc, with the dominant role of Romanian Communist Party enshrined in its successive constitutions...

. It was then transformed into the national recording company, following the centralization-oriented socialist

Socialism

Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...

 doctrine. Electrecord has survived until today and, in spite of its reduced popularity, it is still releasing a number of records every year.

Policies before 1990

In order to avoid disc importing from Western Europe

Western Europe

Western Europe is a loose term for the collection of countries in the western most region of the European continents, though this definition is context-dependent and carries cultural and political connotations. One definition describes Western Europe as a geographic entity—the region lying in the...

 and U.S.

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, Electrecord was often demanded to release copies of some of the discs released abroad (just as recording companies in U.S.S.R.

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 were doing themselves). Even today it is the subject of many anecdote

Anecdote

An anecdote is a short and amusing or interesting story about a real incident or person. It may be as brief as the setting and provocation of a bon mot. An anecdote is always presented as based on a real incident involving actual persons, whether famous or not, usually in an identifiable place...

s complaining about the bad quality of Romanian discs; a comparison between an import and a local copy would be the most eloquent proof.

All in all Electrecord had a very difficult task to maintain a good balance between the government's demands and that of the artists and listeners. Despite the bad quality of recordings and lack of information with disk covers (regarding line up

Line up

Lineup may refer to* a queue area of waiting people* a police lineup of suspects* the roster of a sports team at a given time** Batting order in baseball** the starting position in polocrosse...

s and personnel), Electrecord proposed a number of collection discs, of which the most successful were those of the Formaţii de muzică pop series. (Translated as "Pop music bands", which became Formaţii rock - "Rock bands", starting with number four. One must keep in mind that even the word rock was a concept very difficult to accept by the regime!)

Electrecord after fall of the regime

From 1990 on, Electrecord gradually lost market share as new recording companies emerged. However, some of the musical groups who had worked with them before have carried on until today. Aside from these cases, most of the discs Electrecord released after 1990 were either best of's

Greatest hits

A greatest hits album is a music compilation album of successful, previously released songs by a particular artist or band...

 extracted from older recordings or remastered versions of LPs recorded years before.