An entrepreneur, producer & curator of creative projects, Alec Hanley Bemis is best known for running the music label Brassland, which he co-founded in 2001, with members of the band The National. For that work, he has been featured in The Irish Times, The New York Times, Print Magazine, The Wall Street Journal and other important places. Pitchfork referred to it as a “venerable artpop boutique label” and on its 10th anniversary, The Guardian newspaper profiled Brassland as “the record label at the centre of New York’s other music scene,” citing it as “a focus for some of the most intriguing and creative musicians.”

In his first career, he was a writer, journalist & critic covering topics such as Beck, backyard wrestling, Elliott Smith, video games, recent evolutions in classical music, Tucker Max's "fratire" books, and William Shatner. He has published in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Bookforum, the Los Angeles Times and LA Weekly.

Bemis has been an invited speaker/teacher at institutions such as the Rhode Island School of Design, New York University, and the School of Visual Arts; a panelist at music industry gatherings including SXSW (USA), by:Larm (Norway) and Haldern Pop (Germany); and a curator at the Summer Nostos Festival (Greece), the National Concert Hall (Ireland) and Adelaide Festival (Australia).

He is based in New York City but travels a lot. Current enthusiasms include: Jorja Smith, communitarian art & pedagogy, Joni Mitchell, photography, and the legend of the KLF.

Wanna listen? He updates this Spotify playlist semi-regularly. And you can hear Brassland music at YouTube, Spotify, Apple Music & other reputable music sites.

NOTE: The 'Writing Archive' link below is on the fritz. Try some of the links in the second paragraph if you'd like to read some samples.