ABOUT
Jamie Beck is Marketing Director at Merge Records, the influential independent label founded in Chapel Hill, North Carolina in 1989 by Superchunk bandmates Laura Ballance and Mac McCaughan. Home to a celebrated roster that has included The Clean, Neutral Milk Hotel, Caribou, The Magnetic Fields, Waxahatchee, and The Mountain Goats, Merge releases roughly 40 albums a year from artists across the US, Canada, Europe, Australia, and New Zealand.
Jamie has remained a key part of Merge's day-to-day operations through a major moment of change for the label. When Secretly Group acquired a 50% stake in Merge in 2025, Jamie stayed on alongside label director Christina Rentz and head of digital Wilson Fuller to help guide Merge's continued growth as a standalone label within the broader Secretly ecosystem.
PANELS
Your Audience Is Ready to Buy. Are You Ready to Sell? Why Artists and Labels Need to Start Thinking Like DTC Brands
Independent labels have the loyalty, the catalog, and the demand. What they're missing is the infrastructure to convert it. This panel digs into where revenue is slipping through the cracks in direct-to-consumer sales, and what it takes for labels to capture the value their fans are already trying to give them.
Tuesday, October 13, 2026, 3:00 PM