Label Guide: Kent

Kent Records was a Los Angeles-based label, launched in 1958 by the Bihari brothers. Lester, Jules, Saul and Joe Bihari started their first label, Modern Records, in 1945. Over the next twenty years they launched several more labels and sub-labels including RPM Records, Flair Records, Meteor Records, Crown Records, Riviera Records, Yuletide Records and United. In the mid 1960s Modern Records went bankrupt and stopped operating, but the catalogue went with the management into Kent Records, so Kent's story really starts around 1965.

Kent was primarily a blues label and most of its releases were reissues of earlier Crown Records material. After the deaths of Saul, Lester and Jules Bihari, Kent's back catalogue was licensed to Ace Records (UK) in the mid 1980s, and then later purchased by them during the 1990s. The label is now used by Ace Records to release Northern Soul recordings.