Ray Barney

CTL-E-0559 · Person · 1985

Verified evidence grade of this record

In the mid-1980s Ray Barney took over management of his father's record distribution company on Chicago's West Side and built Dance Mania (founded 1985 by Jesse Saunders for a one-off release; the label name picked by Barney in 1986) into the preeminent fount of ghetto house, releasing nearly 300 records.

Notes

Merged into canonical KG 2026-10-03 from MUSIC-001; source entity IDs: CTL-DR-MUSIC-001:music-001-infra-038; source research type(s): person. Description completed 2026-10-03 from the source research record (claims) during the KG completion pass.

Sources

Bandcamp Daily (2026-09-21); Wikipedia, 'Dance Mania (record label)'
NPR/KVNF, 'Hardcore Traxx' (2014); Bandcamp Daily (2026-09-21)

Record CTL-E-0559 · CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph · evidence grade: Verified · CTL research: MUSIC-001.
Directory: all entity records · the knowledge graph

Cite as: CultureTechLens, “Ray Barney (CTL-E-0559),” October 4, 2026. https://culturetechlens.com/graph/entities/ctl-e-0559/

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