Under the stage name “Samurai Tiger,” senior Conrad Gagnon achieved a goal dreamed of by many musicians: signing to a record label.

According to Gagnon, “Record labels have a bigger reach and more resources. Instead of independently putting out 20 tapes and a few handmade CDs, I’ll get a good size run of very professional looking CDs and tapes, premiers and reviews on music blogs, interviews, and help booking tours.”

Gagnon came into contact with the label’s manager, Craig Lindholm, over a Facebook group. “We had talked a few times before, but he saw some of the vinyl I had made for my EP ‘Real Life Experiences For Real Life People’ and we talked on the phone about it for a bit. He ended up really liking my music, and asked if I wanted to put out an album with his label,” Gagnon said.

After talking to some other musicians who were signed under the same label, Non-Denominational Emo, Gagnon was ready to sign. “They all said that Craig was one of the nicest people they had ever worked with, he’s a great business partner, all the tapes they got were perfect, and it was just all around a great deal,” Gagnon said.

He will be going on a mini tour early in 2016 in the Tri-State Area, and he will have a bigger tour during the summer which will go all the way up to Boston and back.

“There’s no one else that I have to compromise on my music with now, it’s all my vision and my decision,” Gagnon said.

For more on Conrad’s music, go to samuraitiger.bandcamp.com, facebook.com/samuraitiger, or samuraitiger.tumblr.com. Gagnon can be reached at [email protected].

Mitch Hopkins is a Multimedia Editor for The Patriot and jcpatriot.com.