CandyRat Records

CandyRat Records (also stylized as CANdYRAT) is an independent American record label and online music store located in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin.^[1] They primarily represent instrumental guitar artists, with a focus on acoustic guitar, but include electronic music, alternative rock, singer-songwriter, and progressive rock, with musicians coming from many countries.^[2][3]

Rob Poland founded the label in 2004, first signing fingerstyle guitar talent Don Ross,^[4] followed by Andy McKee,^[5][6] Antoine Dufour, and three other artists before officially opening in 2005.^[7] CandyRat Records has been called the "biggest acoustical guitar label in the world",^[8] and the two-handed tapping technique of playing the guitar to produce bass, rhythm, melody and harmony, which is practised by many of its artists, has become known as the CandyRat style.^[9] The label gained fame after videos on its official YouTube page, 'rpoland', gained viral success.^[10] Recording sessions are filmed and uploaded, contributing to the success of the albums.^[11][12] As of November 2014, the most popular video on the channel, a live recording of Andy Mckee's "Drifting",^[13] garnered over 50 million views.^[14][15] Their YouTube channel has over a half-million subscribers and almost four-hundred million views.^[16]

CandyRat Guitar Night Tour features CandyRat Records' guitar virtuosos traveling the U.S. and the world.^{[9][17][18][19][20]} For 2017, Antoine Dufour and Ian Ethan Case toured.^[21] CandyRat is also a festival partner for the Wilson Center Guitar Competition & Festival, with Rob Poland and the CandyRat headliners as some of the judges for the fingerstyle competition.^[22][23]