415 Records was a San Francisco record label created in 1978. The label focused its efforts on local punk rock and new wave music acts of the late 1970s through the late 1980s, including The Offs, The Nuns, The Units, Romeo Void, and Wire Train. Its name, pronounced four-one-five (not four-fifteen), was a play on both the telephone area code for the San Francisco area and the California penal code section for disturbing the peace (indeed, in some promotional material, the phrase "disturbing the peace" was written underneath the 415 logo). The label had a productive partnership with Columbia Records from 1981 until shortly before it was sold in 1989 to Sandy Pearlman, who retitled the label Popular Metaphysics.
Klein ran the label from a tiny office on 16th Street in the Mission, a district of San Francisco, where he kept a pushpin-covered United States map on his wall, bearing a sign that read, "All Bands on Tour All the Time." Klein used his own late-night weekend radio shows to showcase his artist's records and he promoted them all over the country to nightclubs, record stores, and a newly blossoming array of other alternative radio stations. His artists were part of the 1980s San Francisco rock underground, though Klein leaned more toward the accessible, fun, new wave bands than the thrash metal and hard-core punk bands who were also part of that scene. 415 was the first North American record label to focus on punk and new wave music and they featured mostly musicians from the San Francisco region, though the label eventually also included artists from other areas. The British label Stiff Records had done similarly two years earlier; marketing England's emergent 1970s pub rock scene as punk and new wave and releasing their first record in August 1976.
415 Records enjoyed early and sustained support from Bill Graham and from David Rubinson, owner of The Automatt recording studio on Folsom Street. Bill Graham managed many top-name acts through his management and promotion agency, Bill Graham Presents, and from the start of the label he booked 415's artists as opening acts for major headlining bands to help them gain broader exposure. Subsequent early releases included 7-inch EPs by SVT (cat#S0005, 1979), The Nuns (cat#SUB01, 1979), Later records included a 7-inch by The Mutants (cat#34859, 1980), an album by The Units (cat#A0003, 1980), a 12-inch rpm album by Romeo Void (cat# 415A-0007, 1981), a mini-album by New Math (cat#A0008, 1981), and various other releases for many other bands.
- A reunion concert was held at Slim's in San Francisco in September 2009, celebrating 415 Records and featuring several of its recording artists, including Wire Train, Translator and Debora Iyall of Romeo Void.