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steve wrote:Here's where I mention that contracts are of no value to a rock band.

Contracts can only be enforced by the party with enough money to go to war. Such a contract is a liability to the weaker party and a weapon for the stronger party. A contract offers no protection without enforcement, and a band has no means to effect enforcement.

Contracts are of no value to a rock band, and in fact they are a liability.

Phrased this way, I completely agree. Signing a contract guarantees that you will go into debt in the hopes that sales will exceed that debt.

Is there an example of a major label treating a band fairly? Ever? And how do these people survive after getting completely fucked over financially?

My band is attracting some attention at the moment from a couple of major labels in the UK, and although I'd love to be signed to Drag City, Touch and Go, Matador etc, they're not interested and I think we'd find it very hard to turn down an offer from one of the big guys. One of the lads in the band is married with a mortgage, another has a 5 year old kid, we're all fuckin broke...real life, debt and families can impact on these things too.

It's not black and white.

windowlicker wrote:My band is attracting some A&R activity at the moment from a couple of major labels in the UK, and although I'd love to be signed to Drag City, Touch and Go, Matador etc, they're not interested and I think we'd find it very hard to turn down an offer from one of the big guys. One of the lads in the band is married with a mortgage, another has a 5 year old kid, we're all fuckin broke...real life, debt and families can impact on these things too.

It's not black and white.

Those things should have an impact. Do you think those things should be made vulnerable to the impersonal and indifferent machinations of a big record label? You do realize that you are risking them more rather than less by becoming bound and beholden to a big label, don't you?

windowlicker wrote:My band is attracting some A&R activity at the moment from a couple of major labels in the UK, and although I'd love to be signed to Drag City, Touch and Go, Matador etc, they're not interested and I think we'd find it very hard to turn down an offer from one of the big guys. One of the lads in the band is married with a mortgage, another has a 5 year old kid, we're all fuckin broke...real life, debt and families can impact on these things too.

It's not black and white.

you see being in some stupid band as a stable and long term means of financial stability?
I am trying to imagine what kind of delusional retard would think that way, but I am having a hard time picturing it.....can you maybe post a picture?

Marsupialized wrote:you see being in some stupid band as a stable and long term means of financial stability?
I am trying to imagine what kind of delusional retard would think that way, but I am having a hard time picturing it.....can you maybe post a picture?

Minotaur029 wrote:Is there an example of a major label treating a band fairly? Ever? And how do these people survive after getting completely fucked over financially?

The Poster Children managed to function as a self-sufficient DIY outfit while on Reprise, by maintaining complete control of their music and taking minimal recoupable support from the label (i.e. making their own merch, driving a van instead of riding in a bus). How they pulled off working out such a band-friendly contract, I don't know; but the only major screwing they have suffered, that I am aware of, is that the Reprise albums are out of print and they currently cannot re-release them, either themselves or on another label.

If I recall correctly, the only reason they signed in the first place is because they wanted out of their contract with Twin/Tone, which cost $70K to buy out.

lemur68 wrote:The Poster Children managed to function as a self-sufficient DIY outfit while on Reprise, by maintaining complete control of their music and taking minimal recoupable support from the label (i.e. making their own merch, driving a van instead of riding in a bus).

Mike Watt has been on Sony for years, seemingly without any change in the way he conducts his business.

But the point is that these are rare exceptions.

Minotaur029 wrote:Is there an example of a major label treating a band fairly? Ever? And how do these people survive after getting completely fucked over financially?

Actually I was almost tempted to start a new thread based on this. Major Labels that were decent, or artists who had survived in Major Labels, etc. I can think of a few.

The Flaming Lips - Warner Brothers (how this worked I'll never know. I think in a Priest Driven Ambulance and Hit to Death in the Future Head are fine albums, but let's be honest, they weren't big sellers in the major label sense of the word - I'm surprised they weren't dropped, but they've gone on to be a moderate success, have they not? Though they don't rock anymore.)

PJ Harvey - Island Records

Sonic Youth - DGC (this was a long and fruitful relationship for them)

Mercury Rev - Columbia / V2 Sony (though they started out on Mint, all of their albums were released by a major label at one point or another.)

Gang of Four - EMI/WarnerBrothers/V2 Sony (it's always surprised me/seemed ironic that everything Gang of Four has ever done has always been released on a major label)


...now, these are just off the top of my head, and I can't really say if the band is being treated fairly or not, for all I know WB might keep the Flaming Lips locked up in chains and feed them only bread and water between letting them out for public events. However, these are just bands that I can think of that have had long successful/semi-successful careers with major labels.

The question is: Did these bands/artists receive preferential treatments or contracts that made working with the major label easier? Or were they just the lucky ones that swam through the shark infested waters?

I do think since the whole "alternative boom" that the ratio of major label murders of independent bands has gone up exponentially, it was a feeding frenzy there for a while. In fact the whole contract slaying phenomenon really seems to have started rolling since the mid to late 80's. I mean, it always existed, and was bad in the 50's and 60's, but it then seems to have gone into a recess only to come back witha vengeance recently.

Angus Jung wrote:Mike Watt has been on Sony for years, seemingly without any change in the way he conducts his business.

But the point is that these are rare exceptions.

Oh yeah, I wasn't using their example to argue in favor of signing to a major. The P-Kids experience runs counter to everything we know.

I would think a lot of us are curious as to how Brainiac's Interscope deal would have played out....