“We’re working hard to confirm this right now, but several sources seem to be pointing towards the same exciting piece of news: Rapper Jay-Z and and singer Beyonce are in talks with Apple to establish a record label. The rumors place the deal as either close to closed or already executed, with an impending announcement on the horizon. Jay-Z, Beyonce, and Matthew Knowles (Beyonce’s father) will chair the label. If true, this could bring unprecedented power, legitimacy, and experience to Apple’s music division,” Joshua Karp reports for The Boy Genius Report.
“Straight from Def Jam and Beyonce’s label Music World Entertainment, we’re gonna’ have to smash this rumor and put it to rest for now. A source directly involved with both parties who wished to stay anonymous told us, ‘This is the first I’ve ever heard of any of this’ and ‘for the time being this is a rumor,'” Karp reports.
Full article here.
“For the time being…” is hardly a rumor-smashing statement. Note that the February agreement between Apple Inc. and The Beatles’ Apple Corps stated that Apple Inc. will own all of the trademarks related to “Apple” and will license certain of those trademarks back to Apple Corps for their continued use. There do not seem to be any legal issues standing in the way for Apple to become a “record label” if the company so wishes. Eliminate the Middlebronfman!
There are some words which should never be in a sentense together:
Jumbo shrimp
Micro$oft Works
Bush & intellegence
and, of course
rap & music
no way this is gonna happen
Hardly interesting to me- I have no desire to listen to any of these celebrities’ sad version of so-called music. And I highly doubt Apple would get on board with such lightweight talent.
Charko: I don’t think Apple would, or could, do this, because if they did, the Beatle’s ‘Apple Corps’ would sue and this time they would win – hands down!
Did you read MDN’s take? Apple now owns all trademarks in both computer and music service businesses and license it back to Apple Corps.
No Rap for Jobs.: Despite the money potential, Steve Jobs is passionate about his work and ONLY releases products/services that he personally loves. Steve Jobs DOES NOT like Rap/R&B. If Apple were to start a label, it would not begin with those genres.
Really? Eminem is a rapper and Steve Jobs said that his music was growing on him. Besides, personal taste should not prevent business opportunity, should it? Jobs is smart enough to see that. Either way, the evidence was the use of Eminem’s song for iPod ad.
——-
There are many reasons why I think this is just a nonsensical rumors. There is no need to invent new ones or rehash old ones that are no longer valid. I also don’t agree with MDN’s take. Creating a new label only partially solve the situation with getting new and popular music. However, the huge library on back catalog must still be licensed, so Apple must still deal with the likes of Bronfman.
Well, like investing in the market, whatever happens happens. Conjecture and opinion mean nothing.
Personally, I think it’s a good move. Since Apple makes so little on the songs sold on iTunes, my guess is that they can guarantee the artists a larger percentage than Universal (or whatever label) is offering, while at the same time guarantee themselves more than just 5 or 10 cents a song. Also, since there will be a record of every song downloaded, the accounting would be much more transparent to the artist — Apple won’t be able to obscure the actual numbers the way the record labels probably are. I think it’s a good deal all around.
And rap music or hip hop music? I can’t stand the stand it, but there are many people out there who love it, and you have to start somewhere. I’m a huge fan of Arlo Guthrie but I doubt many would rejoyce if he were the first artist signed to a potential Apple label. That’s one of the wonderful things about music — there’s something out there for everybody.
Regarding the deal with Apple Corps, who knows? Perhaps part of the agreement covered this possibility. Perhaps Apple Corps would get a small cut of the profits.
As always, time will tell — this might all wind up being rumor, and nothing more.
Anybody see Bronfman last night on (what was it, CNBC…?) a piece about the music industry and iPhone and such? I just watched a few minutes of it but I saw Bronfman, revealing yet again his complete misunderstanding of the music buying public and (surprisingly) the realization that it might just be too late for his product to continue to sell.
Funny.
“Eminem is a rapper and Steve Jobs said that his music was growing on him.”
He probably meant it’s growing on him like an irritating fungus (Genus Caucasoid, Species bee-yotches) that needs to be scrubbed off and avoided.
Is Bronfman secretly moving to Pakistan?
“Warner’s Bronfman cashes in, sells home for $50-million-plus
Bloomberg (July 13, 2007)
Edgar Bronfman Jr., chairman and chief executive officer of Warner Music Group Corp., agreed to sell his New York City Upper East Side townhouse for more than $50-million (U.S.), The New York Observer reported.”
I kinda see iTunes as a type of record label, just not one that endorses specific artists, but one that supports all artists and supplies the easiest and fastest distribution of the artists songs, etc.
Perhaps they could sign an artist or artists who are not currently under contract and make more money on the sale of songs for that artist. That would cut out the middle man…the record labels and all their leverage. Wouldn’t it be cool if many of the major artists would jump ship and sign with the iTunes label for digital distribution??
As CD sales dwindle and become prehistoric, iTunes could fill this void and become the label themselves and split everything 50/50 with the artist…both would make more money and the record labels would do the death spiral. Sounds like a good future to me.
Rap/Hip-hop is the sewer of music, populated by jellyfish and chameleons, misogynists, and racists. Rap/hip-hop is an amplifier for the toilet-mouthed underclass; it is fuel for the destroyers, and a recruiting tool for vice. It has contributed precious little to the music community and it destroys everything that it touches. Worthless is the music and worthless become those that listen to it.
If it happens, it’ll be with Jay Z, Beyonce, and the Beatles (!) Who else? How many other top artists b**** about the majors?
An easier question with a much shorter answer might be “Which artists like the major loan sharking, demi-mob organization they’ve sold their soul to?” Not too many…void(0);
Direct-to-Market distro is becoming Apple’s coup d’etat(sic) in all markets it does business. How would this be any different?
btw…for those that like to wrap their personal bigotry in false monikers like “taste” or “knowledge”… get OVER yourself. Jazz wasn’t considered “real music” by the industry doom-mongers, and Rock n Roll is what brought record burning to the masses.. You people are no better…
Anagrams of “Paul McCartney” (of Apple Corps):
My pact unclear
Can rectum play
Mr Clean-Cut pay
Can crumpet lay
Apple has become a major player in the music business through the iTunes Store WITHOUT getting involved in the down and dirty parts of the business. It has managed to stay at arm’s length. “We sell your product, we share the profits.”
I don’t think Apple would want to risk stepping into the messy, often-sleazy cesspool that is the engine room of the music business. It would involve setting up a whole new kind of operation, spending untold millions just to get going, and having to start dealing with lots of shady characters and institutions.
Having said that, however, Stevie J. always seems to have a unique perspective on things and a master plan, so conventional wisdom may not hold true . . .
not a chance. I can’t see Apple paying for studio time, high priced producers, marketing, tour support etc. for artists.
They will simply allow direct distribution deals for major independents, instead of them having to go through the slow approval process of an aggregator.
@ BustingTheSkullsOfIdiots
Exactly what the last generation of social conservatives said about rock and roll. Keep it up.
I think there are a lot of older white people on this site. Everyone that thinks that what you hear on the radio in terms of rap is all that rap is about, is dead wrong. That music is, for the most part, fabricated and engineered by greedy men in suits exploiting music. Real, true hip hop music has a point, great beat, and ingenuity. I’d suggest listening deeper rather than just on the surface.
And C1 is right, that is exactly what the last generation said about rock and roll. You’re all about that huh? Seems a little hypicritcal to me pal.
And, Jay-z is into far more than hip hop, he has rock, pop, and rap acts signed to his labels. He did a song with Chris Martin from Coldplay. You guys are generalizing something you know shit about. Congratulations for showing your ass and acting like a jerk.
What if someone such as Jay-Z, Beyonce, and Matthew Knowles wanted to start their own label and bypass the majors’ distribution. They would need deals with Apple, Amazon and Walmart. Apple doesn’t have to start its own label and it’s doubtful they will.
This will never happen.
I cant see Apple ever becoming a content creation company, there just isnt any real innovation in that sector.
I know content creators hold all the cards compared to a distribution service (like iTunes), but I really cant see this happening and if it did I think Apple would go into the movie creation business 1st anway and not the music business.
I think Apple would just buy up the record labels instead of starting one up from scratch.
Makes good business sense to me.
Pay the $millions of dollars, and you get the acts, the talent, the people who know the business, the distribution – the whole package.
SJ then goes in and puts his people in and clears out all the label’s leachers and slackers – just like when he came back to Apple in the 90s.
If a musician uses Pro-logic to create their music, creates a label of their own, use the manager of the label to negotiate a deal with Apple inc. to distribute their music through itunes with the a similar revenue return as the major labels are getting……
Then Apple inc. have not broken any agreement with Apple Corps. However…inn the settlement to the lawsuit in which Apple Corps lost to Apple Computer, Apple Computer bought all the rights to the trademarks and are now licencing some of those trademarks back to Apple Corps.
Do the sums!
So if the rumour is true…….DO THE SUMS!
@ Petey, Last Sunday, Prince distributed his latest album free of charge in the Sunday Mirror Newspaper in the United Kingdom for an undisclosed sum of money……
The major record labels especially Universal gnashed their teeth and tried to spread FUD over that action claiming that music would be divalued if musicians gave it away free…..It is alleged that Prince made more money from the deal than if the record labels had distributed it for him. Recorded media shops get all their music on a 100% sale on return basis, which means that teh shops make the most money, the labels make the second most because they offset the returns against the fees to the musician.
If Apple distribute the music through itunes, for starters they are not making hard copies of discs, so the issue of Sale on return becomes redundant. The musician gets a higher royalty return because two GREEDY BASTARD middlemen agencies are out of the equation. The profit margin is hihger because studio fees are negated by Logic pro and only one copy needs to be delivered to Apple inc. to download onto itunes!!!!
THINK DIFFERENTLY!
I’m not a big fan of hip-hop – there are certain individual songs that I like – but as a genre, I’m not much of a fan. I belong to the older generation, so my tastes run more to old-time rock.
However, my biggest disappointment is to find that even the followers of rock, especially classic hard rock, include so many doorknobs these days.
I recently went to see a Deep Purple concert – decades after seeing them the last time – and I was very disappointed by the crowd around me.
It was full of brain-dead anal cavities – biker-wannabes with their leather jackets, ponytails, chains and obviously empty (other than containing liberal portions of THC and alcohol) skulls.
A whole bunch of them kept screaming, “Highway Star! Highway Star!” throughout the concert, even while the band was playing other songs. Jeez, we’ve heard of one-hit wonders, but you pay 50 bucks just to hear that one, ancient chestnut?
When somebody shouted back, “That’ll be the encore, idiot! Come back then,” it led to a back-and-forth shouting match with all sorts of obscenities being thrown about. (It WAS the encore)
And then there were those who insisted on playing guitar solos loudly with their mouths (“See? I’m a Deep Purple expert!”). It was especially irritating during the softer passages of songs.
Never used to be like that. Good rock used to attract a loud, boisterous, but generally classy and involved crowd back in the day.
Or maybe I am just an older fuddy-daddy out of touch with the times.
gzero’s comment shows the most undertstanding of how the music industry works.
Labels today provide several functions. The front the money required for the recording, they front the money required for marketing, and the provide distribution. It used to they did this for almost all music — recording was so expensive that there was no way for an artist to afford to make a record. However, as recording becomes more computer-based, especially in styles such as hip hop and R&B than lend themselves to computer-based creation, artists are creating their recordings with their own money. Further, most of them also work their own marketing via myspace and other internet-based efforts. For artist who puts in the work and achieves success at these first two areas, all they need is distribution. And many artist now are doing “distribution only” deal with labels.
*This* would make sense for Apple. Not that Apple is going to be a label that fronts money for recording or marketing, but that just does distribution. Actually, they almost do that now. Several artists that record at my studio have their music on iTunes — they got in through CDBaby, a “label” of sorts, that artist sign with for distribution only. CDBaby takes a 10% cut, leaving 90% for the artist, and in return CDBaby gets the music on iTune, eMusic, etc. While CDBaby is a great deal for artists as it is, why not let artist sign for distribution on iTunes directly?
Of course, for artists that can’t afford to make their own albums (e.g. some styles cost a lot more to produce, e.g. rock costs more than hip hop because you need a larger room, more mics, etc), traditional labels will still be needed to front the cost of recording. However, if Apple became a major player in the distribution game, labels could get reduced to just fronting money to pay for recording and maybe marketing. Basically, they get reduced to being musical venture captitalists*.
marc
blue on blue recording studio
* the way it typically works today is that labels pay the full cost of recording and assumes all the risk in case the album is a financial failure. Most people are not aware that 9 or out 10 albums produce are total financial losses, but in that case, the artist does not have to pay the label back — the financial lose is the label’s problem. But in return, the label takes a majority of the profit if the album happens to be a financial successful. Of course, most of that profit goes to cover the lose from the other 9 artists who were financial loses. The label hopes hope that they pick well enough that the profit from the 1 successful artist covers the loses of the other 9.
THINK The Sword of Damocles!!!!!!
I see a lot of people here thinking of an “Apple” label working in the way that the OLD labels work… which is the reason the old labels are dying. Apple wouldn’t need to do ANY of that. They’ve already put the music making tools in the hands of the artists. They wouldn’t need (or want) to print physical CD’s at all. The only thing Apple would need to do would be to provide online distribution — which they are already the kings of. Old label rip off the artists and the consumers. Apple currently receives about 20 cents of the 99 cents charged for each track, and that mostly covers their costs. The artists get, what, about 5 cents? The rest goes to the labels, and it is almost ALL profit, as there is nothing spent on distrubution or physical product. An Apple label would probably mean Apple takes 30-40 cents of the 99, the artist makes the music and gets the rest of the 99.
As for legal problems, uhm, why don’t you folks actually READ the article. Apple, Inc. OWNS the Apple Records trademark. They have the rights now to do whatever the fsck they want with regards to music.
I’m sure I’m simplifiying this whole thing, but not by much. Stop thinking of a “label” like the ones that are failing now. An Apple label would most likely be nothing like those dinosaurs.
@ marc, That is what the labels would like you to believe, meanwhile they do not allow singer songwriters to front their own work because they would demand a higher cut than plastic faced boy & girl bands who are paid next to nothing for fronting someone else’s work.The original creators of the music are kept in a dark sweat shop writing and creating music!
Time they broke free like successsful sports personalities who can now command more money than some musicians.