Warner Music to layoff 20% of its workforce (1 Viewer)

[Danny Tse]

Actually, the 10 WB SACD titles are only distributed officially within Hong Kong, not anywhere else. With a population of approximately 7 million people, I feel that Hong Kong's SACD penetration is greater than that of the US. On sa-cd.net, there're 54 Chinese pop titles so far (I will be adding 2 more by end of the week). There are also HK-issued titles in the "Traditional" section of the website, in addition to the approximately 10+ SACD titles that I know of but haven't been uploaded to the website. And all these are just the local titles. With approximately 70 titles, that's about 3.5% of the total SACD catalog. That's not pretty good market penetration.

BTW, there're also 7 SACD releases from China's ABC Record, making these the first SACD releases from the mainland.

 

[Paul.S]

Lee:

From your post #s 47 and 53, respectively:

I mention a lot of film biz examples, but I think they are analogous to the music biz.

Whereas you would argue Antonio "L.A." Reid's recent ouster from Arista was justified because of his arguably spendthrift ways, I'd counter by mentioning that marketing coin he spent helped Pink transition into being a rock artist. And--what with L.A.'s experience as Babyface's partner as a music producer combined with his recent executive experience--he's the epitome of the kind of rare blend in a label exec that a label should retain, not fire.

Luckily, talented creative people like L.A. Reid (and Pixar for that matter) tend to land on their feet elsewhere. But, for the financial types, I quote what writer David Kahane screams at on-his-way-out exec Griffin Mill in The Player, "I'm a writer! I can write! What do you do?!?"

-p

 

[Lee Scoggins]

One of my favorite movies and I know this scene intimately...I have two major reponses to this. First, the corollary for the music business is fine music songwriting and performing, both of which are largely missing. As Walter Yetnikoff said on Today this morning, "the current music business is just boring!". The writing is bad, the lyrical content is missing, and tunes are wallpapered with studio tricks that obscure the lack of content. That is in part what drove WMG into the ground I believe. This is a by-product of a bet-the-farm mentality on the big contracts. Second, David Kahane adds tremendous value to the production of a movie as a writer. Gods knows I have seen enough stinkers lately at the local cinema to deeply understand that point. In fact, it seems at times that the writers have gone on vacation. My hope is that David Mamet's Spartan film may be a ray of sunshine here. But it is a bit unfair to criticize financial types as not adding an equal but different amount of value to the process (arguably Tim Robbins as a producer is a different discussion altogether). They help manage the companies that make the movie production possible. And when they do their job right, the create cash flow based businesses that last for a long while thereby leading to job security from everyone from security to wardrobe to writing to directing to final screening.

That's a life worth living.

But as we continue, I see that we both want the same outcomes in many ways-better craftsmanship which leads a great end product. I just feel that financial types add value and can create an atmosphere where these goals are reached. There are natural battles where a director may want more money for a project and the financial guys may balk, but in the end the process generally works. In music unfortunately, there is just too little emphasis on artist development.

 

[Paul.S]

Lee:

Off topic request for clarification: The reason Yetnikoff was on Today (I didn't see it) is probably the same reason he made the comments: he's promoting his new book.

I would argue there is quality out there. But frequently those artists get so little support, nourishment and time to develop that they are cut by label shortsightedness. John Hiatt is an amaaaaazing songwriter. But he has had to switch labels so many times in recent years, probably in no small part because label "bean counters" argued for his being canned after he didn't move "X" number of units.

Regardless of the issue of the post boy band, hip hop-rified state of the current pop landscape, I disagree with largely blaming artists and songwriting (or lack thereof) for WMG's demise. I think that, in general, corporate behavior is a far larger issue. The labels are largely to blame for their own problems IMO: they have artificially maintained too-high CD prices (indie retailers and the NARM even sued over this issue), they have been slow to adapt to the Internet and downloadable music and--to come full circle in terms of my contributions to this thread--they have not introduced and supported "Enhanced CD"s early enough and have done a poor job rolling out the hi rez formats.

To wit: I bought the single layer Titanic score stereo only SACD in May 2001. Two weeks ago today, Sony finally released that title the way it should have been done in the first place: as a hybrid disc with both multichannel and stereo DSD tracks.

Why is there an Under Rug Swept DVD-A before one of Alanis' biggest seller, Jagged Little Pill? Executive cluelessness? Marketing department firings? Can't say for sure, but I seriously doubt its because Alanis requested it be so.

These are just two practical, rubber-meets-the-road examples that I think we can all grasp regardless of how we or other Forum members may feel about the larger issues we've been going back and forth on, Lee.

Even if I conceded on all of your perspectives WRT the financial side of the biz and agreed that the recent WMG pinkslipping is "in the best interests of shareholders," I would stand by my assertion that--absent Edgar saying in a press conference that he loves DVD-A and he's making it a corporate priority--the change in management and said firings "do not bode well for DVD-A."

-p

 

[Danny Tse]

Robbie

 

[LanceJ]

The last person I want in full charge of a music company is a person trained solely in financial or legal matters. Though such a person should obviously be in a support position to offer advice to make sure the company is kept reasonably stable to allow it to continue to produce good music. But the person making the big decisions needs to have the ability to understand the ethereal and gut-oriented things that drive people to buy those products they don't need, but simply want, IMO a tricky proposition.

An non-music analogy where a large company also stopped producing something special & now look where they are: back in the mid 90s Buick was going through some hard times & while watching CNN I remember a financial analyst was being interviewed about this. One of his brilliant pieces of advice to help their situation was for Buick to stop building specialty cars, specifically the Riviera, because these types of products sold in small numbers and so generated little profit in comparison to the bread & butter cars like Centurys and LeSabres. What he was clueless about was that such cars are important in generating a particular image for an automobile manufacturer and this image (there is a specific term for this concept but I can't remember what it is) sort of provides a "glow" that shines down on the other lesser models and helps to increase their sales. Same deal with Chevrolet's Corvette or Pontiac's new GTO.

The sad news is, is that Buick did actually stop building the Riviera, and they are still going through hard times and from what I've been reading they may in fact meet the same fate as Oldsmobile. They are hoping their new LaCross midsize sedan will recreate some of that former Buick sizzle but this remains to be seen.

And back in the 80s GM had some of its worst times when their CEO, Roger Smith, ran the company with a strict & unimaginative fist. In Car & Driver magazine he was quoted as saying (approximately) "I don't think you have to be a 'car guy' to successfully operate a car company." What a frightening statement about a business where customer decisions are driven in large part by emotion (who actually NEEDS a car with a 300hp V-8, 18" wheels, gets only 18mpg & has an uninhabitable rear seat suitable only for one hardboiled egg and a magazine?). While he made lots of cash for the shareholders, the company itself was simply limping along with a bunch of lookalike cars and low hp figures. He was finally replaced in the early 90s (read about this here).

But too many financial types don't fully understand anything that isn't made up of hard numbers or offers a nearly 100% guarantee of fat profits. Art--whether in sonic or visual form--is made up neither of these things and requires the use of one's imagination to understand their impact on people, i.e. how such-n-such new band may be popular with such-n-such group of people. The aesthetic appeal of a band's music cannot be neatly quantified on a spreadsheet, I'm sure much to the chagrin of the bean counters. And the near lack of this characteristic is why I think so many large music companies (the ones run by money-minded people) are putting out such lousy product--and this has nothing to do with lack of available talent. If this was true, why are there so many independent labels out there??? Most of the music I have bought the last five years has been from such labels, but if I look at my vinyl collection I bought in the 80s/early 90s, most of that is from the majors. Kinda makes ya think, doesn't it?

Sorry, but for me money and art don't mix very well, particularly when the money side is demanding unreasonably large profits from the art side. What can I say, I'm a lefty!

LJ

 

[Lee Scoggins]

Oh good car talk. GM is a perpetual under-performer and Smith did not create good returns for shareholders. GM has continued to this day to be plagued by boring styling, quality issues (excepting Buick and Cadillac) and recalls. They make a poor product and people are voting with their wallet-they are buying imports! Fortunately these imports employ just as many Americans! I had a Pontiac Firebird that I loved and babyed. I bought it for $12,500, kept it in mint condition and then found out it was worth $3,500 just two years later! I have never owned American since and now buy Lexus cars for my wife and I. Even an expensive GM sports car like the Corvette has a crummy cheap plastic interior.

I believe the key to a good label is a balance between the creative and the financial. Look at Chesky Records which really does a lot for the size...Norman is good at doing business deals and has street smarts and David (also good on business end) is brilliant at finding good musicians and relaunching careers.

As I stated before, most of today's creative companies sell more products and good profits and shareholder returns come from that.

 

[Paul.S]

LOL--now Mr. $treet wants to talk about balance! Good grief, Charlie Brown.

Please lemme know if you were talking about Titanic DVD bootlegs, Lee.

-p

 

[Lee Scoggins]

Actually I was confused. I was thinking about my T2 collection. I have some 6 or 7 versions including various laserdisc offerings.

 

[Paul.S]

Lee:

I said:
Which is why I have, on at least three occasions, acknowledged that I'm speculating but have gone to I think significant lengths to explains the rationale behind my speculative conclusions.

I only have all three T2 DVDs.

-p

 

[Danny Tse]

In reference to post #54 in this thread....

John, Warner Music (most likely out of Taiwan) just issued a new SACD title....not a reissue, but a SACD release of a new recording.

 

[Lee Scoggins]

We certainly don't see Sony releasing any DVDAs.

 

[Justin Lane]

No, Sony just releases Dual Discs with that awful PCM and Dolby Digital that they hate

J

 

[Paul.S]

Tidbits from a story in today's L.A. Times entitled "Industry Waits As Warner Music Decides On Artist Roster Cuts":

--As much as 50% of the label's 170 artists will be dropped.

--Third Eye Blind? Dropped.

--"With the exit of several top executives at Elektra, one of that label's top-selling acts, rock icons Metallica, struck a deal to have its next -- and final -- new album under its contract marketed and promoted by Warner Bros. Records, sources said."


The beatings will continue until morale improves.

-p

 

[ElevSkyMovie]

Will Van Halen be one of those? I think so. Best Of Volume II will be out soon, then VH will be out.

Paul, what about Rush, on Atlantic? since Vapor Trails hasn't gone gold, is there a risk there?

 

[Paul.S]

Just speculation of course, but yeah: I unfortunately think that, despite my having heard that they will re-enter the studio to make another record after the current 30th anni tour, Rush will be looked at critically. The Times story mentioned that senior execs are being asked to take salary cuts of up to 30%. Lyor Cohen said the only acts that will remain will be those they are "insanely passionate" about. In this environment, I'm sure they're looking at everyone.

I'm reminded of something Nicky Santoro says in voiceover when the feds' hammer falls in Casino: "When the bosses found out you could get 25 years to life just for skimmin' a casino, sick or no fuckin' sick, you knew some people were gonna get clipped."

-p

 

[Danny Tse]

And that was after "Van Halen 3" went gold. After 55 million albums sold in the US alone, you would think the band deserve another chance.

I am thinking Linda Ronstadt is gone as well, although her contract has been fulfilled. Dire Straits/Mark Knopfler??

 

[ElevSkyMovie]

Van Halen's BOVII will be out on Warner Specialty Marketing (maybe Rhino?), but I suspect Warner Music will want to push one of the new singles with Sammy, corret? It has always been said that VH left Warner, but who knows. I think BOVII is a contractural obligation with Warner. I think VH will release that record and then move on to another label.

If the people that signed Rush to Atlantic are still there (probably not) then they might have a chance to stick around. Another label would take both of these bands in a heartbeat.

 

[Paul.S]

Val Azzoli managed to survive the bloodbath and is still at Atlantic.

Dunno about "heartbeat." I think we would have heard by now if another label had signed Van Halen. Despite strong past sales, I think one of the problems with the band from the perspective of a new potential label is all the acrimony, pettiness and litigation amongst the band members.

Thank God Geddy, Alex and Neil don't behave that way.

-p

 

[ElevSkyMovie]

I'm pretty sure it has been comfirmed that BOVII will have 2 or 3 new tracks with Sammy, and the last thing I read online said it wouldn't be released through WMG, but through Warner Special Marketing, which I think is the arm that put out the recent 2 disc Eagles greatest hits package.

I don't think anything is final, but last rumour was that Warner wasn't happy with the two tracks and sent VH back to the studio to make them more "commercial".