Major Labels

The Deep Dive: Metallica’s New Independent Label [LISTEN]

6a00d83451b36c69e2017c345406fb970b-800wiThe Deep Dive is a new mini-podcast from The Upward Spiral. We've shortened our News segment in the regular podcast to take 10 – 15 minutes and "dive deep", analyzing a single news item from all different angles. In this installment, we dive into the news of Metallica's new label Blackened Recordings, and the fact that all their masters reverted back to the band from WMG. What does it mean for the future of the band – and the future of major labels, for that matter? Listen to us hash it out in this short, free-wheeling discussion.


The Upward Spiral is a podcast about the new music industry featuring Kyle Bylin (Live Nation Labs), music industry consultant Jason Spitz (Former Director of Marketing at Topspin), and Hypebot's Hisham Dahud (also of Fame House). Along with special guests, the group discusses current events and issues that face artists & music professionals.

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Feedback? Comments? Ideas for discussion topics? 

Email upwardspiralpodcast@gmail.com, or Tweet to @UpwardSpiralPod on Twitter.


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1 Comment

  1. great talk! A thought:
    I think an important aspect with regards to artist-entrepreneurship is risk-taking. Taking your rights back as a band and enterprise means you bear 100% of the risk. If a label “buys” your copyrights it is basically a signal that means we believe in your content, invest in it and bear the major part of the risk. A label is diversified (having many artists on their catalogue) and thus can manage the risk better. It’s not a secret that you can’t predict success in the music business. At the end a label is a specialised bank that invests in an endeavour getting specific rights as a security in return. One endeavour might excel and compensate the other 9. The same principle like venture capital works.
    The counter intuitive implication is that artist-entrepreneurs end-up in a much more risk averse strategy due to the lack of diversification. Why should Metallica risk anything musical wise as if they fail they bear 100% of the risk. As a consequence, the consumer might be better off with regards to musical diversity if labels release music compared to artists release music…
    Of course there are a lot of “buts” and “it depends” but maybe worth a discussion …

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