Hard Rock Records Is Accepting Demos, Bands Will Get A Year Of Serious Support

The ever expanding Hard Rock empire, best known for the Hard Rock Cafes, launched Hard Rock Records earlier this year. Now their first signees, Rosco Bandana, have their September release ready for preorder. Rosco Bandana are not only getting a year long boost from Hard Rock Records, they're getting to keep the money they make as will all Hard Rock Records signees.

Hard Rock has already become a live music powerhouse. As noted by Billboard back in May:

"In 2011 Hard Rock venues hosted more than 17,000 concerts in 174 different venues. One particular event, a battle of the bands called Hard Rock Rising, draws more than 12,000 unsigned acts and could be a potential talent pool for Hard Rock Records acts in the future."

In fact, that competition was where Hard Rock Records found Rosco Bandana whose album "Time to Begin" will be the label's first release. The album is listed as a digital release on iTunes and Amazon.

Rosco Bandana – Time To Begin

According to Rolling Stone the idea had been bouncing around for awhile but trying to figure out how it would make money made it a nonstarter. But once CMO John Galloway realized that the label could be approached as a marketing expense, he gave the go-ahead to "A&R co-heads" Blake Smith and James Buell during Lollapalooza 2011.

James Buell clarified:

"It's a marketing budgeted expense that gives us the freedom to not worry about if a band sells 100,000 copies or 100 copies…The success for us is taking a band that doesn't have the means to tour but really wants to pursue their dream of getting on the road. We're hoping that it's a long-term marketing thing, so that when they are out on tour and any bands they are playing with, hopefully they are talking positively about Hard Rock."

Blake Smith explained how Hard Rock Records will operate:

"We want to find bands that need a leg up. We take them for a year, make a record with them, give them video money, give them a van, get a booking agent to help them get on the road, and hopefully find them another label that is going to house and better build them for the long-term. We do all this with them, and they keep every penny of everything and they walk after 12 months."

Apparently a lot of folks have found this hard to believe because they're thinking in terms of how record labels traditionally operate. Major corporate marketing departments have that money and this is a smart way to spend it as more and more marketing dollars are spent in such areas as content marketing.

Hard Rock Records, which doesn't seem to have a website or even a subdomain at Hard Rock, is planning on singing four acts each year including the Hard Rock Rising winners.

If you want to be one of them, send your demo to:

Hard Rock Records
6100 Old Park Lane
Orlando, FL 32835

Hypebot Senior Contributor Clyde Smith (@fluxresearch) maintains a business writing hub at Flux Research and blogs at Crowdfunding For Musicians. To suggest topics for Hypebot, contact: clyde(at)fluxresearch(dot)com.