Bingonians approaching

Last year the music industry was like a fragmentation bomb, exploding in all directions. Radio and the rock business ripped toward alternative rock, with stations changing formats, labels switching A&R directives, and the underground transforming into the overblown. Technology kept coming on like gangbusters, making street-level artists wiser, and threatening areas like retail and radio with radical change. And narrow-niche marketing -- cynically observed as a response to our ever-narrowing minds; more generously identified as catering to our more specialized current tastes -- became standard, with specialty labels popping up everywhere.

To answer some questions about the state of selling and signing new music, we went to an expert: Val Azzoli. Under his leadership, the Atlantic Records Group has become the best-selling company in the music biz. Since Azzoli became president of Atlantic in 1994, the label's sales have risen to grab 10.49 percent of the revenue from all current recordings sold. Certainly Hootie deserves as much credit as Azzoli for the label's high stock, but within the industry, Azzoli has earned a reputation as an outspoken, freewheeling leader. Inside the corporation's Rockefeller Plaza offices, he's respected for his hands-off approach -- for allowing smart, creative people to do their job without undue interference.

Azzoli credits his penchant for delegating to his days as a band manager, where he learned the wisdom of teamwork. Nearly 20 years ago, he started managing a bar band in his native Canada and got bitten by the biz bug. He's since worked with such groups as Metallica and Queensrÿche; and for nearly 10 years he was the general manager of Toronto's SRO Management/Anthem Entertainment -- handlers of art-metalists Rush. He came to Atlantic in 1990, being primarily involved in marketing until 1991, when he was promoted to senior vice-president/general manager and began overseeing the label's day-to-day operations. In '93, he was boosted again -- to executive vice-president/general manager, taking on additional duties in every realm of the Atlantic Group.

Shortly after this interview was conducted in his comfortable New York office, Azzoli was made co-chairman of Atlantic, becoming the corporate peer of Ahmet Ertegun, the legendary music-industry pioneer who co-founded the label in the '50s.

Q: Given that the pop-music industry's become an alternative-rock sweepstakes, how would you characterize the competitiveness of the record business right now?

A: At an all-time high. That genre seems to be what everybody wants to get into to be hip, cool. But it's all about signing good rock bands. People are becoming so competitive because they think that if they have "alternative" bands they're going to sell records, as opposed to thinking that if they have a good rock band they'll sell records.

Q: Do you feel that record labels were caught unaware when the "alternative" rush hit, without acts on their rosters?

A: Absolutely. And in a scramble and a panic. At one time we had an alternative department, a metal department, a dance-music department. And what turned the company around -- around 1991, 1992 -- was that we abolished all those departments. I think you have to de-ghettoize these labels. I don't think you should make an alternative department. It's about music.

Q: Decentralization seems part of your management style. And within the company, you've got a reputation for giving people more freedom.

A: Because it's more competitive out there, you have to create an environment that gives people a lot of room to move. The best people to manage are intelligent creative people because you give them the tools to work with -- budgets, control -- and let them do what they do. There's nothing more stifling than having an idea and having someone say, "No, you have to check with me."

Q: Is there something that happened as you were learning the ropes of business that made you feel that way -- to relinquish pinpoint controls?

A: I used to manage bands, and when you manage bands you have to depend on people -- your road manager, the lighting guy, the sound guy -- and there's nothing you can do. If the sound's not good, you can't tweak it yourself because you don't know what you're doing. You realize, "If I get a really good person as road manager, as a sound man, those are two things I don't have to worry about. Then I can concentrate on working the record company, the agents, the band, whatever."

Business has become too complicated to do by yourself. Once you realize that you can't do it all, you better get good people.

Q: One thing that strikes me about the alternative rock out there right now is that so far relatively few superstar acts have emerged. Why do you think so few artists who are playing this sort of new rock seem to have emerged at that level?

A: One of the things is MTV. MTV is a burnout. Just remember, the only time you got to see the Beatles was when they played Ed Sullivan or you saw them live. Or the Rolling Stones. Or the Who. Or whoever . . . Now you see them every 10 minutes on MTV.

It accelerates the burnout factor. That, and radio is much more fragmented now, Also, I think your entertainment dollar . . . you have a bigger choice than listening on your radio. Your musical needs get satisfied with MTV, the radio, video channels . . .

You sell more records now. You know, the Rolling Stones never sold a lot of records [compared with sales figures for, say, Hootie & the Blowfish and Mariah Carey]. If Nirvana were still around, they'd still be big, and they could still be around 20 years from now. I'm not sure Pearl Jam's gonna be around. But I think they will be; they're a real band.

Q: I have a feeling that Green Day won't be.

A: Yeah, it's very limited. Bruce Springsteen's still a superstar. But in the last five years, no one's really stepped up to the plate. Stone Temple Pilots could step up to the plate. They haven't lasted the test of time because they haven't been around long enough. Hootie & the Blowfish -- they haven't been around long enough. There is another generation coming out, we just gotta give them the test of time.

Q: I think it must be intimidating to sit in the chair that Ahmet Ertegun sat in for so long. When you started working with him, did you find him intimidating, because of the history he carries?

A: Yeah, very. And only because of that, not because of his style of management. He's a legend, truly a legend. Hearing the stories about what he did in the old days . . . That truly was a romantic time that will never be repeated again.

It was a great era, on a lot of levels. They did everything: promotion, marketing . . . The studio manager would get a call Friday night from Ahmet saying, "I'm bringing in a band tomorrow, have everything ready." They would record on Saturday night, press it on Sunday at the plant, give the singles to the promotion guy. The promotion guy would literally get on an airplane and start visiting stations. That's just amazing, you know?

Q: What does it take to break an artist these days? What are a couple of key components that really put someone over the top?

A: Certainly you really have to have a good work ethic. It's really hard work.

Q: As an artist?

A: As an artist. It's not just about getting on the radio. It's about getting on radio, playing live, doing news stories, doing a great video, doing a great interview, doing a great photo shoot . . . And that's assuming you have a hit song, which is even more than that -- it's magic. Since you're competing against so many other forms of entertainment, every night you've got to be out there. It's important that you have patience. It takes a long time to break a band out. More than ever.

There used to be a thing called Top 40 radio. That radio station would play the Top 40 songs in America. Those same Top 40 songs in Connecticut were the same Top 40 songs in LA, in Chicago. And among those Top 40 songs, it didn't matter if it was country, novelty, black, white. And we would play these Top 40 songs five times a day. Right? Every fucking day they would play those top 40 songs.

Now, you're on heavy rotation in a particular format that's somewhat limited, meaning they'll play it twice a day. So that's why it takes a longer time for a song to sink in to someone. It's very rarely that you hear a song once and you go buy it.

Q: How hard is it to get a record played these days?

A: You know, it's a catch-22. Somehow, the record company has to create a demand for that record for them to play it, and you can't create that demand until they play it, so you have to find other ways of creating that demand. Sometimes you have to find sympathetic program directors, sympathetic music directors, who really like the new song even though they don't know who the artist is.

It was almost easier in the old days, because program directors really did program the station. DJs programmed their slots. Now the music director kind of filters it to the program director who checks with the consultant to see if it meets the mix of the kind of stuff the radio station is trying to do.

A radio station has to feel heat. Is the heat from record sales, is the heat from people calling in, is the heat from people talking about it? They all have their own heat indicators, so you gotta create heat. Then you gotta spread the heat from Hartford to Boston to Worcester and so on. This is with new acts, obviously. Big acts everybody wants to play.

It's a grind. The thing you have to understand is, the last thing people need is a new record. If you never bought another record in the rest of your life, your life would be fine. You could not go through the rest of your life without buying a new pair of shoes. Plus, I can watch music on television. Radio stations have free concerts all the time. So you can get it without paying for it.

Q: Over the last year, it seems a lot of former AOR stations have switched over to a new-rock format, which has created intense competition. Since there are so many stations in this format right now, do you expect some sort of shake-out over the next year or so?

A: I think so. It's interesting, because this happens all the time. Remember when everybody was playing disco music? Remember everybody was playing country music for a while? For a while there was a huge, huge push for all-news radio. Stations have to be a reflection of what's happening out there. AOR was what was happening when they all started these stations. AOR . . . album-oriented rock. What did that mean? "We're not gonna play what Top 40 plays, the single. We're going to find the album track." That worked for them. Now, the station across the street is saying, what do we do to be ahead of the crew? We'll call ourselves "alternative rock."

AOR kind of dug their own hole, because they started playing old classics. People just got sick of it. How many times do you want to hear Janis? The Who? The fucking Doors? I mean, stop already. I grew up with the Doors. I don't want to hear "Roadhouse Blues" over and over. Stop! I want to hear something new. So what does modern rock play? New bands! I mean, hell-o! This isn't brain surgery.

Q: Now since pretty much all music is available in a digital medium, and since cable and telephone are so adaptable to carrying digital information, could radio become obsolete? Will music be broadcast directly into people's homes via cable with even more selective channel options? And what does digital transmission of musical information imply for record stores in the future?

A: Let's deal with the record stores first. I think that people will end up buying their music through digital transmission. There's no doubt about it. Ultimately, you can buy anything you want from a catalogue. There's no reason for you to go shopping, but the sensation of going out . . . Three out of five people walk into a record store and don't buy anything. They just browse. For that reason the record store will still exist in some form. But I think people will buy through their computer, through their television set when they make the box where you can press number six and order the new Stones record. It'll be there the next day, or it will appear on your CD player -- however that's going to work. So the retail will close down a little bit. Probably within the next 10 years.

I think radio will always be there. When the world of digital radio comes about, where they'll play just R&B or just jazz or just rock, and you pay $5 a month, nobody will talk on the radio. You'll just hear these great records. Having said that, I still think the type of radio that's community-minded will still exist. You got your news . . .

Q: When you talk about concern over fragmentation in the marketplace, are the relationships Atlantic's had with indie labels like Seed and Matador, and in establishing the Irish-music label Celtic Heartbeat, addressing that?

A: Absolutely. Because the market is fragmented, you have to find experts. Not only in the music, but in the marketing and the way to promote it. That's why we have these small . . . different personalities.

Q: How do you determine the need for a new offshoot label or alliance with an indie?

A: Each style has its own barometers. With Celtic Heartbeat, we had such huge success with this record called Clannad [that is, Clannad Themes]. And we also had the first Enya record. Then we did this campaign called "Music for the Rest of Us," with Clannad, Enya, Máire Brennan -- who is Enya's sister and who is in Clannad -- and they all sold. It occurred to us this market is out there; if you buy one, you'll buy all three. So that's how Celtic Heartbeat started. We started it with the manager of Clannad and Paul McGuinness, who manages U2. And all of the music we have for Celtic Heartbeat comes from Ireland. What you try and do is recognize if there's a market out there and then try to figure out if it's big enough for you to get into.

Q: How important is music to you, personally, or even spiritually?

A: Music is really important to me. That's why I feel so fortunate. My seven-year-old daughter summed it up the best. She was telling a friend, "My daddy listens to music and watches television all day. And he talks on the phone." That's what I do. It's great! Every day of my life, I listen to music. Every day.

Q: How did you come to your calling?

A: It was absolutely a catharsis. I finished college and I started working for a company in the sales/marketing part. The guy I was sharing an apartment with was in a rock-and-roll band. And he said, to make a long story short, "You should manage us." I said, "Yeah, why not?" The band wasn't that good; it was just a club band. We toured across Canada, and we played every fucking bar in Canada from reservations to mining towns. To tour in Canada for a year, I'm telling you, you're playing everywhere. We finished in Vancouver, which is in the western part of Canada, and I lived in Toronto. I drove back with the road crew. And we had one of those big trucks, three in a cab. And driving across, it just occurred to me: "I gotta do this. I'm not gonna be a salesman again. I'm really going to give this a shot." And there was like a 16-ton weight taken off me. Because there was never any turning back. And I'll never forget that. In the middle of the western prairies or somewhere. I've been doing it for almost 20 years now. And as I got more experienced, I produced records, co-produced records. It's a great feeling -- smoking a joint and listening to your record after it's done. Fantastic!

Q: You've managed artists. Do you feel the music industry rewards originality in artists?

A: Yeah. Absolutely. Who was more original than the Rolling Stones?

Q: Well, they did base all their stuff on Muddy Waters.

A: Yeah, but basically everything starts with an inspiration or something. Original artists last the test of time. Elton John is really original. There are a lot of bands that aren't original, and they don't last.

Q: For me, it's easy to be cynical -- especially when you see a couple of bands from Seattle making it and suddenly there's a flood of A&R people going to Seattle looking for the next Nirvana, the next Pearl Jam. And even in Boston, when Tracy Bonham was signed, I remember a VP from a label asked me whether I thought Tracy Bonham was the new Liz Phair. And I'm thinking, well, does it matter? Besides, it's not as if Liz Phair had made a gold record. It always seems there's this dog race going on to catch the same rabbit.

A: Yeah, that's true. On the whole, people aren't original. Let me put it this way: [former Atlantic Records Group president] Doug Morris once gave me the best quote in the world: "On the team of sleigh dogs, everybody has the same view except one dog." We as an industry are very sheeplike; there's a hit in Seattle . . . we all go to Seattle. But you know what? The guy who's in Seattle first wins. It doesn't mean you're smart, but originality is very important. Sure, it's a fashion industry. Walk down the hall, everybody's got the same fucking shoes on.

Q: Doc Martens?

A: Exactly. That's people, you know. There's that comfort zone.

Q: I have to ask you about the Interscope label's divorce from Atlantic. How do you feel personally and as a business guy about Time-Warner making that split happen because of pressure from censorship groups? Interscope is a pretty significant chunk of overall sales for Atlantic, and it's been a good creative label.

A: I think the guys running the label, Jimmy Iovine and Ted Fields, are great. Geniuses. Jimmy in particular is the more musical guy. It's sad to see it go, because we were there from the beginning. Looking at it very philosophically, Interscope became mature and it was time for Interscope to get on to bigger and better things. And that has nothing to do with the lyrics. As a company Interscope needs independence. They outgrew Atlantic; they outgrew Time-Warner. [Pauses.] Really, they outgrew Time-Warner.

Q: The pressure from this side came from Time-Warner.

A: Yeah.

Q: What about signings? Is there sort of an Atlantic boilerplate contract for a new band, or some common ground for new band deals?

A: There are certain boilerplate points, absolutely.

Q: Do you typically look for a three- or seven-album deal?

A: Five to seven.

Q: Does the budget seem to clock in for a first record at a hundred grand plus?

A: Yeah, it should. It's $100,000 to $300,000 for a new record, depending on the band, depending on the time. The point structure . . . We have a limit of how high we'll go. There's certain things I just will not do with new bands, and the reason is because the front-load expense on a new band is just fucking phenomenal. Most bands are failures. One out of five make it. Your failure rate is so high, and the cost of failure is so high that you have to somehow hedge your bet.

Q: Do you have a favorite band or a style that you love?

A: My absolute favorite used to be Little Feat. It's soulful stuff. And I really didn't get into R&B till I was older, well into my late 20s. And classical I got into the last five years. On the whole, I'm not a big jazz fan, but I do like certain types of jazz. What I don't like, though, is opera. I can't handle opera. And I speak Italian; I can understand what they're saying.

Q: So overall, how would you characterize the last year in music?

A: I think it's been probably the most interesting year in music ever. I don't think we'll ever have a year like this again. The turmoil that's happening at the executive level, the bands that have broken. Look at Green Day, Hootie & the Blowfish, Alanis Morissette, Dave Matthews, Live. Totally different from each other. When is that ever going to happen? Unbelievable.

Rock radio changed like this [snaps fingers] to alternative rock radio. It's been the shake-up year. And I really don't think that will ever happen again. Retail was really weird; this was the year of opening big megastores.

What's on-line has changed things a lot. Getting back to signing new bands, because of the on-line services, bands are much more aware of what's going on, from the business side of it. Bands come in here that we're about to sign, and they know more about me than I know about them. They can find out what the market share is of Atlantic Records. They can find out who runs Atlantic and who used to run Atlantic, and they know who does the marketing and they know who runs Sony. And they know who got fired yesterday. When I was coming up, the bands I managed and I had no idea who the record-company president was -- let alone the chairman. I knew the A&R guy and the promotion people. They would come to the dates.

What really shocks me about it is that people have that much time to spend on-line. There are people who just devote hours and hours and hours to getting in the gossip stream, which flips me out. I can't imagine having that much time on your hands, and if you did, I can't imagine spending it that way.

I used to live in this broken-down hotel right across the street from a bingo hall. Every night, seven days a week, a thousand people would come and play fucking bingo. I used to call them the Bingonians. They would all weigh 400 pounds and they were the weirdest-looking fucking people. Why would you play bingo every night of your life? Why would you hang out on the Internet?