Labels doch nicht die Dinosaurier der Musikbranche?

Der Guardan fasst Erkenntnisse aus dem MusicTank Report ‚Remake, Remodel: The Evolution of the Record Label‘ zusammen:

Sponsorship deals are more important than ever. The Black Eyed Peas have done deals with dozens of brands including, Pepsi, Blackberry and Honda while bands like Girls Aloud have endorsed everything from Sunsilk hair products to Kit Kats.
 

* Investment is under strain and some bands are looking for alternative funding sources. Madness signed a deal with Power Amp who took a share of profits while the band maintained their copyright. But labels remained the primary investors.

Der Report wurde unter anderem vom ehemaligen EMI-UK/Irland-CEO Tony Wadsworth verfasst. Wadsworth machte gegenüber dem Guardian auch eine interessante Aussage zu Google Music:

„The key thing is that labels are now at a size they can sustain. As digital models – like a Google music offering – gain real scale I think we will start to see business increase. There is big digital business to come into play and we are not quite there yet.“

Der Forester-Analyst Mark Mulligan fasst die Situation der Labels gut zusammen:

„Each of the major digital music players, Apple, Amazon and Google have made it clear that they think labels are being unflexible and Spotify still cannot launch in the US because of wrangling over licensing,“ he said. „The record labels are at the start of a very long journey, but they have only taken a couple of steps and they are not walking quickly enough,“ he said.

Meine Prognose angesichts des heutigen Verhaltens der Majorlabels: In zehn Jahren gibt es nur noch ein großes Majorlabel, das in der kommenden Dekade über mehrere unterschiedliche Wege die Backkataloge und die verbliebenen Organisationseinheiten der anderen erhalten haben wird.