Industry insiders talk to Pro-Music about their fields of expertise
A&R
- Daan van Rijsbergen, A&R manager at Sony Music in The Netherlands talks about the search for new talent.
- Luis Cobos, Spanish composer and conductor, talks through the process of composition.
- Steve Lillywhite whose credits include U2, Talking Heads, Morrissey and The Rolling Stones, talks about the producer's role.
- Caroline Molko, Managing Director for Warner Chappell Music France gives a publisher's perspective.
- Michel Lambot, of independent record company Play It Again Sam on signing a new act to a label.
Dag Häggqvist, founder and owner of Swedish independent record company Gazell Records AB talks about nurturing new talent.
- Hans Zwitser, owner of Melody Shop in the Netherlands says it's hard but rewarding work running a small independent retail music store.
- Steve Harley, singer/songwriter on writing songs and the inspiration for them.
Robin Gibb, of Bee Gees acclaim, talks to Robert Ashton about what it takes to make a hit.
Daan van Rijsbergen, A&R manager at Sony Music in The Netherlands talks about the search for new talent.
"You sign a contract with an artist or band because they have talent. Because they have 'something', an incredibly beautiful voice, a great talent for composition, an enormous personality. But - a good voice or a good song is not enough on its own; they must also have something that will really appeal to people.
Sometimes you sign contracts with bands because you think they are marketable. Boy bands and girl bands have been an established concept for 20 years, for example. The best of these from a musical point of view are not necessarily the most successful; it depends on who was launched most cleverly. We have seen many of these kinds of marketing concepts over the last ten years; now we're seeing a sort of counter-movement. Guitars are once again outselling keyboards in musical instrument shops; it is cool to play in a band now, whereas three years ago people would rather have been DJs. You also get girls coming to see bands now, whereas ten years ago it was mainly guys. And where the girls go, the boys will generally follow...
ALL the money you invest in the music industry has risk attached. It is based on belief and hope; there are no absolute guarantees whether something will be a hit or not. An artist can have three best-selling albums and the fourth can flop completely. It is always difficult to decide whether something will be a success. You very seldom recover your investment in the first album. The second album is important; if there is clear growth, both musically and commercially, then you know you're on the right track.
We invest an enormous amount in marketing, recording and design, and the media are crucial partners for us in this. These days, TV is more important than radio. Radio helps you to promote sales up to a certain point, but the ultimate breakthrough to the wider public comes through a big TV event. And then it is not just about the songs; you also get exposure for the artist and everyone can see who they are. The key to the breakthrough lies in the goodwill that Dutch artists generate. All artists who are really big in the Netherlands became successful because people liked them. An artist achieves this identification with their audience via TV.
In the music industry you're always busy. Listening to tapes, reading magazines, visiting radio stations, CD presentations; you hardly ever get an evening at home. A&R, the hunt for talent, is something you not only do with your ears but with your eyes as well. You have to be a trend watcher; what do people like? Clothes, language; whatever is going on. You never discover something that is completely perfect. Sometimes you'll find a bad band with a great singer who has masses of charisma, sometimes you'll find a good band with dreadful material, sometimes you will find a good singer with great songs but with no real public appeal. Perhaps I would like to have given them a go, but no matter how great something is, if it doesn't sell we can't keep pouring money into it.
A&R is sexy, and everyone in the record company gets involved in it to some extent. But as the A&R manager you have to find a bit of a balance in your own stable of artists. You can't have ten rock bands, you can only have one or two, and even then you have to space out their albums so that they don't compete with each other. A&R is just like football: as a good football coach you know that you won't get anywhere with seven strikers.
The difficult thing about A&R is that you must have business instinct and vision on the one hand and a feel for the musician and for the music on the other. This can be quite a difficult balancing act. A&R stands for Artist and Repertoire, but the "R" can also stand for Relations; you find yourself involved in all sorts of personal problems - and joys!"
Luis Cobos, Spanish composer and conductor, talks through the process of composition.
"The moment I wake up, I have a very good breakfast and read the newspapers, but I like to have a musical score with me, just in case I get an idea for writing some notes. When I am composing for orchestra this peculiar process involves working on two different, individual scores.
Sometimes I put down on paper basic musical ideas, using the piano, to be developed later in the orchestration. In this case, I need time to play and I try to get inspiration playing piano. This leaves my imagination free to go any place, follow any emotion, any possible idea. It's wonderful to get a small idea, then after playing and playing, you can discover the answer you instinctively wished for.
I love this process of creation: having a long night entirely to yourself. No telephone, little noise and good feelings.
If I have to orchestrate a large score, in symphonic way, I wake up early in the morning and work on scores all day. I want to have time in the evening to go out for dinner and have time to be with family and friends.
Sometimes when I am composing a song, I prefer to sleep longer in the morning and to work in the evenings and by night. Normally I use the piano as essential instrument to compose.
Occasionally, I get a musical idea without using any instrument. But when I play, I always modify the original idea, using different chords, exploring various solutions in harmonies. Giving, finally, the personal touch to the song.
When I compose film music or music for television, following images, I also work by night, having long sessions to understand and memorise the sequences.
This is, basically, the way I like to work in music. I still have time for sport, horses and sea, when it is possible. I like to talk with friends and to walk with my girlfriend, and enjoy the very many wonderful things contained in the most simple and insignificant place or thing in the world around us.
I love orchestration. I have to dedicate all my intelligence, all my knowledge and I am fascinated by the effect of all these very small notes, together, creating amazing worlds and sensations when they are played.
Every thing is music. Music is the best prize I can get from life.
Really, after many years composing and scoring music, I have to say: music is magic."
Steve Lillywhite's credits include U2, Talking Heads, Morrissey and The Rolling Stones. Currently joint Managing Director of Mercury Records UK, he talks to Pro-Music about the producer's role.
"As a producer you're responsible for the quality of the end product - whether you sit at the back of the studio reading a newspaper, letting them do it themselves, or whether you're in there writing and arranging and helping them perform the record - it doesn't matter - you are responsible. Personally, I think I come somewhere halfway between the two.
A lot of people say a producer is like a film director but it's not as dictatorial as that - as they work with actors who don't write their own scripts. I would always work with people who wrote their own records. It's always done in conjunction with the artist; we'd discuss things and we'd have arguments and it would go backwards and forwards and I'd say, at the end of the day - it's your record!
U2 in the early days were very intense. They'd made one single with producer Martin Hannett (who worked with Joy Division) and he was too freaked out after the death of Ian Curtis to work on the album with U2 and I was there. I'd come through punk, Siouxsie and Banshees' Hong Kong Garden was my first hit, and then I did XTC, The Members, The Psychedelic Furs. Then Peter Gabriel called me up - and I thought it was one of my mates making a joke - as he was seemingly the opposite of everything we stood for. But in fact when we met and I heard some of his ideas, he was so open: it was a ground-breaking record at the time, his third (he didn't title them then).
I have this theory that recording studios were designed mainly by men - and there is no touchy-feely feminine aspect to 99% of recording studios. And artists, creative people in general have more of their feminine side on show than other people - so I've always liked to record outside of the usual recording studio.
So when Counting Crows asked me to produce their album last year - Adam Durwitz is one of the better songwriters of the 1990s - we rented a house in the hills of Hollywood and turned the racquetball court of the house into a studio. It was a fantastic time: we did in about four three-week stretches - which is good because you don't get bogged down that way.
You don't do one song from beginning to end: you normally do backing tracks first, anything from drums on their own, right through the musicians. Sometimes you want to get the feel of the interaction between all the musicians so you record them all at the same time. But that happens less and less often now.
The first CC single, American Girls, we did a really good version of it in one of our three week stints - the only problem was it was slightly the wrong key and a bit slow. So we decided to record it again and we did a faster version and in the right key and it sounded good but there wasn't quite the magic the first one had. The other one had its inadequacies but something about it was magical. The new one, we fixed the flaws but it wasn't quite right. We spent a lot of time fiddling with that.
Knowledge stops you being fearful in anything, so a knowledge of music certainly helps you communicate with musicians. I was a bass player. I can't really read music but I can talk to someone about chords. I came up through engineering, so engineers are my friends. I know I can talk their language and I won't ask for something they can't get.
I have to gently steer the musicians. I might say we need to work out what you're going to play here - and you're hiding behind fact there's six people in the band - let's get what you play and make it really focused.
But I say, it's up to the musicians. I only plant a seed it's up to you to grow it. You build the ship - I just help steer the ship. I'm not a producer/songwriter, I'm purely helping the artist fulfil their vision.
It's a nightmare scenario if they bring in a record and say 'make the drums sound like this'. You can't do that. You can't take one element - it's only there because of its perspective within all the other sounds.
In the early/mid eighties there was this thing called the Steve Lillywhite drum sound which was all over records like Simple Minds, Big Country, U2 - I was the 'rock guy'. I had this drum sound and I though I had a system. I went to New York with this particular artist and used this system of big ambient drums on this record and ruined it! Just when I though I had a rule, I realised there were no rules. So after that every time I started a new record I'd enter it with no preconceptions.
You don't know when a track is done but you know when it's not done. My whole theory is the more I listen to it and finely tweak it and refine it, by the end, if there's nothing in there that annoys me, then by definition it's alright, it's done.
As a producer a lot of my work was based on trying to enable the musician to free themselves up to be musicians, rather than to have on their mind, 'this is possibly the most important thing that ever happened to me, I'd better not get it right, right now, otherwise I'm fucked!' And that can cross their mind and they tense up. I love to set the scene - lull them into a sense that it's not the most important thing in the world what they're about to do, otherwise they won't be able to do it as well.
I put my heart and soul into a record when I'm producing it. The weeks - sometimes months - of 12/14-hour days honing, refining, making something that really will last you all your life. I don't think there's a better value product in the market than a CD. Music can absolutely move you on a continuous basis. You not going to watch the same movie every night, but you can listen to Grace by Jeff Buckley every night and think, what a brilliant record.
I've been blessed to have a fantastic job. I'm lucky I worked with brilliant, creative people and all we thought about was art - we never once considered about the market and units - and through that, our sense of taste translated to the general public.
I never listen to records I've made. When you're making a record you're very active in it. When you've finished you're passive: there's nothing more you can do. Therefore there are only two responses: one is that you like it, one that you don't. If you like it there's the possibility of complacency, and if you don't like it there's the possibility of uncertainty. Complacency and uncertainty are two negative emotions you shouldn't have: that's why I never listen to the records I worked on. I love hearing them on the radio… but I won't actually sit down and listen to them."
Caroline Molko, Managing Director for Warner Chappell Music France gives a publisher's perspective.
"My role is to sign new writers and promote the repertoire we already have. Like any A & R manager probably, I go to gigs, and work closely with specific contacts that are very active in the music field. I work on projects and listen to artists from the very beginning of their careers. When I hear demos, I'm listening for nice melodies or good lyrics.
In terms of helping develop new talent, we can sign acts that don't have a record deal and then help them find one - by arranging showcases, for example
We help artists to build their songwriting skills: we might work on the structure of the songs, or the arrangement or the lyrics.
Part of this involves setting up meetings, for example introducing them to other artists for potential collaboration and also to producers.
Song pitching is a really important part of our work. You have songs, and you have people that are looking for songs. And to pitch the right song to the right person makes all the difference!
We have a synchronization department, which suggests and puts forward songs that could be used in advertising, for movies, videogames etc. Either they can take an already existing hit and ride on the success of that, or use fresh material and help develop new writers. We also sometimes work as music supervisors on movies - suggesting potential songs or writers for specific projects.
There are two main issues that publishers' deals outline: they help to develop the artist/the writer and promote the songs while also collecting and monitoring royalties.
And, when we sign an act, we give money towards tour support, which is non-recoupable. Sometimes we add another non-recoupable sum for demos, and we can also help co-finance the video. Of course we're not obliged to do all this, but it's getting more and more usual.
What's great about the job I have is that I'm right there at the beginning and it's good to have the time (more so than the record companies) to work on a song.
It's a real pleasure to be in at the birth of songs, for example, asking Sandrine Kiberlain (one of our writers) to create lyrics for major French artist Florent Pagny (No.1 in the album charts) and finding the right music to fit the lyrics.
It's also a huge honour to represent one of the most talented and famous French writers Pierre Grillet, who wrote for Bashung and Dani, for example.
Another project we really enjoyed was working on the synchronization of the soundtrack of 'Chouchou' - a huge movie success (No.1 at the French box office, produced by Les Films' Christian Fechner and distributed by Warner Bros)."
Michel Lambot, of independent record company Play It Again Sam on signing a new act to a label.
"Signing a contract, for the record company, artist and manager, is a bit like getting married. People will first need quite a lot of time to see if they want to work together for what will hopefully be a long period of time. You can't just sign an artist because you loved a concert and a day later put them into the studio. You have to evaluate if you will be able to work with them, if the personal chemistry is right and also try to understand if they really want a career or just want a Saturday night hobby.
We have artists from Germany, the Netherlands, France, Belgium and the UK. We usually hear about new bands by word of mouth and from radio DJs and managers. We may end up signing a band after an A&R war where companies are competing against each other and the price increases - which can be very expensive.
Often bands need a space to work, practice and create songs. So we may be obliged to help them find a practice room and finance it. We may also pay for equipment, because we want them to have professional equipment when they play live and record. We may end up financing their time because composing, arranging, preparing demos and talking to their record company is a very time-consuming process. So if the band members have day jobs, we might end up paying for their wages.
At this stage we have to find a record producer and pay for a studio. A band might take one to two months in the studio. Then we start talking about the marketing campaign including what advertising should be booked and when. With Play It Again Sam, we very often try to cross national borders with our music. This means collaborating with local managers and our international marketing department.
We need to decide what track should be released as a single and find a graphic artist for the sleeve. We also start looking with the artist for the right video producer and try to find them the right tour managers.
If we hope to sell 25,000 records we know that maximum budget will be in relation to estimated sales. If we feel, like with SoulWax in the UK, that the band will crack the market, we will invest a lot of money. We knew that we would not be able to break even on our campaign for SoulWax's first album, but we needed to do the campaign to bring the next album to the next stage.
When an album is launched, our press people take over. In big countries and for large campaigns we will also work with freelance consultants in addition to our own staff.
We offer bands confidence in themselves. Psychological advice is also a big part of the job. You also have to act as a love consultant and deal with broken hearts!"
Hans Zwitser, owner of Melody Shop in the Netherlands says it's hard but rewarding work running a small independent retail music store.
"I'm what you call an independent retailer - I own and run a music store in Holland called 'Melody Shop'. I set up shop a while back now; we opened the doors for the first time in 1989 in what was then a brand new shopping complex.
It's a small shop, only about 100m2 with a maximum of five employees at any one time, and compared to many of the big chains it doesn't sell vast quantities of albums. But the difference between the chain and the independent shop is that it's up to me and my employees to cherry-pick the music we think our local customers want. In that way it's very personal and very human.
We sell about 5,000 CDs and 3,000 DVDs, although the number of DVDs is increasing. As time goes by it's obvious to us that the market is changing, and that people are more and more interested in DVDs - so we'll be increasing orders for that format. We've also started selling film DVDs, merchandise for kids and we've set up a small internet café with ten computers at the back of the shop.
Running a small music shop is hard work. I get up early in the morning to go fetch the day's shipment of music from the wholesalers, while the rest of the staff open the shop. When I get back we check the goods together and conduct an inventory. Then we proceed to empty out all the CDs from their covers so that people can't steal them. This actually takes a lot of time. Once that's done we pick out the new releases we specifically reserved for our customers and contact them to let them know their order has arrived.
My employees and I live by two mottos. Firstly, 'always have your ear to the ground.' It is essential to be passionate about music, to constantly read about it, listen to it, talk about it. If we are to survive we need to know what is happening in the music world and remain in close contact with the wholesalers who supply us. We have to anticipate what track or album will make it, and what music customers will want to buy and in what format. That decision is our life-blood: if we order too many copies of a new album and it doesn't sell, we lose money that could have been better spent.
Our second motto - and this is the case for all small retailers - is 'the customer is King'. And he or she is, as far as we're concerned. Sometimes customers want albums that aren't immediately available, which we'll order specially. We also specialise in music genres that aren't necessarily found elsewhere in big stores, because that's what people who come into the shop are interested in. For example we have a good selection of Country Music, German and New-Age music.
We'll even hold special 'listening evenings' if that's what we think our customers want. We recently held a New-Age music evening, which attracted 50 to 60 people. Winfried Derks, the director of an independent record company and shop called 'Simply Relax' came in and organised the music, and people loved it. Apart from showcasing local artists from time to time however, we don't have much contact with the labels or acts, certainly not on an international level. Our promotion of international stars is restricted to posters announcing new releases.
Being a small retailer is not necessarily an easy business, especially when you're in competition with large, multinational stores. You have to order the right albums in the right amounts. You have to set a price that will keep both your customers and wholesalers happy but also allow you to make a living. You have to make sure that you have sold 20% of the new releases quickly, because the last 80% of sales will be slower. You have to specialise and personalise to ensure people still come to your shop. You have to offer something different - which is why we're diversifying and have opened the internet café.
But you also need to follow the trends - I see a future where retailers and recording companies work hand in hand to offer customers the opportunity to download or burn CDs in the shops where we could offer them a choice of catalogue and packaging. This would be a tremendous opportunity for retailers like me who would be able to cut costs by ordering less physical CDs and instead offer music legally through our internet café. There's still some work to be done, but I'm prepared for the digital age, and I think it's already presenting us with lots of exciting opportunities.
I wouldn't change my job for the world. If we stick to our principles of listening to our customers and knowing what's going on in the music sector, with an eye on what's happening online, I think that the personal, one-to-one service that a small retailer can give people will always be welcome."
Dag Haggqvist, founder and owner of Swedish independent record company Gazell Records AB talks about nurturing new talent .
"Nurturing new talent is a very long term process. You have to try to keep developing artists active and positive, even though you know that in the incredibly competitive marketplace they need to be even better to have the chance of making it. In fact, you may be in contact for years with an artist before they are ready to make it.
Then you have the whole, long struggle involved in creating the right environment for the artist, musically and artistically. A very important part of this is trying to find the right individual to produce their record and guide the artist through the recording process.
It is also important to create a visual image for the artist and their album. Often we try to get a painter or graphic artist who can present visually the same level of musical quality that you want to achieve.
Many people think that artists are created by record companies. In the pop world it is an enormous task to find the right way to promote the artist to the media. At the same time, what you want to achieve is to enhance or visually promote the quality of the artist, rather than create the artist. That is rarely the case and it is not the key to success. It's really a matter of developing and adding to the individual qualities of the artist. You need to take a long perspective to achieve that."
Steve Harley, singer/songwriter on writing songs and the inspiration for them.
"For me, and I think I was like most kids who start writing songs, you start doing it because - if you like words and music - it's the next step.
Back in early '70s, you had to write songs, you had no choice. Now of course you can get a synthesiser for a couple of hundred quid, set up in your bedroom, get some samples up and write some rap stuff.
So I had to write songs. You had to prove you could get up with a guitar or a piano and play the song - regardless of studio production. Stripped to the bare bones can you sit down and play it on the piano and does it still appeal? Can you play it on acoustic guitar with no embellishment? That's a song then, rather than just a recording.
The craft is simple: verse chorus, verse chorus, middle eight, verse chorus and out - in a nutshell. They're not all like that, but that's the standard song shape and then you try and make something interesting within that framework.
I write and play songs because I have to - it's in my blood. In my house, there are five guitars in different tunings, on stands in various rooms, and two pianos, so I'm playing all the time.
When you get an idea for a song and you sit down at a piano or with a guitar and a blank sheet of paper or when you're on a plane or in your car writing that bit of lyric, you can't possibly know that it's got longevity. You've no idea whether a song has legs. Lennon used to say to McCartney. 'let's write a swimming pool', and they could do that, sit down and write a swimming pool!
I don't usually do that - although I did with Judy Teen. When the first album came out, Human Menagerie, it proved to have no hit single in this country although Sebastian was enormous in lots of European territories.
The record company said 'we don't have a single.' And I said very arrogantly, 'I'll write one, I know how to do it.' That's exactly what I said and exactly what I did. Now I think - what an arrogant young man, fearless!
Judy Teen was a boy/girl story, a teenage romance, a bit of sex in there, interesting drum rhythm, hooks all over the place - lo and behold big hit! It's a good sexy little teenage love story.
And I think most artists, except some of the great novelists, leave their best work behind in their 20s and 30s. I think after that you're rehashing your own influences. If you've had success, you're comfortable - that's when it doesn't get easier. I've had a great life - money in the bank, paintings on the wall - but to write songs when you're comfortable, what do you write about?
With Come Up And See Me (Make Me Smile) - my pension as they all call it! I hear it everywhere in the world, and I am very lucky… although I wish I had six like that!
It was easy to write because I was angry. The song is a wolf in sheep's clothing. It was written about the first Cockney Rebel, who walked out on me. Everyone thinks I sacked them (and I got a wicked reputation for that) but the fact is they resigned. They wanted to move the goalposts and I didn't, so they went off into oblivion. And I wrote Make Me Smile - thanks guys! It's a finger-poking song. 'Come up and see me', come back - I'll be laughing. It's a rather mocking song. I didn't think it would sell. The lyric was quite nasty! The inspiration was ferocious anger at them leaving and pretending I'd sacked them and for not being grateful for what I'd given them. Cockney Rebel was my concept and they wanted too much.
To write a song, you need to have something to shout about - which tends to happen when you're young. Whether it's total passionate love or whatever. When I wrote Judy Teen, I was 18 or19 when I had the experience that that song came from. Make Me Smile I was 22 and really angry! But I couched it in a mid-tempo back beat rhythm, which people get up and dance to. That's makes it rather acceptable with that great guitar solo and that Beatles rip off with the 'ooh la las' - that made it commercial, but lyrically it could be a slow, dirty blues.
You've got to look at what's happening to you, and then make that into an interesting story. As you get older, you can't write that much about a happy marriage. You can only write one or two love songs to the missus before it gets cloying and repetitive. But what's great now is that I've found the muse again. These days I'm writing about my early experiences and I've found a subject matter that I think is giving me some of the best songs I've ever written… and I'm in my early fifties now.”