If I had a label, everything would have been easier. But it wouldn’t have been the same album, from the cover art to the songs on it.
You don’t want the biggest record deal as far as money goes, you just want to make sure that the people at the label really support your band and the music and stuff.
It’s the worst feeling, going into your record label when you haven’t got a hit. It was like: ‘Maybe you’ve lost it.’ And, once you’re done, that’s it. There’s no support, or anyone to help you.
Even though my label is that of a beauty queen, I’m not going to limit myself to that, just because that’s my title.
Aborting my baby is the most serious of the many maternal crimes I tally in my head when I am at my lowest, when the Bad Mother label seems to fit best. Rocketship was my baby. And I killed him.
To ensure maximal fiber intake and to identify true whole-grain products, do the ‘flip-and-check.’ Flip to the nutrition facts label and list of ingredients on the back, and check that the product has at least three grams of fiber per serving and that whole grains is first on the ingredients list.
By the end, everybody had a label – pig, liberal, radical, revolutionary… If you had everything but a gun, you were a radical but not a revolutionary.
People label you the way they know you best.
For years, I tried to resist the hero label.
It’s more about the music and doing good shows than it is about our ethnicities. We’re not trying to label ourselves as the all-around universal ethnic group. It’s not a gimmick.
I’m a huge Cure fan. I love the Cure. The scales being tipped to when they weren’t on a major label compared to when they were seems pretty meaningless. I had the good fortune of having them go before me and seeing their careers, musically at least, lose something. Like a novel written by a dead hand.
I feel that I want what allows me to reach the largest number of people as possible, and I don’t feel ashamed of that. I think I’m the kind of artist that’s meant to be on a major label because my music is different.
I resent the label on cigarettes. If they’re going to warn you, why don’t they put the same sign at the entrance to every freeway or on every banana that’s sold? You can slip on the peel, you know.
The mark, to me, of a constructive argument is one that looks at a specific problem and says, ‘What shall we do about this?’ And a nonconstructive one is one that tries to label people.
When you’re doing a deal with someone in the southern Sahara, it’s a very different way of doing business than in London. You can’t sign them in the usual way because they’d end up getting ripped off, which would defeat the object of setting up a label like this.
We are all people… don’t label me as an LGBT rapper or a female rapper… I don’t like to be labeled.
We as label executives, we have to know the limitations of the artists.
The press don’t like to say nice things because nice is boring. It’s much better to label me the devil. What we do is not brain surgery. We are entertainers, plain and simple, and we’re responsible to bring that money back, to make a profit.
I think any label is bad. I’m more than a label.
Every project might only sell like 30 to 50,000, but I mean, I’m getting seven, eight dollars every CD. I make more money per record than an artist on a major label – I can definitely say that.
Because with Black Label and all the fans it’s just one big family.
Being a musician, especially at the major label where you work for so long, it becomes a cycle. Write a record, make a record, tour. It’s just this cycle, and I don’t think there’s any life built into it with time to assimilate what’s going on in front of you and what’s going on in your head.
I’ll always work with Stones Throw, but I’m trying to start my own label to release my old material and sign new artists. I want to do everything from rock, to jazz, to electronic, to noise records and movie sound tracks. Both sampled and original music.
We had a heroic attitude to artistic freedom, and we thought normal contracts were a bit vulgar – somehow not punk. But that was the whole point – we weren’t a regular record label.
After giving countless hit songs, I felt saturated. I decided to do music only for my own films and music albums. And so, I decided to start my own music label.
You shouldn’t feel you have to label yourself for someone else to understand you. You should be able to feel what you want to feel and that’s okay.
My favorite record label of all time is Motown. That era of music was my favorite.
I just had it with the corporate money, money, money label thing.
There’s this label called Neurotica by these sweet girls that have given me some lovely things to wear, and we might collaborate on making a little piece. They’re really lovely, and I think they’ve been quite inspired by me in turn.
In terms of trying to inspire other people with faith to play and stuff I am very proud of that. I remember seeing Muslim athletes or guys with other faiths performing and still carrying the label of being a religious person and it does inspire people.
I don’t like labels, but if you have to put a label on it, I’m a gay man.
I try not to see myself as anything, as that would be embarrassing. But if I had to label myself, I’d probably say I was an artist due to the fact that I enjoy working within the arts on different platforms, of which comedy is just one.
One of the key problems is that the Germans know what they do because everywhere they go there’s a ‘made in Germany’ label on it – they can feel proud of Volkswagens and Audis and Mercedes.
It’s not a giant thrill to hear someone give you the label ‘manic-depressive,’ but to me I was so relieved. What I was suffering from had a name and could be treated.
It became a question of do I want to be on a label where it could take three years to put out a record instead of putting out three records over the same period of time on my own.
Anyone who’s an executive at a record label does not understand what the Internet is, how it works, how people use it, how fans and consumers interact – no idea. I’m surprised they know how to use e-mail.
I got introduced to Maps by my label, and I liked his sound. I had been living with the original version of ‘Younger’ for quite a long time when I heard the result of his remix, and I loved it. It actually made me find a new love for the track.
Because we are Nashville-based and predominately a country label, people obviously think of us in that way, and that’s fine.
If you’re on an indie label, you’re not getting enough money. And if you’re on a major, you’re not getting enough support.
I realized how important it was to have a good team – manager, attorney and label. It’s not just about putting out a record and somebody signing you.
My family makes these vinegars – out of everything from grapes to peaches and cherries. We go through the whole process with the giant vat and drainer, label them, and give them as Christmas presents.
I sometimes look on YouTube and see people label videos ‘Anthony Yarde sparring his trainer Ade’ but that is not sparring, that’s just practice. We practice getting attacked, countering and attacking your opponent back, in intelligent ways.
While working for Diplomat Records, I helped several artists with their online branding and social media. Once I left the label, I worked directly with artists and noticed many artists were overlooked and underrated if they weren’t in ‘XXL’ or ‘The Source.’
A sociopath is just a label and doesn’t encompass the entire being of a person.
It’s great to be able to find a way to release your music and do what you want to do artistically and not have to just worry about being accepted by the major label industry.
There’s all kinds of mothers, so to use the label ‘mother’ and to think you really understood all that a human being is because she’s a mother, is a mistake.
I was actually really stunned that my label suggested ‘Door’ as the single to lead with, as it’s such a long and winding song.
It’s an album that is a little bit different and probably isn’t easy to get out. It’s not likely that a major label would have picked it up and said that they had a smash hit record.
Plain white T-shirts do it for me every time. You can spend anything from £3 to £50 on a T-shirt, but I’ve bought some great ones from H&M, as well as shelling out on Duffer Of St George and a Polish label I discovered while filming ‘Robin Hood’ in Hungary called Scotch And Soda.
When the label came to me to say, ‘would you like to do another record,’ I said, ‘Well I got these sixteen songs sitting here, so let’s do it.’ And that was pretty much it… I never stopped writing, it’s just the way that the business is now; you just try to find a different model.
The president says, ‘What difference does it make what you call the enemy?’ Are you kidding me? As an intelligence officer, I would never get away with that. I could never say, ‘Well, you know, boss, I don’t label this enemy that we’re facing.’
You get dinged for wanting to do a comedy, then wanting to do a big-budget action film, and then wanting to do an indie. But you can’t let other people trying to label you get in the way of trying to do something artistically.
I don’t like the intellectual label.
I think the line is where you’re in the studio, you’re creating. That belongs to you as an artist. Nothing should taint that. I shouldn’t be thinking about what the fans want, I shouldn’t be thinking about what the radio wants, what the label wants, what your manager wants, a song for the chicks, a song for the street.
