NEW YORK - From clothes to kicks to the liquor they sip, rappers are label connoisseurs. With their attention to trends in both play and work, it s no surprise that they are record label conscious too. But at a time when record sales have plummeted, making a living in hip-hop has gotten tough.
Now, Koch s image is shifting as their business models tempt artists who prioritize pocketing a profit over becoming a megastar. And recently, Koch has been successfully breaking new, hot artists such as Jim Jones ("We Fly High") and Unk ("Walk It Out"). "It s like, do I want to look like I have money or do I actually want to have money?
(Koch) is not like a graveyard, but more like a retirement pension." "The old model of business with majors is out of date like dinosaurs," says music and MTV personality Xzibit, who left Columbia Records to release his sixth album, "Full Circle," in October through his Koch imprint Open Bar Entertainment. Eighty percent of the company s sales stem from their hip-hop division; last year rap sales topped $40 million, Koch says.
In September, Grammy-award winning group Bone Thugs-N-Harmony released their first album in four years through Koch. "Thug Stories" reached the No. 1 spot on Billboard s top independent albums chart and No.
7 on the top R B/hip-Hop charts. Despite that, Bone Thugs signed to industry giant Interscope, which is a division of the conglomerate Universal Music Group, for the release of their next album. Layzie emphasizes, though, that he has no intention of abandoning Koch for good.
He plans to use his Interscope-generated hype to amp sales of his solo work through Koch. He insists, "Koch is always my home." Cross promotion is key.
B.G. is piggybacking on the success of fellow labelmate T.
I. with a rap on the platinum-rapper s remix for the song "Top Back." Atlantic s golden boy is also executive producing B.
G. s album. Atlantic also boasts an aggressive digital campaign.
Expanding into digital marketplaces isn t as much of a priority at Koch, offering a glimpse into their low-frills strategy for putting music out and money in the pockets of their artists. "I still think it s all about radio and video," says Alan Grunblatt, Koch s executive vice president and general manager. He admits that there are limitations on even doing that, due to the smaller budgets of an independent.
"We re basically self-financed and we have to be very smart and careful," says Grunblatt. "For example, on a recording budget, instead of spending fifty-thousand dollars a track, we are going to try to get it done for five or ten (thousand). We re going to spend a lot more time doing research on the top new producers instead of going to the hot producers we can t afford.
" Koch doesn t necessarily see this as a liability. Keeping an ear to the ground for new talent, Koch executives say, means the label is continually connected to the fresh voices of the street. And as a smaller label, they can take more risks, allowing the artists creativity to run wild.
"(Sometimes major labels) just A R these records to death," says Grunblatt, of how images, sounds and visions are often tinkered and toyed with by executives at majors. "We go for real, hard-core street artists. Everybody wants to find the next Tupac.
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