parent company?

[kantlover]

i am compiling a list of TRULY indie rock labels, record companies that do not have a giant corporate partner/parent. is matador independent? i read on the faq matador recently "extricated" from capitol... care to elaborate?

thanks... this is for a school project so any info would be greatly appreciated.

gratzi

[tinobeat]

far as I know, Beggars Banquet, the company that Matador is now affiliated with (owned by?) is completely independent. No more Capitol or Atlantic...

so yeah, Matador is an indie again...

[Patrick]

kantlover, Matador and Capitol ended their joint venture in 1999 when co-presidents Chris Lombardi and Gerard Cosloy bought back their stake in the label from the major.

In August, Chris and Gerard began another joint venture company, this time with another independent label, the UK's Beggars Group (also home of 4AD, XL, Too Pure, Mo' Wax, Beggars Banquet and others).

Chris and Gerard own 50% of Matador, and Beggars Group own the other 50%.

As part of this deal, several Matador staffmembers moved over to Group positions where they work on Matador releases as well as other Group releases. At the same time, the US branch of Beggars moved into the Matador offices where the two companies now share space. In the UK, Matador maintains its separate (though smaller) offices.

In addition, Matador maintains its direct-sales distribution company in the US (selling to 300 key independent stores), and now distributes all the other Beggars labels to these stores as well. One Beggars employee moved over to Matador Distribution so that the extra volume could be taken on.

Matador maintains a staff of 10 in the US and 3 in the UK.

For full info, check out the press release from August:

http://www.matadorrecords.com/beggars.html

Patrick

[winterwooskie]

is it true the beggars people don't shower much and are smelling up the office?

[anagrama]

Originally posted by winterwooskie
is it true the beggars people don't shower much and are smelling up the office?

that was so simple...

it actually made me laugh.

*pictures homeless group on street with sign "need money to fund bardo bond LP pressing + food"

:)

ahh, those crazy beggars.

[Gerard]

the bit about "beggars people not showering" was ridiculous, offensive and wrong.

However, there might be some confusion because the showers at the Beggars/Matador office on lower broadway were recently shut down. Our hot water bill was through the roof --- if you're wondering why the "obstacle 1" video is shorter than the song's album version, well, we spent all the money on showers.

We're trying to be cost conscious and as a result, the showers are closed, as are the whirlpool, sauna, steamroom and tanning salon. All staff are encouraged to continue maintaining both companies' excellent standards of hygiene --- on their own time, at home.

I am hopefully that we won't have to remove pheasant from the commissary menu. But if you fuckers keep burning CD's for friends, we're switching to hamburger helper.

GC

[anagrama]

I can picture Gerard being the hugh hefner of indie rock.

He would wear a robe and lead aspiring rock bands through the offices of Matador.

"This is wear Mary Tim--oh, I mean our playmate of the year...sleeps, this is the room where Stephen Malkmus copies and pastes pieces of paper for artwork/kidnapping letters...in the spa the fellows from Interpol tan while dressed in black suits and sunglasses. Here's the fireplace where we keep warm at night burning old useless Arsonists LP's."

[Gerard]

I thought Matt Ransford turned off the webcam when he left!

(there's nothing useless about Arsonists LP's)

[tinobeat]

no no, see, the fire place is where they "delete" old Sportsguitar albums...

btw, what is the difference between "Out Of Print" and "Deleted"? I would guess that OOP means it could possibly be repressed, but Deleted is more final. So why are the Sportsguitar records deleted? are they even around anymore?

Best band name in rock music, I tell you.

[mac]

...and not a bad band to go along with the name. least when I saw them ('94-95). all: pastels/Visser/Swell Maps shamble.


and amiable to boot.


though I didn't hear their Matador CD's.



ah, well..

[Funk]

Originally posted by tinobeat
no no, see, the fire place is where they "delete" old Sportsguitar albums...

btw, what is the difference between "Out Of Print" and "Deleted"? I would guess that OOP means it could possibly be repressed, but Deleted is more final. So why are the Sportsguitar records deleted?

Martin, perhaps you should stop using Everything Is Nice as a reference. Matador's online discography (http://www.matadorrecords.com/releases/discography.html) shows that the two Sportsguitar albums are hardly the only deleted items released in the last 5 or 6 years.

[tinobeat]

oh Vic, Vic...

I didn't say I thought Sportsguitars albums were the ONLY ones deleted... They were just the ones I noticed and remembered.

my question remains. why do some go OOP and some get the big D?

[beekeeper]

In August, Chris and Gerard began another joint venture company, this time with another independent label, the UK's Beggars Group (also home of 4AD, XL, Too Pure, Mo' Wax, Beggars Banquet and others).

this is actually going to seem like a really silly question...but... how does it work when a label is an umbrella to other labels? Ok, that probably didn't make sense...see, I thought that Beggars Group was a distributor, and that the labels underneath it (XL, 4AD, the whole shebang) were distributed by Beggars Group...like I said, this is probably a dumb question, and sometimes I don't fully follow some of the relationships within labels. anyway, thanks for any answers w/ this!

[mojo]

how it works. I work for the Beggars Group so my time works out between all the labels, currently busiest with Matador, 4ad and XL, but all labels are pretty busy in general.

Each label has a set number of staff who only work for the label, (ie there's two people at 4ad, one at Beggars Banquet, eight at XL) and it works like that.

in the US I think its pretty much the same, there's dedicated Matador staff, and everyone else in the US office works for all labels.

I bet that made no sense...

[Funk]

Originally posted by Patrick
kantlover, Matador and Capitol ended their joint venture in 1999 when co-presidents Chris Lombardi and Gerard Cosloy bought back their stake in the label from the major.

In August, Chris and Gerard began another joint venture company, this time with another independent label, the UK's Beggars Group (also home of 4AD, XL, Too Pure, Mo' Wax, Beggars Banquet and others).

Chris and Gerard own 50% of Matador, and Beggars Group own the other 50%.

Philosophical question: Does this really make Matador "independent"?

[Gerard]

"Philosophical question: Does this really make Matador 'independent'?"

Depends on your definition. If you mean indepedent as in the dictionary definition, most certainly not. If you mean independent in the record biz parlance of not-owned-or-distributed by any of the Big 5, than yeah, we're kind of independent.

On the other hand, our primary US distributor, ADA, is a Time-Warner company. So we're not independent at all!

[Funk]

Originally posted by Gerard
"Philosophical question: Does this really make Matador 'independent'?"

Depends on your definition. If you mean indepedent as in the dictionary definition, most certainly not. If you mean independent in the record biz parlance of not-owned-or-distributed by any of the Big 5, than yeah, we're kind of independent.

On the other hand, our primary US distributor, ADA, is a(n AOL) Time-Warner company. So we're not independent at all!

Well that's what I mean. Years ago in the CMJ (the radio version, not the newstand) they did a story on indie labels vs indie labels with major affiliations, and how a label is deemed "independent". The owner of Drag City commented that they weren't an independent label because they were dependent on getting paid by their distributors to in order to survive.

[dola]

two words:


Chan Case

[jt. r]

Originally posted by Funk
Philosophical question: Does this really make Matador "independent"?

this really isn't a philosophical question-it's economical.
/piss-take