Music Rights Quotes

I feel very lucky to get to fly the flag of RCA Records and Sony Music.

One of the biggest wake-up calls of my career was when I saw a record contract. I said, 'Wait - you sell it for $18.98 and I make 80 cents? And I have to pay you back the money you lent me to make it and then you own it?'

I have had the good fortune to experience both the limelight and the traffic light as a musician. I did my first recording on my own and it was available at concerts. The second to seventh were released on small and then large labels. My eighth to 14th were done under my own steam once again, but with the benefit of the Internet.

I do have a lot of music out.

I had to put me foot down with the first record company. It was about 1975, when singers were being given names like Gary Glitter and Alvin Stardust, so they wanted to call me Benny Santini just because me dad's an Irish-Italian with an ice-cream business!

It's not an uncommon event for artists and labels to part ways - Patty Loveless, Vince Gill both did - and it often happens for the better.

I want to do, like, 50 records.

Major labels act as banks in terms of how they produce and release your album. No major label is really good or bad; they just 100 per cent operate as a business, which makes sense... no hard feelings.

In the old days, people shared music; they didn't care who made it. A song would be owned by a village, and anyone could sing it, change the words, whatever. That is how humans treated music until the late 19th century. Now, with the Internet, we are going back to having tribal attitudes towards music.

Translation and UnitedMasters, which is all one company, is my vision and my dream, and I think it's today's reality of the convergence between storytelling, technology, and culture.

I'm continuing to produce and will start a new record soon, as well.

The fact that you can't base a coffeehouse on any other rock band is the other rock bands' problem, not mine.

Well, I had a record deal since I was 18, and it got me where I am.

I think that Napster is the greatest invention since sliced bread. Napster, to me, is liberation and freedom for artists.

Charts and learning the politics behind making a record - it's pretty soulless.

I have been with the record company and Tommy was there doing records with other people.

I'm one of the few that comes from this vantage point: I never tried to get a record deal.

Being on United Artists was almost as bad as not being on any label at all. They were the crappiest in the business. All they did was movie soundtracks. Now, they were making an effort to become much hipper - signing people like Bobby Womack and what have you.

My passion is music, you know, and music influences culture, influences lifestyle, which leads me to 'Roc-A-Wear'. I was forced to be an entrepreneur, so that led me to be CEO of 'Roc-A-Fella' records, which lead to Def Jam.

The very first big one I had was 'Turn Around and Look At Me.'

For new bands, I think a major label is the safest place to be. Independent labels are the ones getting away with murder. A lot of them are hobbyists who rip-off young bands, taking advantage of people who would never get signed to a major.

I think that's the problem in a lot of music. We've got these record labels.

I really hate it when I see other bands selling their music to commercials.

I remember telling the head of Warner Brothers that if they'd just make a video for 'Ol' Red'... and if it didn't work, they could drop me from the label.

My next baby will be my new record.