There’s a startling report in music industry website hitsdailydouble.com about the legendary Atlantic Records.
According to hits, executives are playing a Game of Thrones and are at war as the label has yielded very low sales and bled money.
Right now, Atlantic — which has made it through decades with many generations of hits — is in trouble. They have just two albums in the top 50 — Charlie XCX’s “Brat” and the “Twisters” soundtrack.
Mainstay artists like Ed Sheeran and Bruno Mars have not been releasing music. At the same time, Atlantic has not been developing new artists.
Hits says the label’s biggest mistake was a $400 million investment in something called 300 Entertainment. 300 — which is all hardcore rap artists — has produced no hits and no real names.
Several of their artists — including Gunna and Young Thug — are part of a massive 56 count RICO Indictment from the US government. According to NY Magazine’s Vulture, YSL — which stands for Young Stoner Life Records — is part of 300 Management. They have an 88 page indictment against them alleging “182 instances of the collective’s participation in gang activity and criminal conspiracies, citing lyrics, social-media posts, and clothing or accessories with SLIME emblazoned on them as evidence.”
Of course, all of this somehow relates to Lyor Cohen, who started out working with Russell Simmons (currently living out of the country) with Def Jam Records. Then he joined Edgar Bronfman, Jr in the eight year destruction of Warner Music Group. He founded 300 Entertainment in 2016. Cohen is currently the head of music at YouTube.
But now hitsdailydouble.com speculates that Cohen is waiting for his good friend, Julie Greenwald, to leave Atlantic — where she was recently deposed — to form a new company. Hits say they will try and poach Sheeran and Mars, although for those two big stars leave Atlantic — part of the current Warner Music — seems insane.
Atlantic somehow got themselves into this mess by not developing artists and letting stars like Sheeran and Mars slide into an abyss. Right now, Atlantic has no new releases on schedule this fall according to hits.
Hits, always irreverent, concludes their piece this way: “Julie and Lyor could be successful in their next venture(s), to be sure, but don’t get in their way or they’ll run you over with a cement truck and throw your body in the East River.”
This is quite a fall from Atlantic’s halcyon days under founders Ahmet and Nesuhi Ertegun. They built the label of Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, Sam & Dave into an R&B behemoth, then developed Crosby, Stills & Nash and Led Zeppelin, among others. The newer regimes had dozens of pop hits in the 2000s with Matchbox Twenty, Kelly Clarkson, etc.
But recent public issues for their acts — like Lizzo’s lawsuits — have made them vulnerable to exec takeovers and rampant gossip. Lizzo, for example, is frozen as an artist until her lawsuits are settled or dismissed. They have two acts that could help them– Jack Harlow and Coldplay — but otherwise, to quote U2, they’re stuck in a moment and they can’t get out of it.
