At Sony Music, a Plan to Dominate the Industry

By BEN SISARIO

A huge self-portrait of Bono hangs in the Madison Avenue office of Doug Morris, the new chief executive of Sony Music Entertainment, and on a nearby table sit his snapshots, arm-in-arm with Tupac Shakur and Snoop Dogg. Along with a determination to dominate the music industry, Mr. Morris brought them from his last job as head of the Universal Music Group.

“My plan here is very simple,” he said on a recent visit, leaning back in his sofa. “To help create the pre-eminent record company in the world.”

Mr. Morris, one of music’s reigning patriarchs, took over Sony in July, after 15 years at Universal. He is widely seen as the most capable hand to steady Sony’s music division, which has been plagued by internal quarrels since its merger with BMG in 2004. So far he has been aggressive in trying to remake the company, the home of artists like Bruce Springsteen, Beyoncé and Usher.

At 72, his age and experience summon up the inevitable charge that as part of the industry’s old guard he is ill-equipped to thrive in the digital age. Mr. Morris rejects that notion, pointing out his role in creating Vevo, the hugely successful music video site.

Yet Mr. Morris is also an embodiment of one of the unchanging realities of the music business: that despite all the changes in technology, there is still money to be made in hits, and staying successful means holding on to a bigger piece of a shrinking pie. One way he has done that is hiring strong creative executives who can spot the next stars.

“He is a master at attracting and developing executive talent,” said Jon Landau, Mr. Springsteen’s manager. “No one is better at picking the people who pick the hit artists.”

Last Friday afternoon, after months of talks, Mr. Morris signed his first major new deal, with Dr. Luke, the pop producer behind big hits by Katy Perry and Kesha. It creates a record label, Kemosabe Records, to be financed by Sony and run by Dr. Luke in Los Angeles. And, perhaps most valuably, it also gives Sony exclusive rights to Dr. Luke’s services as a producer for five years.

Already sounding like a label boss, Dr. Luke said between the signing and the Champagne last Friday: “I plan to sign only artists that I really love and really want to work with. I also believe that songs are the bloodline of a label, so I will still be instrumental in creating and acquiring them.” Dr. Luke is a 38-year-old former guitarist with the “Saturday Night Live” band whose real name is Lukasz Gottwald.

Mr. Morris, a creature of habit, called the Dr. Luke deal an attempt “to duplicate a magic trick” 21 years ago — his bankrolling of Interscope Records, which was co-founded by the producer Jimmy Iovine and has become one of the most successful labels in the business. Dr. Luke, Mr. Morris said several times in an interview, is his new Jimmy.

“He’s the best guy at the moment, as far as a writer and a producer,” he said. “He and Jimmy are very different, but it’s the same kind of level of intellect and talent.”

In turn, Dr. Luke seemed ready to adopt Mr. Morris as a mentor.

“Doug has an amazing history, creating labels, finding talent,” he said. “I felt there is a lot I could learn from him.”

Mr. Iovine, for his part, said he was still close with Mr. Morris, but noted that they were now playing for different teams. “If we played on the Lakers and he got traded to the Knicks, I would still love him,” he said. “But when we get on the game floor, we still compete.”

Kemosabe will become Sony’s fourth label division, with Dr. Luke reporting directly to Mr. Morris. The label is expected to become operational in January, and Dr. Luke will have free rein to hire staff members and sign artists. One trade-off: because he can now produce only Sony artists, Dr. Luke will not be able to work with Ms. Perry, who records for EMI.

Mr. Morris started his career in the 1960s as a songwriter (he co-wrote the Chiffons’ “Sweet Talkin’ Guy”) and held top positions at Atlantic Records and the Warner Music Group before Edgar M. Bronfman Jr. hired him in 1995 to run the collection of labels that would become the Universal Music Group.

Late last year, Mr. Morris stunned the industry when it emerged that he would take over Universal’s biggest competitor, going head-to-head against his former protégé, Lucian Grainge, Universal’s new chairman. The two are expected to bid aggressively for artists and for Cash Money and Big Machine, two independent labels whose distribution deals with Universal are expiring soon.

Since taking over Sony, Mr. Morris has replaced top executives in Sony’s international division and streamlined the label structure, a process that resulted in dozens of layoffs and shuttered several prominent labels, like Jive and Arista. He hired a longtime Universal lieutenant, Antonio Reid, who is known as L.A., to revamp the sluggish Epic label, by separating it from the Columbia umbrella and making it an independent division.

How much leeway Mr. Morris will have is unclear. Music, while representing a fairly small part of the overall business for the Sony Corporation, has been profitable. Yet the corporation itself is troubled. Last week it announced that it expected to lose $1.2 billion this year.

Because of his influential position running Universal, Mr. Morris is often blamed for all the mistakes that the major labels made in the early digital age. In a remark he will never live down, he once called iPods “repositories of stolen music.”

“All the major label heads spent years mistakenly trying things they thought would change consumer behavior,” said Fred Goldring, a former music lawyer who now invests in media and technology companies. “Their attitude was, ‘We’re not going to let anybody take our content and create new businesses that we’re not getting enriched by.’ But as a result they stifled innovation.”

Mr. Morris says his stubbornness in negotiations over digital music helped protect the rights of artists and record labels. He also rejects the idea, whispered and blogged about when he went to Sony, that he is simply too old to run a company reliant on youth culture and fresh technology.

“In each company that I’ve gone to run, that’s always been the same question,” Mr. Morris said. “And each company has gone to be the No. 1 company and the most innovative company. And I think the reason I’m never getting the credit for this is because I’m the oldest guy.”

Yet in one of his mantras, he also made it clear that no matter how music was delivered, the most important thing for a record company was simply to release music that people would want to listen to again and again.

“Our core focus still needs to be developing hits,” he said. “That’s the only constant amidst all the change. So if you don’t get that right it doesn’t matter how revolutionary the distribution model is or how many revenue streams you have. You still have to have the hits.”

重演魔術秀找來超級經紀人路克博士幫忙挖掘新秀，迎戰數位時代…
樂壇老將莫里斯 奏Sony新樂章

走進Sony音樂娛樂公司新執行長莫里斯（Doug Morris）位於紐約麥迪遜大道的辦公室，U2樂團主唱波諾的巨幅自畫像映入眼簾，旁邊是莫里斯和2PAC（已故饒舌歌手）及史努比狗狗的合影。莫里斯把過去在環球音樂（Universal Music ）工作的照片帶在身邊，為的是時時提醒自己縱橫音樂界的理想。

靠在沙發上的莫里斯說：「我的計畫很簡單，就是在世界上打造卓越的唱片公司。」

莫里斯是至今仍活躍於市場的少數音樂界元老之一，今年7月離開工作長達15年的環球音樂，接下Sony音樂執行長。2004年Sony與BMG合併至今風波不斷，莫里斯被視為最有能力穩定軍心的人選，上任以來積極重塑這個旗下擁有史普林斯汀、碧昂絲和亞瑟小子等知名歌手的唱片公司。

儘管外界對這位身處數位時代的老將有些疑慮，72歲的莫里斯無視他人眼光，強調自己在MV網站Vevo上的亮麗表現。

莫里斯很清楚音樂產業一個不變的真理：即使科技不斷進步，熱門唱片仍是賺錢的法寶；只要保持成功，就能在不斷萎縮的市場中掌握較大的那一塊餅。為此他請來一流的創意總監，幫他挖掘下一顆閃亮的星。

史普林斯汀的經理人蘭道（Jon Landau）說：「莫里斯懂得如何吸引、培養一批管理長才，沒人比莫里斯更擅長挑選經紀人。」

這個月初，莫里斯剛簽下為凱蒂佩芮和惡女凱莎等暢銷歌手專輯操刀的路克博士（Dr. Luke）。Sony將為路克博士經營的Kemosabe Records提供資金，並獲得路克博士五年合約的獨家大禮。

莫里斯把路克博士的合約視為「魔術再現」的機會。莫里斯20多年前為Interscope Records提供財務資助，這是一家由製作人吉米艾文（Jimmy Iovine）共同創辦的唱片公司，後來成為最成功的音樂品牌之一。莫里斯多次稱路克博士為「下一個吉米」。

Kemosabe將成為Sony第四個唱片品牌，由路克博士直接向莫里斯匯報，預計明年1月正式營運。

莫里斯1960年代以作曲者的身份跨入樂壇，在大西洋唱片（Atlantic Records）和華納音樂（Warner Music）歷任重要職位，1995年被小布朗夫曼（Edgar Bronfman Jr.）延攬，經營後來成為環球集團的多個唱片品牌。

去年，莫里斯入主Sony、成為環球最大競爭者的消息震撼音樂界，因為他將直接槓上子弟兵、現任環球音樂執行長格蘭奇（Lucian Grainge）。外界預料，兩人未來將積極爭取歌手，以及與環球合約即將到期的兩個獨立音樂品牌--Cash Money和Big Machine。

莫里斯上任Sony執行長以來，大舉汰換國際部門的高階主管，精簡公司的組織架構（包括裁員、關閉幾個唱片品牌）。他還找來環球老將雷德（Antonio Reid），把銷售疲軟的Epic唱片從哥倫比亞唱片（Columbia）中獨立出來。

莫里斯過去在環球音樂的顯著地位，讓他經常因為大唱片公司在數位時代早期的錯誤決策被批評。莫里斯曾形容iPod是「盜拷音樂的儲藏所」，時過境遷，這句話如今可能讓他覺得尷尬，卻令世人難以淡忘。外界也批評莫里斯年紀太大，不適合轉戰到一家仰賴年輕文化和新科技的唱片公司，但他絲毫不放在心上，認為年齡和資歷是自己最大的資產。（取材自紐約時報）

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/08/business/media/at-sony-music-a-plan-to-dominate-the-industry.html

2011-11-28/經濟日報/A8版/國際人物 編譯 余曉惠