Sure. But I'm half-blind, so someone else better fire it. I'd hate to miss!:lol:

:lol:

 

:laugh3: Good grief.

Got the next batch of hot dogs ready to serve up.

 

You can find the first batch here.

 

First up, Mr. Hands issued a press release this morning summarizing all the changes that will be taking place, and where he wants to take the company. Finally found a full copy of the official press release here

 

EMI Group announces fundamental restructuring of Recorded Music Division to respond to the needs of artists and consumers London, 15 January 2007 — EMI Group is today announcing a series of wide-ranging initiatives within its Recorded Music division to enable the group to become the world’s most innovative, artist friendly and consumer-focused music company.

 

In a series of presentations to staff, artists and managers, Guy Hands, EMI Group’s chairman, is unveiling a fundamental reshaping of the business to reflect the rapidly-changing nature of the music industry. The changes include:

 

Repositioning EMI’s labels to ensure they will be completely focussed on A&R and maximising the potential of all their artists

 

Developing a new partnership with artists, based on transparency and trust, and helping all artists monetise the value of their work by opening new income streams such as enhanced digital services and corporate sponsorship arrangements

Bringing together all the group’s key support activities including sales, marketing manufacturing and distribution into a single division with a unified global leadership

 

The elimination of significant duplications within the group to simplify processes and reduce waste

The changes, which will be implemented over the next six months, will enable the group to invest more in its A&R operations both to identify and sign promising new artists and to maximise the potential of its existing roster.

 

The restructuring is being carried out following an intense three-month consultation review of the business by Terra Firma since it acquired the business last year and many of the measures being implemented have come at the suggestion of staff, artists or their managers.

The restructuring will also enable the group to capture significant efficiencies and cost reductions which are expect to reduce costs by up to £200 million per year. The restructuring is also expected to lead to a worldwide headcount reduction within the group of between 1,500 and 2,000.

 

Guy Hands commented: “We have spent a long time looking intensely at EMI and the problems faced by its Recorded Music division which, like the rest of the music industry, has been struggling to respond to the challenges posed by a digital environment

 

“We believe we have devised a new revolutionary structure for the group that will improve every area of the business. In short it will make EMI’s music more valuable for the company and its artists alike. The changes we are announcing today will ensure that this iconic company will be creating wonderful music in a way that is profitable and sustainable.”

 

 

Coldplay's Manager spoke briefly to the Financial Times: "Dave Holmes, who manages Coldplay, says he is keeping an open mind before hearing the full plan. However, he says he would 'definitely not' advise one of the new artists he represents to sign to EMI because 'it's a label which is going through too much change'."

 

On the gist of "corporate sponsorship" from here "He is looking to tie-up artists to major sponsors in the same way that football teams are. Bands who are not destined for global success could also link up with local sponsors to help break into the student market under his plans." Because you know, students, with their hard-core indie sensibilities would have no problem embracing local corporate sponsorship for one of their local bands. :freak:

 

Finally I found this article about Guy Hand's background and track record if anyone wants to know a little more.

 

The big meetings are going to take place all day today apparently, so we probably won't hear more until after they take place and the managers themselves know more about what is happening.

Does anyone want to help me crash a poll?

 

Would you like to see albums sponsored?

^thanks so much for all this information, mo. it saves me such time coming the nets! and i just voted in that poll...i was thinking about starting one in the lounge (if no one else has already; i havent checked yet!) well, i figure most of the answers in the poll would be a loud NO to corporate sponsorship, but i'm more interested in the debates behind it all.

At the same time though, if they do just go ahead and release it though EMI, they will own the copyright and could do all sorts of evil things with it. And are inclined to under the new regime. It sounds like this started because the last voices of reason who would keep it from happening were being let go.

 

and this could also go to not releasing a dvd! I don't know about the rest of you but I'm still waiting on that damn dvd more than the next album! :bigcry:

Wah??!!?? Some people actually voted 'yes'!! Money is taking over the world!

and this could also go to not releasing a dvd! I don't know about the rest of you but I'm still waiting on that damn dvd more than the next album! :bigcry:

 

I have it on dvd... :)

 

 

 

but with ads and logos as I recorded it off tv. :(

Latest updates from the hotdog factory:

 

As is now widely known, the Rolling Stones have abandoned EMI for Universal. EMI insists that it is only for one album, but it doesn't look like that. http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/article3200821.ece

 

Another top boss from the old regime has been kicked out: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/jan/17/3

 

A former EMI executive has written about the company's history of infighting (don't read if you can't handle a passing negative comment about Coldplay... you have been warned): EMI: A giant at war with itself

 

 

 

And finally, there have been plenty of various write-ups about the whole situation. Here are some of the more interesting ones:

 

- The Wall Street Journal has a writeup about how most of the changes are actually very sensible ones that should have happened years ago. The Strong Will Survive at EMI

"EMI tells us it will begin doing what it should have been doing all along -- signing fewer acts, developing the ones with potential, then marshaling its resources to market their records and ensure they're properly compensated."

 

 

- The "chief rock critic" for the Times writes about how although the industry needs a shakeup, Mr. Hands attitude may be what ultimately sinks things: The Guy to save the music industry?

"It's not that all of his ideas are awful. Rather, it's the arrogance of their execution that seems set to trigger an exodus."

 

- Lastly, this is hilarious. On how business people just don't get it: Any fool can write, it takes a genius to have a meeting

". . What do you mean, that’s not their job? It’s just a bit of writing, isn’t it? Anyone can do that. What do you mean, why don’t I give it a go myself then? I told you before. I’M TOO BUSY. Understand?"

Just a thought on LOCAL sponsorship of local artists. I don't have a problem with it because it's one hand washing the otherr and it's a community supporting each other. It's nothing like big money making more big money on the backs of bands and fans. Here in Kingston, when we have a large music event, each artist is often sponsored by a local bar or restoraunt. Everyone gets cross-promotion, everyone wins. Not at all the same.(and generally, our market is students with indie values...just saying.)

Coldplay to release new album with EMI

 

 

British band Coldplay will be releasing its long-awaited new album with EMI, the troubled record label that has been abandoned by artists including The Rolling Stones and Radiohead, it was reported today.

 

David Holmes, Coldplay's manager, has been reported as saying that the group plans to release its fourth album through EMI early this summer.

 

The band are currently putting the finishing touches to it and recently quashed rumours that it is to be called Prospekt.

 

Writing on their official website on January 30, from Devon in the UK, the group said: "Back home for a few days. A brief rest before the final push.

 

"Another five weeks and we should be home and dry: another ten mixes and re-recording one of the songs from scratch."

 

At that time the band did nothing to dispel the rumour that they were considering quitting EMI, which was taken over by Guy Hands' private equity group Terra Firma for £3.2bn last year. Indeed, Mr Holmes told The Times newspaper last month that "Coldplay have a lot of options."

 

Several artists are thought to have threatened to abandon the company, including Robbie Williams, whose manager Tim Clarke, has accused Mr Hands of "behaving like a plantation owner" at EMI.

 

However, of the furore surrounding EMI, Coldplay's manager, Dave Holmes, told Billboard.com yesterday: "When all that was going on we were over here in the studio, so we kind of steered clear of all that. We've got a great plan in place.

 

"We're just about finished. They're in the final mixing. They'll start mastering, and away we go. It's a fantastic record. They've really put the work in."

 

The band have been working on the untitled album since November 2006.

 

Mr Holmes told Billboard.com that Coldplay's fourth album is set for an early release this summer, with a tour of North America and Europe to follow.

 

Last month, Mr Hands confirmed plans to offload a number of artists. He told the Daily Telegraph: "About a third of the artists who sign with EMI never make an album.

 

"We're going to drop a fair number of them. You've got to get them to a level where you can provide a super service."

 

EMI currently has more than 14,000 acts under contract. Mr Hands also plans to slash around 6,000 jobs.

 

EMI did not have an immediate comment on the report.

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/02/22/bcnemi122.xml

Guy Hands feels the strain of EMI takeover

 

EMI's Brit award-winning Kylie

 

Guy Hands has admitted that his takeover of EMI has not gone to plan and has taken a far greater emotional strain than he had expected.

 

However, the chief executive of private equity group Terra Firma said the transformation of the business was on track and insisted that it would be seen as a success.

 

Mr Hands, who has courted controversy for his handling of long-standing artists at the music group, home to stars such as Coldplay and Kylie Minogue, said it has been a struggle to change 25 years of tradition of how the music business operates.

 

Asked by delegates at the SuperReturn private equity conference in Munich whether his first 100 days at the group had gone to plan, he said: "The honest answer to that is no."

 

"Strategically and financially we are 100pc there, but emotionally and physically it has been harder than we thought."

 

"The power and the decision has sat with the A&R man, who is someone who gets up late in the day, listens to lots of music, goes to clubs, spends his time with artists and has a knack of knowing what would sell.

 

"They were committing money with no sign off, no nothing."

 

"What we are doing is taking the power away from the A&R guys and putting it with the suits - the guys who have to work out how to sell music. Trying to persuade 260 people to give up their power has been hard."

 

"We had labels at EMI that were spending five times as much on marketing as their gross revenues. We told them you could stick a £50 note on the cover of a CD and have the same effect, and we also wouldn't have to pay them. Those sorts of comments don't go down too well."

 

"We're getting there - a little slower than I would like, but I'm always impatient."

 

However, he said that EMI was a good example of the sort of deal that private equity houses should be doing - using "strategic and operational change" to create value rather than financial arbitrage.

 

He argued that people who thought the days of big bank lending would return were wrong. "I do not believe that the crisis in the credit market is just a cyclical blip which will simply work its way through the system," he said.

 

"It signifies a structural change taking place in the financial markets which will make life substantially harder for all of us in private equity for years.

 

"In years to come investment banks will be seen as a classic case study of a businesses doing very very well making ever increasing profits year after year but that very success hiding where profits were really being made.

 

"To give you an example that is close to my heart, it reminds me of EMI and all the major record labels in the 1990s believing their success was due to their personal genius and ability to find and market new music, when in fact it was only due to the baby boom generation replacing their vinyl with CDs.

 

"The banks have made extraordinary profits in the last few years out of collecting assets, packaging them up, selling them on and accelerating the expected earnings on these assets. People need to realise that the basic businesses of banking, which is lending and advising, have simply not become fundamentally more profitable over the past few years."

 

He said the time was coming when Wall Street and the banks would be bypassed by private equity houses doing deals. They would instead turn to sovereign wealth funds instead, he suggested.

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/02/27/bcnhands127.xml

"The music industry is racing to reinvent itself.."

 

Music : lost in the shuffle. The music industry is racing to reinvent itself as the digital age renders its old business model obsolete.

from Time magazine (Europe edition)

page one

page two

page three

the entire article can also be found on time.com

I didnt read it all but here's some parts about EMI

 

The major record companies have the most to sort out. The problems at EMI, the smallest of the Big Four record companies, have been getting more ink lately than its artists, which include the likes of Lily Allen and Coldplay. With EMI's slice of the world market under pressure — its share fell to 12.8% in 2006 from 13.6% the previous year — U.K. private-equity company Terra Firma acquired the firm for $6.5 billion last August. The new owner has been quick to make its mark: earlier this year EMI announced it was axing as many as 2,000 jobs in a bid to pare costs by $400 million a year. But the overhaul is not just a matter of numbers, says Guy Hands, ceo of Terra Firma and chairman of EMI: "What we are saying to artists is: The current model is broken. Unless we find a new model, new music is dead."

 

But few bands can expect to score sneaker ads or globe-trotting tours. Record companies still need the music to make them money. But some 30% of the artists on EMI's books have yet to come back with a recording, and sliding CD sales mean that overall, only 3% of the label's artists are profitable. "The actual economic power of new music is declining at an extraordinary rate," says EMI's Hands. Keen to keep it alive, he is mulling changes to the way EMI's artists are rewarded. Out could go generous advances for some artists — "an excuse for us to lose more," he calls such payments. Instead, some expect him to experiment with salaries or even day rates for artists cloistered in the studio.

Would artists buy this kind of shift? Jon Webster, chief executive of the London-based Music Managers Forum, is not so sure. Far from spoiling musicians, he says, "most personal advances are to keep people alive." Squeezing out an album is an unpredictable affair, and regular pay checks might strike some artists as an unwelcome reminder to hurry up. "Creators rarely want to be sitting here watching the clock," Webster says. "The creative process doesn't work like that."

hah! i remember how much i freaked out over all this news a few months ago, thinking that it would delay/prevent the album indefinitely. i'm SOOO happy it didn't come to this! :dance:

Google information officer becomes EMI digital chief

 

 

Google information officer becomes EMI digital chief

 

EMI, the struggling record company, has poached Google chief information officer Douglas Merrill (left) to the newly-created role of president of digital. Merrill will take on the role on April 28.

 

The move is part of EMI's private equity owner Guy Hand's drive to rebuild the troubled company. Hands bought EMI, whose artists include Coldplay and Kylie Minogue, for £3.2bn last year.

 

Merrill joined Google in 2003 as senior director of information systems. During his time at the search engine, he led its strategic efforts and held accountability for all internal engineering and support worldwide. EMI's digital unit is based in London but Merrill will work at the company's headquarters in Los Angeles.

 

EMI also plans to cut up to 2,000 jobs to reduce costs by around £200m a year and this is expected to impact its marketing team and budget. The move has concerned artists signed to the label, who are worried the company will aim to take more of its revenue from merchandising and concerts.

 

http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=60206&d=254&h=260&f=3

Bankers call new tune over EMI finances

 

The Kooks provided a boost to the recorded music division, which is under pressure to generate earnings of £180m by September

 

The private equity vehicle run by city financier Guy Hands is fighting to meet financial targets set by Citigroup in a bid to avoid a fractious showdown with the bank that lent it £2.5bn to fund the EMI buyout.

 

Hands' Terra Firma Capital Partners originally signed up to tough financial targets for the year to June, but The Sunday Telegraph can reveal it has re-negotiated some of the terms to give itself three extra months to turn EMI around.

 

Managers have now been told that EMI's under-pressure recorded music division, whose roster of artists includes Coldplay and Kylie Minogue, must generate underlying earnings of £180m by September to meet key targets set by Citigroup.

 

Hands was able to buy time after raising £250m in January from outside investors who now have direct holdings in EMI. The new money will help finance a restructuring which is expected to add £100m to the bottom line by cutting over 2000 staff from its 5,500.

 

Internal forecasts suggest the original June target, to which EMI's record label managers' bonuses were linked, will now be missed. EMI managers say they were told at the end of last year that in the 12 months to June, the recorded music division must generate £150m of underlying earnings, also known as EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation).

 

Company sources suggest the division is likely to make £133m, missing the goal by £17m. As a result, many managers will now not receive bonuses.

 

Instead, staff have been told that once Terra Firma realises its investment either through a sale or refinancing, 15pc of the equity in EMI Music, the recorded music division, will be shared out amongst its entire workforce. A similar incentive will be offered to the music publishing business.

 

Citigroup is likely to pounce on any shortfall to try and renegotiate the terms of the deal. It has so far been unable to sell on any of the loan which funded Terra Firma's acquisition of EMI last summer for £4bn including debt.

 

But the bank's room for manoeuvre is limited. The original loan was a 'covenant lite' deal agreed just before the beginning of the credit crisis last summer, and has seven and a half years to run. Citigroup later managed to insert some clauses to give it more protection, and wring £200m of extra equity from Terra Firma, but the terms of the deal still give Hands significant flexibility.

 

A source close to Terra Firma said: "Guy will just say 'do you want to run the company yourselves? If you do, here's the keys.'"

 

Terra Firma is also understood to be sitting on a secret long-term plan, code-named Project Poker, to tie-up with listed US major Warner Music Group, merging their struggling recorded music divisions would be merged. No approach has been made to Warner, but the strategy would be to sell on some music publishing assets in order to avoid regulatory constraints. While the music publishing division, which generates a third of the revenues but most of the profit, continues to run smoothly, Hands will have his work cut out turning around recorded music.

 

The label was hit last year by the defection of Radiohead, and The Rolling Stones have indicated they could be next by releasing their latest album with a rival, Universal Music Group.

 

In the last year before the company was taken private, EMI Music made underlying profit, before exceptional items and amortisation, of £45m on total income of £1.35bn. By contrast, the music publishing division with a fraction of the staff made £106m underlying profit on income of £401m.

 

EMI has struggled to maintain market share. Its slice of the home market fell to 9pc last year from 16pc in 2006, while according to some measures it is now the smallest of the four majors.

 

Music & Copyright magazine claims that during 2007, EMI's global share was 10.9 %, behind Warner at 14.4pc. Universal Music Group, home to Amy Winehouse and the Scissor Sisters, topped the league with 25.8pc while Sony BMG was in second with 20.1pc.Terra Firma took a huge bet on EMI, sinking £1.5bn of its own money into the deal. Hands had originally intended to put in £1.3bn of equity, but Citigroup negotiated that amount up by £200m.Not everything is going badly. Last month one of its bands, The Kooks, entered the UK album charts at number one. And it's supplemented its executive ranks with two high-profile recruits.

 

Douglas Merrill has been lured from Google to transform EMI's digital music business. Based in Los Angeles, he will bring together the company's digital strategy, technology, innovation and supply chain activities. Out of print albums from the back catalogue will sell via Amazon.com, which allows customers to create their own CDs.

 

Nick Gatfield has joined from Universal, where he was president of Island Records and was part of the team that signed Amy Winehouse and oversaw the recording careers of Keane, McFly and the Sugababes. Gatfield will oversee the signing and management of artists in the UK and the US for EMI.

 

The biggest seller this year is expected to be Viva La Vida, Coldplay's first album in three years. Released on June, 16, it follows 2005's X&Y, which sold 10m.

 

Coldplay took a leaf from Radiohead's book earlier this month by releasing their music free online before putting it on sale. Violet Hill, the first single, was downloaded two million times in one week before going on sale. Had it been paid for, it would have outsold that week's top 40 four times over.

 

Hands may take comfort from a revival in the fortunes (and share price) of Warner Music. Warner's stock has risen over 60pc in two months, from $5.04 on 13 March to $8.45 on 15 on Friday, giving it a market capitalisation of $1.3bn (£664m).

 

Analysts said the jump indicated that the industry decline was slowing, while Warner had scaled back investment without losing market share. On the other hand, Warner may owe its momentum to the fact that one of its three rivals is running at half speed - eight months after the takeover, EMI has yet to appoint a new chief executive.

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/05/18/cnemi118.xml

[Article] EMI trusts in Guy Hands and Coldplay

 

 

The label faces its biggest challenge with release of a key new album this week

 

TRY as he might, Chris Martin can’t keep out of the limelight.

 

The Coldplay frontman avoids being pictured in public with his actress wife, Gwyneth Paltrow, yet when it comes to album releases, financial analysts as much as music fans take a long, hard look at him and his band.

 

Selling 10m copies, as Coldplay’s last album, X&Y, did, is enough to move the dial financially, particularly in an industry undergoing unprecedented change and battling with piracy.

 

Martin knows that and doesn’t particularly like it. Three years ago he described shareholders as “the great evil of this modern world”, and added: “I don’t really care about EMI.”

 

Since EMI’s £3.2 billion take- over last year by Guy Hands’s Terra Firma, the music group that counts Coldplay as one of its most important acts has only a single shareholder for Martin to become het up about.

 

Four days before the release of Coldplay’s new album, Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends, Hands knows that its success is crucial — more so than in the days when EMI’s shares would spike or slump according to the pop charts. If there is a safe bet in the music industry, a blockbuster release from Coldplay is it. Talking to the trade press, Hands sounds nothing but confident. “While expectations are high, what Coldplay have done is produced something that goes way beyond anyone’s expectations,” he said.

 

Drumming their fingers in anticipation, not particularly in time with the music, are the bankers at Citigroup who are still stuck with £2.5 billion of EMI debt on their books, unsold since the buyout.

 

There are also EMI’s other stars, such as Robbie Williams, curious to see how the new regime handles a key release.

 

More important, EMI must prove that the big labels still have a role to play. In a digital age when artists can simply sell direct to their fans, the long-held marketing muscle of record labels has dissipated online.

 

In a recent interview, Martin accepted that the traditional model of artists signed to any label was “obviously antiquated”. He added: “Being on a major label at the moment is like living in your grandparents’ house. Everyone knows they need to move out, and they will eventually, but we kind of like our grandmother.”

 

That affection is not surprising because Coldplay is contracted to EMI for several years to come. Another album could be ready by autumn next year. A duet with Kylie Minogue is already in the can.

 

In comparison, Radiohead have walked out on EMI and the Rolling Stones are thinking about it. Sir Paul McCartney has experimented by selling CDs in Starbucks coffee shops.

 

Record contracts used to be based roughly on three thirds — one slice to the star in advances and royalties; another to cover the costs of both sides; and the rest representing the label’s cut.

 

In the age of online distribution, stars are now questioning the third portion. Some argue the best thing a label has to offer is its advance — which EMI would dearly love to cut back.

 

For acts such as the Rolling Stones, with a giant following and strong back catalogue, it would be feasible to sell albums “on the out” — music speak for selling freshly minted copies of the performance as fans pour out of a concert venue.

 

It is not surprising that EMI and Coldplay are trying to do things differently. A free download of Viva La Vida’s first single, Violet Hill, shifted 2m units, emulating the success Radiohead had by distributing their In Rainbows album online. Harking back to the good old days, the track was also given away as a seven-inch single on the front cover of NME.

 

There are also free Coldplay gigs at Brixton Academy in London, Barcelona and Madison Square Garden in New York to drum up extra buzz.

 

“The measure of success will be whether the band can replicate the publicity and PR generated by Radiohead for In Rainbows, which drove up revenues for merchandise, ticket downloads and sales,” said James Bates, media director at Deloitte.

 

The effort appears to be working. iTunes, the download service, said it was the most pre-ordered album it had ever handled. Insiders said EMI’s willingness to test other routes to market was its new approach to the future.

 

Hands may be disappointed to learn that Martin regrets allowing AOL to sponsor a New York concert in 2005. Hands floated the idea of sponsors to cover the costs of up-and-coming artists.

 

EMI’s need for a hit was laid bare as its share of music sales in the US — the world’s biggest market — fell below 9%. Its publishing arm is performing better, hanging on to first place in the UK in the first quarter, with a 25.4% share of the album chart.

 

Hands told Terra Firma shareholders last month that efforts to cut annual costs by £100m were on target to be achieved this month. Some say his cuts, which include the loss of up to 2,000 jobs, have been implemented slowly so EMI can save money to meet its interest payments.

 

However, its loan was struck on “covenant lite” terms. So while Citi gets a regular update on EMI’s financial position, EMI doesn’t technically have any hurdles to leap in the near term. Its internal target is £150m of earnings for its recorded-music arm by the year ending in three weeks’ time. That is unlikely.

 

Then there is Robbie. After Rudebox, a far-from-critical or commercial success, he is resting and won’t deliver another album to EMI, his last under his present contract, until next year. A new contract will be a key concern for EMI’s new chief executive.

 

Meanwhile, Coldplay is the focus. “The challenge is not how it sells in the first few weeks,” said a music executive. “It is the months and months after that really matter.”

 

Like it or not, Martin may be about to make a karaoke singer called Guy Hands very happy.

 

In a spin over piracy

 

SOME 12% of revenues in the recording business are coming from tracks sold over the internet and by mobile phones, according to the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). Digital sales hit £70m in 2006, up from £5m in 2004. This rise is not enough to offset declining CD sales, and record labels are losing the piracy battle, with only one in 20 digital downloads made legally. No wonder the music industry is trying to get internet service providers on side.

 

Under its ‘three strikes’ initiative, the BPI wants internet providers to disconnect persistent illegal downloaders. Virgin Media has agreed to warn its broadband customers, but Carphone Warehouse’s TalkTalk service, Britain’s third-largest supplier with 2.7m customers, is not playing ball.

 

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/media/article4086596.ece?token=null&offset=12

Can't wait til the lads are free of EMI.

 

Can't wait to see it SINK.

 

even with acts like Kylie they can't keep their heads above water.

 

after the next album, coldplay will produce their own stuff.

Can't wait til the lads are free of EMI.

 

Can't wait to see it SINK.

 

even with acts like Kylie they can't keep their heads above water.

 

after the next album, coldplay will produce their own stuff.

 

All this EMI stuff doesn't do them any favours. It makes it look like they're making music to make money and please their bosses.

Can someone explain to me why EMI are in constant financial trouble with an act like Coldplay? This calls for a private equity buyout! *rubs hands together, lights cigar with a Benjamin*

Fuck EMI. :dozey: Putting all this pressure on their albums, it's annoying and it's seems like it sucks the fun out of it for them.

I was reading a Led Zeppelin biography today when I thought of something.

 

You know the next album, which is meant to feature much of the material that didn't make it to Viva la Vida and not releasing them as b-sides to singles for some reason (as oppossed to writing new material). Of course this is partly because they want us to hear the songs properly and not just as b-sides.

 

But it could also be a way to escape EMI's clutches as fast as possible. They have a 5 album deal right? So if they just release the leftovers for thier 5th album then they're free to do whatever (unless they land themselves with another bad company, though I'm hoping they go indie)

Do we know for sure just exactly how many records their contracted to do? Chris keeps making it sound like they have a lot more than one to go...

As far as I know it's a 5 album deal. I might be wrong though...

it IS a 5 album deal.

 

I was reading a biogrophy of them over on coldplay.com a WHILE ago, when X&Y was coming out.