But people don’t really record or write that way anymore.
Technology makes it easy to get everything “right.” But if you rely on technology to get it right, you’re removing all of the human drama. The way most music is made today is parts are created and then played perfectly and then copied and pasted. Everything’s in time, everything’s in tune, but it’s not a performance. My goal was to get Black Sabbath back to performing together—to jamming—because they are experts at it.
That brings up some larger questions about the state of the industry. If you had to deliver a diagnosis right now, what would you say is wrong with the record business?
People are willing to get short-term gains at the risk of long-term choices. So, if someone can do something to sell a few more records now at the expense of the artist, even if that artist will sell a lot less later, they’ll make that choice.
Why?
A lot of it has to do with structure, because the structure of the music industry is rooted in a corporate structure. It’s a quarterly business, but art is not a quarterly business. At Columbia, if Beyoncé didn’t deliver a record one year, for whatever reason, that really affected the whole economics of the company. And it’s impossible to build a music company as if you were selling shoes. It’s a different business. It has a different ebb and flow. The highs are higher and the lows are lower. You have to look at it as a longer-term game.
As co-chairman, you tried to change Columbia. How?
My basic, simple idea was to actually listen to the music we were putting out and see if it was as good as it could be. That was something that didn’t exist. It was just a conveyor belt putting stuff out. The day I got there they sent me a CD of maybe 40 upcoming releases by artists. At the end of that, only two of them survived. And then we signed all new artists. It’s a different company today. It’s night and day.
You said at the time that your job would be to protect the label from itself. Do you feel like that’s what you did?
Well, I tried [laughs].