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Many indie labels skip this step, at least initially, but it is a good idea to have your record label set-up as a legal business entity from the start. You will need to be an actual, legal business if you want a business bank account or credit card, and it certainly makes tax time a lot more manageable. Likewise, if you are applying for business loans or other kinds of funding, you will need to be a legal business.
The names and specifics of various business frameworks differ from country to country, state to state and city to city (for example, sole proprietorship, LLC, Corporation, etc). You will need to spend a few hours with your computer or at the library to learn about the law in your area and to print up the forms you need to set up your company. There are a few general guidelines to keep in mind that apply everywhere:
- If you are starting the label with other partners, you will need a partnership agreement that details the percentage of ownership each partner has, how each partner can leave the business, how decisions will be made in the partnership and so on. Depending on where you live, the laws associated with your business structure may dictate your partnership agreement, or you may need to devise a separate agreement.
- For most indie labels, the best business structure is one that is simple and that protects the partners from personal liability should something go wrong in the business.
This is also the time to figure out how the company will operate, such as who will be responsible for which tasks and how people will be paid. If there are issues not addressed in the paperwork to set up your business, then write up a separate contract detailing this info.
Of course, now is also the time for a label name. Do a little online research to make sure your name isn't already taken.
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A researcher at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) conducted the first study of hand-clapping songs, revealing a direct link between those activities and the development of important skills in children and young adults, including university students.
"We found that children in the first, second and third grades who sing these songs demonstrate skills absent in children who don't take part in similar activities," explains Dr. Idit Sulkin a member of BGU's Music Science Lab in the Department of the Arts. "We also found that children who spontaneously perform hand-clapping songs in the yard during recess have neater handwriting, write better and make fewer spelling errors."
Dr. Warren Brodsky, the music psychologist who supervised her doctoral dissertation, said Sulkin's findings lead to the presumption that "children who don't participate in such games may be more at risk for developmental learning problems like dyslexia and dyscalculia. There's no doubt such activities train the brain and influence development in other areas. The children's teachers also believe that social integration is better for these children than those who don't take part in these songs."
As part of the study, Sulkin went to several elementary school classrooms and engaged the children in either a board of education sanctioned music appreciation program or hand-clapping songs training -- each lasting a period of 10 weeks.
"Within a very short period of time, the children who until then hadn't taken part in such activities caught up in their cognitive abilities to those who did," she said. But this finding only surfaced for the group of children undergoing hand-clapping songs training. The result led Sulkin to conclude that hand-clapping songs should be made an integral part of education for children aged six to 10, for the purpose of motor and cognitive training.
During the study, "Impact of Hand-clapping Songs on Cognitive and Motor Tasks," Dr. Sulkin interviewed school and kindergarten teachers, visited their classrooms and joined the children in singing. Her original goal, as part of her thesis, was to figure out why children are fascinated by singing and clapping up until the end of third grade, when these pastimes are abruptly abandoned and replaced with sports.
"This fact explains a developmental process the children are going through," Dr. Sulkin observes. "The hand-clapping songs appear naturally in children's lives around the age of seven, and disappear around the age of 10. In this narrow window, these activities serve as a developmental platform to enhance children's needs -- emotional, sociological, physiological and cognitive. It's a transition stage that leads them to the next phases of growing up."
Sulkin says that no in-depth, long-term study has been conducted on the effects that hand-clapping songs have on children's motor and cognitive skills. However, the relationship between music and intellectual development in children has been studied extensively, prompting countless parents to obtain a "Baby Mozart" CD for their children.
This study also demonstrates that listening to 10 minutes of Mozart music (.i.e., the 'Mozart Effect') does not improve spatial task performance more than 10 minutes hand clapping songs training or 10 minutes exposure to silence.
Sulkin also found that hand-clapping song activity has a positive effect on adults: University students who filled out her questionnaires reported that after taking up such games, they became more focused and less tense. "These techniques are associated with childhood, and many adults treat them as a joke," she said. "But once they start clapping, they report feeling more alert and in a better mood."
Sulkin grew up in a musical home. Her father, Dr. Adi Sulkin, is a well-known music educator who, in the 1970s and 1980s, recorded and published over 50 cassettes and videos depicting Israeli children's play-songs, street-songs, holiday and seasonal songs, and singing games targeting academic skills.
"So quite apart from the research experience, working on this was like a second childhood," she noted.
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It's refreshing in an era of music bandwagon jumping that Sade has managed to glide through the last two decades seemingly untouched by anything resembling change. Their (and they are a band) sound has become synonymous with '80s sophistication and yet it's also strangely unique to them and them alone, elevated above most smooth R&B by Sade Adu's sumptuous vocals.
Given this context, it's not surprising that Soldier Of Love - only their sixth album in 25 years - doesn't mess with the formula too much. The excellent title track and first single is the only real curve ball, featuring a startlingly insistent drum pattern. Elsewhere, Babyfather is a dubby, near-reggae concoction that features some neat vocal interplay and shows what can happen when the band explore different horizons.
But if you're looking for stark experimentation then Sade aren't the band for you. With most acts this kind of militant denial of evolution would seem counter-productive. Yet somehow this hermetically sealed way of working suits them. Tracks like the gorgeous Morning Bird and the swirling In Another Time are as comforting as slipping on an old jumper.
As with all of their records, there's an obvious sense of hiding their light under a bushel. These are songs that can sashay straight past you if you're not careful, but producer Stuart Matthewman (whose work with Maxwell sounds equally poured over) slips in subtle moments such as the twinkling percussion on Morning Bird and the slow-burn backing on opener The Moon And The Sky. This unfussy backdrop allows Adu's voice to shine; to cloak it in anything more isn't really an option.
Whilst it's difficult to work up a sweat about Soldier Of Love - and there are stretches where the album fades into obscurity, the epitome of background music - it's a beautifully constructed album from an enduring band unafraid to mess with a sound that has influenced many. It's best to remember, however, that if you are disappointed with this then the next one isn't due for another 10 years. - Michael Cragg -
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Josh Groban is a rare commodity in the music business: a safe bet.
Classically trained, celestially voiced, the kind of sweet-faced, well-mannered, personable young man who probably gets hand-knit sweaters as gifts from fans in lieu of panties, Groban is virtually immune to the vagaries of pop-music trends.
His most recent album, the 2007 Christmas record "Noel," sold 5 million copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan, and topped the Billboard 200. All told, he has sold almost 20 million albums in the United States.
Because his material appeals to adults whose taste and preferences are stable, Groban can depend on their loyalty. No one would have batted an eye had he released another collection of holiday tracks every couple of years, toured theaters and arenas, dropped in again on Oprah and "Today" and "Glee," headlined public-TV pledge drives and generally reaped the quiet but lucrative rewards of mainstream, middle-of-the-road success.
Instead, Groban, 29, decided to make some drastic changes. He split from his former manager, Brian Avnet, and signed to Q Prime, known for managing guitar extremists Metallica and Muse. He also parted with longtime producer David Foster and teamed with Rick Rubin, the bearded Zen master behind the Beastie Boys, Johnny Cash and Danzig.
On his new record, "Illuminations," due November 15 on Reprise, Groban co-wrote more of the material than he ever had on previous albums, and also recorded a song by an unlikely favorite: goth-rock cult star Nick Cave.
The new partners are especially head-scratching given that Groban's music is possibly the most un-rock stuff out there. With a voice ranging between tenor and baritone, Groban draws more comparisons to Celine Dion and Andrea Bocelli than Eddie Vedder or James Hetfield. It's easy to imagine him singing on the radio in the 1940s; his music, which nods to Broadway, opera and European pop, typically finds its truest expression in the kind of swelling, inspirational ballads that accompany first dances at weddings.
Moreover, Groban's older audience still buys physical albums: His breakthrough song, "You Raise Me Up," has sold a relatively modest 977,000 downloads, despite being covered by artists around the world and by "American Idol" contestants who want to bludgeon the judges with their range.
"I was in such a cozy position," Groban says of the period after "Noel" blew up and soundtracked family Christmas dinners across the world. "I had the No. 1-selling album of the year and I could have just kept doing that. But then I started to have an itch." (reu)
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Gregory Isaacs, the Jamaican reggae singer whose smooth style earned him the nickname "Cool Ruler," has died. He was 59.
Isaacs' manager, Copeland Forbes, said the singer died Monday at his London home. Isaacs had been diagnosed with lung cancer a year ago, but continued performing until weeks before his death.
His wife Linda said Isaacs was "well-loved by everyone, his fans and his family, and he worked really hard to make sure he delivered the music they loved and enjoyed."
Born in a Kingston, Jamaica slum in 1951, Isaacs began recording in his teens, and went on to produce scores of albums .
With his sinuous baritone and romantic songs, Isaacs became a leading proponent of the mellow "Lovers Rock" style of reggae. He hit his stride in the mid-1970s with ballads like "Love is Overdue" and "All I Have Is Love."
Later that decade he teamed up with the Jamaican production duo of Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare for several hit songs including "Soon Forward" and "What A Feeling."
"Gregory's voice and writing ability was wicked. He was one of those soulful singers you could sit and listen to for hours," Dunbar said Monday.
Isaacs was best known internationally for the title song from his 1982 album "Night Nurse," a club favorite which later became a hit for Simply Red.
His career was stalled by a cocaine habit that landed him in jail on several occasions. Isaacs said ruefully in 2007 that he'd gone to "Cocaine High School ... the greatest college ever, but the most expensive school fee ever paid."
Drug abuse took a toll on his voice but he kept making music, releasing a well-received final album, "Brand New Me," in 2008.
Suggs, lead singer of reggae-influenced British band Madness, said the dapper, fedora-sporting Isaacs was "a great reggae artist and also one of the most sartorially elegant stars on the world stage." (AP)
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Many indie labels skip this step, at least initially, but it is a good idea to have your record label set-up as a legal business entity from the start. You will need to be an actual, legal business if you want a business bank account or credit card, and it certainly makes tax time a lot more manageable. Likewise, if you are applying for business loans or other kinds of funding, you will need to be a legal business.
