WALK THAT WAY: For years, the word...

WALK THAT WAY: For years, the word around town was that the only way you could get A&R; executive John David Kalodner away from Geffen Records was to make him the head of his own label.

So when Kalodner announced earlier this month that he was leaving Geffen, the guessing game centered on which label he’d start running. Instead, he told Pop Eye, he’s going to be joining the A&R; team at Columbia Records.

“I don’t want to be a president or anything,” he says. “I don’t want the crap that goes with that job. I just want to sign new bands and make records.”

One old band Kalodner will continue to work with is Aerosmith, which is also moving from Geffen to Columbia, its home in the band’s ‘70s heyday. But he says it’s a mistake to link the two moves, noting that he’s had successes with a number of other acts, including Foreigner (while at Atlantic in the ‘70s) and Cher.

What does this move mean for Geffen’s A&R; department, which lost another high-profile executive last year when Gary Gersh left to become Capitol’s president? Geffen President Eddie Rosenblatt says that the company had already been bringing new blood into the department and that he does not anticipate making any major moves.

But industry insiders speculate that Geffen will court at least one major A&R; figure to join Tom Zutaut, Tony Berg and Mark Kates as a visible presence in what is still widely regarded as one of the top A&R; departments in the business.