New Label Aims to Reshape Today’s Country Music Mold

The joke around the country music capital these days is that the creative and commercial health of country music is a lot like the Nasdaq: Things are so low that there’s nowhere to go but up.

Album sales rebounded slightly during 2001, but they were still down 7.4% from 1998, and one major reason was a lack of exciting new artists. There may be great young talents in town, but they are operating under the radar.

Locals grumble when they see such “outsiders” as Ryan Adams, Lucinda Williams and Sheryl Crow nominated in the country vocal categories in the Grammys, but they had a hard time finding better vocal performances among pure country artists last year.

Two of the city’s most respected record executives of the ‘90s, Tony Brown and Tim DuBois, hope to change that. Last month, they joined forces to form a new label, Universal South, with the aim of finding that overlooked talent.

One reason for the commercial drought: After the gargantuan sales in the ‘90s of Garth Brooks and Shania Twain, major labels became obsessed with finding more artists who can appeal to pop as well as country record buyers. Many of these pop-leaning artists lack the raw emotion and character that have been the foundation of country music for decades.

If you spend a few minutes with industry veterans here, it’s easy to assemble a list of problems, but they mostly revolve around spiraling budgets that discourage the signing of maverick talents who don’t have the potential to sell half a million records the first time out. Where it cost about $250,000 to launch a new artist a decade ago, promotion costs have escalated so much that it now costs about $750,000.

In forming Universal South, Brown and DuBois are hoping to sidestep some of the problems that many feel have prevented major labels from finding and developing the great new acts in recent years.

“Nashville has done a poor job in recent years of finding the new stars because if the act is the least bit different, everyone just runs ... from them because they didn’t think they were safe enough bets,” Brown says.

“What we all have to remember is that great new artists are the ones that are going to be a little bit different, the ones that stand apart in some ways,” Brown adds. “Whether it’s Vince Gill or Alan Jackson or Reba [McEntire], they didn’t make it right out of the box. Garth was turned down by almost every label before someone saw the magic in him.”

Brown, who played piano in the ‘70s on the road with Elvis Presley and Emmylou Harris, is sitting in his new office in Music Row, just a block from his old office at MCA Nashville, where as president of the label he signed and/or produced records for such bestsellers as Gill, George Strait, Wynonna and McEntire, as well as such critical favorites as Lyle Lovett and Steve Earle.

DuBois, who is sitting across from Brown, also has a strong music background. He has written five No. 1 country hits, including 1982’s “She Got the Goldmine (I Got the Shaft)” and “Love in the First Degree.” As head of Arista Nashville Records in the ‘90s, he helped launch the careers of such country bestsellers as Jackson, Brooks & Dunn and Diamond Rio.

“The reason labels feel so nervous about putting up $750,000 or so every time out is that they have to depend on country radio to reach the masses,” DuBois says. “And radio is so conservative these days that they’ve driven the music to the middle rather than the edges because they don’t want to take chances.”

The pair feel they can be more flexible in signing acts at their new label because they can cut overhead by maintaining a small staff and depending on their joint venture partner--powerhouse Universal Records in New York--to supply additional promotion and marketing punch when needed. They also believe they’ll have greater authority in sticking with promising young artists who might take a few years to establish commercially.

“When news of the label began leaking out in December, a lot of people thought we were going to try to be some alt-country label,” Brown says. “But we are planning to be a mainstream label. We want to sign artists who can sell a lot of records, but we also want artists who are a little edgy and who might take some time to develop.”

But is there really great young talent out there?

“We wouldn’t be here if we didn’t think there was talent out there,” Brown says. “What we need to do is get the kind of artist we are looking for to come out of the woodwork and say to themselves, ‘Hey, man, I think there is somebody in Nashville who might like me.’

“Great artists need to know that. Great artists like Alison Krauss [who records for the folk-based Rounder Records despite huge offers from mainstream Nashville country labels] aren’t driven by the money. They are driven by the music. If they don’t feel welcome, they don’t come out of the darkness.”

Another local joint-venture label, Lost Highway, has already begun the search for Nashville mavericks. Since beginning its partnership with the Island Def Jam Music Group, the label has built a roster that includes such respected figures as Adams, Williams and Robert Earl Keen. It goes into this month’s Grammy Awards telecast with an impressive 16 nominations.

The Universal South label starts with four country acts, including acclaimed singer-songwriter Allison Moorer, that Brown brought with him from MCA Nashville. Like Lost Highway, however, Brown and DuBois want to move beyond the borders of country music and sign acts in other fields, including rock.

“I feel we are coming back to the age of the singer-songwriter, not just in country music, but in all parts of music ... and Nashville has long been a center for songwriters,” DuBois says.

“We have a lot of people here who are journeyman songwriters who are great strategists who can handcraft a song for an individual artist and for what radio wants these days, and that’s the focus of the business today.

“But we also have great writers who write something that is honest and true and heartfelt and touches people in a way that gets them to go into the store to buy the album and not just listen to it on the radio. That’s what country music needs again.”