Music to pay your mortgage by

Two recent studies showing that the music business over-promotes to teens but under-promotes to adults couldn’t have come at a better time for Alan Light and John Rollins. They’re the editor in chief and publisher, respectively, of Tracks, a magazine scheduled to launch in November.

With the youth-oriented Maxim-ization trend taking over Rolling Stone, Spin, Blender and others, where music battles for space with lifestyle, fashion and skin-baring photo layouts, Tracks will target a core audience of thirty- and fortysomethings with the slogan “Music Built to Last.”

“It’s not about the hit single, not about the flavor of the month,” Light says. “It’s about artists who have either been around for a while and remained vital and demonstrated the continuing strength of their body of work or the artists who aspire to that and who we believe 10 or 20 years from now can be important.”

Light points to Norah Jones as an artist who tapped into that sensibility and was first embraced by the adult market. He holds up the recent No. 1 debut of the live Led Zeppelin package as proof of the audience for worthy releases by veteran favorites. Other acts that fit the bill for him include Neil Young (who was on the cover of a Tracks mock-up prototype) and Dave Matthews.

Light says the magazine will be wide-reaching in terms of musical styles at a time when such labels as Blue Note, Nonesuch and Verve have reached across jazz, classical, world and pop lines with new releases.

“When you’re younger, you define yourself more tribally by what kind of music you listen to -- ‘I listen to hip-hop and not that guitar stuff,’ ” Light says. “Our assumption is when you get further in your life and have a job and kids and a mortgage, you’re much more concerned about what is good enough to justify spending time on and you’re not genre-driven.”

Light and Rollins have been correct before in spotlighting an underserved pop-culture market. Ten years ago they were involved in founding Vibe magazine at a time when hip-hop music and culture were not yet mainstream. The two also worked at rock-oriented Spin from 1999 until spring 2002.

“Alan and I feel strongly that this is similar to our founding Vibe,” Rollins says. “The hip-hop audience was a consumer audience that was ignored and marginalized by the mainstream media. The Tracks demographic has been too.”

But how many in that demographic will buy a magazine like this? And can it be profitable, given the steep costs of production and promotion and the overall slump in advertising revenue in an uncertain economy?

They’re setting relatively modest goals compared with the million-plus circulation targets sought by big magazines.

“We’re launching at 100,000 copies,” Light says. “And we have a plan that grows us to 500,000 five to six years out. But we don’t need to hit that. We’re profitable well before we get to that circulation. We’ve run lean magazines before.”

Andy Buckholz, managing director of media-oriented merchant bank Veronis Suhler Stevenson, says that the Tracks circulation targets are probably realistic, given the current figures for Rolling Stone (1.26 million), Vibe (820,000) and Spin (532,000). He adds that with the right approach, the rough climate doesn’t matter.

“With Blender, everyone said the last thing we need is another music magazine,” he says. “Yet Blender’s been fairly successful, depending on who you ask. If you have a good product, success is possible.”

Raphael Saadiq tries his own label

If Raphael Saadiq wanted to put out two albums in four months, the R&B; star probably wouldn’t have been allowed to by his record label, given the investments in production and promotion that go into each release.

But that’s just what he’s planning to do, and with his label’s blessing -- of course it’s his own label.

Saadiq, who had been under contract with major labels since 1988 with the bands Tony Toni Tone and Lucy Pearl and as a solo act, has now taken his own Pookie Entertainment independent and plans to release a live album in October, which is to be followed by a new studio album in February.

“I want to put out records like James Brown did, whenever he wanted to,” Saadiq says. “I can release a record in one

region and just go and work there. I could work Atlanta for

a month, play and play, go to

radio stations, work it at my pace.”

At the moment, that pace is a busy one. Saadiq will record his live album at shows July 2 at the Belly Up Tavern in Solana Beach, July 3 at the House of Blues in West Hollywood and July 4 at the Las Vegas House of Blues.

He’ll then return to work at his North Hollywood studio on his second solo album, while also producing and collaborating with other artists, including D’Angelo, Kelis, Nikka Costa and Q-Tip.

Saadiq is coming off a best R&B; song Grammy win in February for co-writing Erykah Badu’s “Love of My Life (Ode to Hip Hop).” His 2002 album, “Instant Vintage,” earned five Grammy nominations, although he’d been dropped from Universal Records before the nominations were made.

“If you’re a new artist, you have to be on a major label to make your name,” he says. “But for me, as an artist, now being independent is the best. I can put out a couple of albums a year, work with a couple of different artists a year, showcase artists on tour together.”

Small faces

* While some old Norah Jones recordings will be released soon, a new one will not. “Those Sweet Words” is being used as the musical centerpiece in the movie “Alex & Emma,” but there are no plans for a soundtrack album. However, the song is likely to appear on Jones’ next album, tentatively due in early 2004.

* Lillix’s new version of the Romantics’ staple “What I Like About You” and Simple Plans’ new rendition of the Turtles’ “Happy Together” are both featured on the soundtrack to “Freaky Friday,” along with an unreleased song by the Donnas and new recordings by Bowling for Soup, Halo Friendlies and Lindsay Lohan, the movie’s co-star. An album is due July 22 from Hollywood Records.

* Jethro Tull had a 1972 hit with “A Christmas Song,” but the band has never done a Christmas album until now. A collection of three new songs, three traditional carols, four classical pieces done in jazz-blues style and remakes of four Tull songs is due in October. Meanwhile, leader Ian Anderson has a solo album, “Rupi’s Dance,” due in August, with guitarist Martin Barre’s instrumental “Stage Left” coming the same month.