Yeah, but if EMI don't wanna promote a band then they simply aren't going to... no matter what. I mean last year Megadeth and Maiden both had new albums come out on EMI... and there was very little in the way of promotion for either. But as you said, Stomp seem to want to promote the likes of Halford and Megadeth... and here's the reason...
Stomp distribute here for a number of different overseas labels. But last month they started up a new subsidiary called Volume... it's the same as Stomp... same offices, same personnel as before... it's just that it's a specific metal label. Now as far as I'm aware any albums that come out on the Metal-Is label (Sanctuary) they'll be the distributors for them here... now when I was over in Melb, I saw quite a bit of the dude in charge of Volume... they were just planning or had just released their first two albums - Halford and WASP, with the new Deth album coming in May... of course they are gonna want to promote these bands and their albums... these are the only bands they have on their roster at the moment. That's why Dave and Al were here promoting the new album for 5 days, that's why there were instores with signed guitar giveaways, that's why you can win a signed gutiar if you pre-order TWNAH from
www.sanity.com.au, that's why you saw that ad...
Now here's the real key to it all... they are a
metal label and they are
ONLY intersted in selling metal albums. It's as simple as that!!! EMI and all these big labels couldn't give a shit about selling Maiden or Megadeth or the majority of "non-popular" metal bands... because they can make more money, in less time by selling Britney Spears and Limp Bizkit to trendy teenagers than they will by promoting music that doesn't make the charts or video clip programs. So why waste your resources on something that isn't gonna make you the most money?? BUT if you are a metal label with only a few artists on your roster then you can pour ALL your money into those few bands and get good publicity and still make money... but maybe not as fast and not quite as much... but because Volume know metal, they understand that they will have a steady flow of money from these artists over a long period of time because they know that these type of bands have a long lifetimes and their fans are very loyal.
So then when we come back to the Maiden case... as long as they are on EMI in this country I don't believe they'll ever be promoted the way they deserve to be.
Sorry for the essay, this is just one of the real issues I have with the music industry...
