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NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- Merle Haggard may have summed up the
current state of country music with a line from a 1982 hit: ``Are
the good times really over for good?''
Layoffs have hit the country music industry.
After reaching record heights in 1995, country album sales have
sagged. Sales were up a feeble 2.7 percent in 1998, and the gain
was due largely to one artist: Garth Brooks, who accounted for 10
percent of the nearly 73 million albums sold, according to
SoundScan, which tracks sales.
At the same time, the industry has been unable to launch new
acts able to generate the kind of pop-star revenue that Brooks and
Shania Twain produce.
As a result, Arista Nashville, a division of RCA, fired six
executives last week. Song publisher Sony/ATV Tree dropped about
half of its Nashville roster of 100 songwriters in October, citing
declining royalties.
Mercury and MCA Records, owned by Seagram Co., have laid off
seven country-division employees between them. And the publishing
divisions of PolyGram and MCA will soon merge, costing jobs,
primarily in country music.
Some worry that a repeat of the mid-1980s may be in store.
That's when the bottom fell out of the country music boom started
by the 1980 movie ``Urban Cowboy.''
``The consumer is changing,'' said Joe Galante, who runs the
Nashville office for RCA Records. ``And I'm not sure everybody's
got their finger on the pulse. Clearly there is a problem in terms
of what we are doing as an industry.''
Nashville may be a victim of its own phenomenal success. Revenue
from the sale of country music albums quadrupled between 1989 and
1995 to about $2 billion, when Brooks became one of the most
recognizable celebrities in America.
As the money rolled in, companies like Warner Bros. and MCA
built expensive office buildings, gave employees raises and hired
more people. Now those companies are looking to cut costs.
Small record companies Rising Tide, Magnatone, Almo Sounds,
Imprint and Decca have all closed their doors in the past couple of
years.
``It was a total surprise to me, to everybody,'' said Kim
Fowler, a publicist who had barely started a job at Rising Tide a
year ago when the company folded. ``People are getting squeezed out
and they have nowhere to go in the music business.''
Promising singers like Shane Stockton, Chris Knight and Matraca
Berg have lost their record deals. Dolly Parton did, too, when
Decca closed last month, although she won't have trouble getting
another deal.
``Whenever you mix art and commerce, you put yourself in danger
of the current craze or trends or style,'' said Jimmie Fadden of
The Dirt Band, country music veterans who were about to release an
album on Rising Tide when the label closed. They have since signed
with DreamWorks SKG.
Galante estimated that 10 percent of record company staffers may
be cut in the long run, and as many as 20 percent of songwriters
will lose the stipends from publishing companies that allow them to
write full time.
``I think that we're not done with consolidation,'' he said.
``We have been carrying, probably, just a little too much in the
way of manpower.''
Nashville has survived such trends before. The industry
rebounded from the decline in the mid-1980s to reach unprecedented
heights. And even now, far more country albums are being sold now
than a decade ago, and country music remains the most popular radio
format by far.
Del Bryant of New York-based BMI, which distributes songwriting
royalties, said all the changes could help in the long run. Larger
companies will be leaner and the consolidations may allow smaller
record companies to re-emerge, he said.
``Nashville is the classic town that takes two steps forward,
then one step back,'' said Bryant, who started his career in Music
City.
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