We're not too top heavy with executives. I don't have to check with New York or L.A. My crew walks in, we talk about something, and either we do it or we don't. There's not a long, drawn out process.
— Scott Borchetta
I learned a long time ago, Don't ever doubt the power of Taylor Swift.
We're a content company. And if we create the best content, every distributor will want what we have.
There is no way to keep your thumb on the pulse unless you have your thumb on the pulse, and I think we have it.
The camera is the gatekeeper to the audience that's watching you.
Something that I've told all of my young artists is, there are going to be haters. You're going to read things that are going to hurt you. It's not going to make any sense. Just know that it's out there and that it's really easy to just press 'delete.'
If you look at most of our roster, we've got great singer/songwriters. I'm always attracted to that.
I'm not a 'practicing' musician anymore. I played bass and guitar. I still pick up a guitar around the house every once in awhile.
I've had so many conversations with new artists trying to figure out their careers.
I don't know that you can set out to be a brand. For us, it happened very organically, and we never rushed it or leaned on it too hard. I felt a true culture had started to emerge several years into the Machine, so we started trying some things, starting with simple stuff like cool merch.
Most of our artists are songwriters, so the songs are still central to all this. If you don't have great songs, it doesn't matter the marketing or how many times you are on TV; you can only polish it so much.
We came up with all these crazy ideas that Taylor Swift could be the biggest artist in the world - and it came true - and that we could have five labels and become the biggest independent record company in the world - and it came true.
With the launch of Big Machine Premium Vodka, we are now offering a superior product that perfectly complements the music we take such great pride in.
It's a rare opportunity when you can do something for the greater good.
You can come after me all day long. I don't care.
Can a label group by itself scale to make a sensible business? I don't think so.
You have to be responsible to yourself... but that doesn't mean you can't have a point of view about something.
Our focus is still on country, but, really, on whatever music our artists are making.
If you listen, people will tell you exactly what they want - whether it's a business relationship or a consumer relationship.
The end game is always a hit song.
There are a lot of similarities, even though we're in two different businesses: There's the Taylor Swift business and the Big Machine Label Group business, but there's a huge intersection there. When we're together, it's limitless.
Are there a million people out there who would love a Joey Cook album? I think there probably are.
I grew up in Southern California. I played in rock bands out here, and I've been around pop music my whole life. I've been around all music my entire life.
Relationships feed on credibility, honesty, and consistency.
I've always thought that I've had a nice gift for putting the right people together.
Sirius and XM went on air in 2001. It's taken 14 years for that to be a real business. It took them combining to be a real business.
When we first started, I had the time to personally live every project. As I continue to build the company, I've learned much better ways to delegate and let the executive team run. It's just as exciting for me to see the executives succeed as it is the artists.
We decided when we were building Big Machine that we wanted to be a Harley or a Ferrari.
We have a mantra at the Big Machine Label Group: Start with crazy and work backward.
It's just part of my DNA. I love racing.
Like everything at Big Machine Label Group, the music comes out when it's ready.
Winning 'American Idol' really anoints you the opportunity to have a great career; it does not anoint you a career.
Without naming names, you can take some of the biggest artists of the last 25-30 years and point to those moments where they thought they were going to be movie stars, put the entire weight of a film on their back, and it failed. And some of them didn't recover from that.
If you stand for something, that means there are going to be people who support you and people who don't support you.
When we signed Taylor Swift, people said, 'You're signing a 15-year-old female country artist? Good luck!'
We try to stay on the edge of the mainstream and look at what the most aggressive young kids are running toward.
Our entire goal is to make something that moves you... if you don't want to call it country, I don't care. That doesn't matter to me.
As an artist development platform, we've proven that all the work done behind the scenes at American Idol, along with surviving the rigors of the intense live shows, can properly prepare a winner for a real-world music career opportunity.
You've got to believe in yourself.
Because we are Nashville-based and predominately a country label, people obviously think of us in that way, and that's fine.
I learned that you could beat the big guys with desire, passion, and hard work.
The facts show that the music industry was much better off before Spotify hit these shores.
The Big Machine Label Group will continue to knock down doors to break female talent.
Every day is an adventure, and no two days are ever alike.
I've always thought we've done our best work when everything is on the line.
Some people are just gifted with a great voice, other people are gifted with great emotion, other people are gifted with great engagement - when you find all of those things in one package, you have Taylor Swift.
It never gets easier to break a new act.
So much time and attention has been spent on streaming that we've really gotten away from some of the things that we could have, energywise, put into working together with radio more closely for terrestrial.
When we grew up, we couldn't wait to get our hands on cars, work with them, change the look of them. Now you see kids being like, 'I'll just take the Uber,' or 'Oh, I don't even have my driver's license yet.' I'm like, 'Ugh, who are you people?'
A lot of times in a record company environment, it's, 'All right, go out on the road, go get some experience, come back in six months, and we'll see where we are.' I've erased that. Now it's, 'This is what we're working on today. I expect you to come in tomorrow and address this and be better.'
