Why was JIVE absorbed into RCA?

[rik]

Correct me if I’m wrong but JIVE was still relatively successful in 2011? Why was it absorbed by a parent company around Criminal? I know it wasn’t exclusive to JIVE either right, and may be a money thing/common practice  as Arista artists were absorbed around 2007?  Were there issues at JIVE? Was it difficult to have Britney be the main source of income given that other artists had moved on? Was this also the case for Justin Timberlake or was his move from JIVE prior to the absorption 

 

@Midnight @Jordan Miller @SlayOut @GODNA IS A QUEEN  @I Always Sing Live @Y2KLady @Urbanney @Isla

[Isla]

Justin was on Jive until its closure and moved to RCA just like Britney and the other artists signed to the label did (which is ironic, considering Nsync were originally signed to RCA, but later switched to Jive).

J and Arista were closed down at the same time too. Arista was relaunched in 2018, although I'm not sure which artists are signed to it.

I think the main reason why the labels closed is because Sony were restructuring them and thought it'd be better for all the artists across the three labels to be signed to one label, so they decided to just shut them down and moved all the label's artists over to RCA. Probably not the best idea imo considering RCA already had many artists on that label. Might have been better to merge Jive/J/Arista as a whole new label separate to RCA?

Edited March 19, 2022 by Isla

[Bo da toe]

On 3/19/2022 at 2:44 PM, Isla said:

Arista was relaunched in 2018, although I'm not sure which artists are signed to it.

I didn’t know Arista relaunched! Avril needs to leave Travis’ trash label and go back with them. Her first 2 albums with them were her best. RCA just wanted more of Girlfriend.

i know that’s unrelated to the topic but RCA is trash.

 

[Isla]

7 minutes ago, Bo Johnson said:

I didn’t know Arista relaunched! Avril needs to leave Travis’ trash label and go back with them. Her first 2 albums with them were her best. RCA just wanted more of Girlfriend.

i know that’s unrelated to the topic but RCA is trash.

 

Why did she move to RCA in the first place?

[Bo da toe]

Just now, Isla said:

Why did she move to RCA in the first place?

Like someone else said Arista was absorbed by RCA around 07. The Best Damn Thing was her first album on that label. Then she tried to go more grown up, singer/songwriter and RCA said “nope!” and now we have another once promising artist who doesn’t know who she is as an artist anymore. Idk how that label is still afloat when they sabotage their artists like they do.

[Isla]

53 minutes ago, Bo Johnson said:

Like someone else said Arista was absorbed by RCA around 07. The Best Damn Thing was her first album on that label. Then she tried to go more grown up, singer/songwriter and RCA said “nope!” and now we have another once promising artist who doesn’t know who she is as an artist anymore. Idk how that label is still afloat when they sabotage their artists like they do.

Oh dear

[Spicechinodiva]

3 hours ago, Bo Johnson said:

Like someone else said Arista was absorbed by RCA around 07. The Best Damn Thing was her first album on that label. Then she tried to go more grown up, singer/songwriter and RCA said “nope!” and now we have another once promising artist who doesn’t know who she is as an artist anymore. Idk how that label is still afloat when they sabotage their artists like they do.

Goodbye lullaby was delayed, people forget avril lavigne, stated it was ready since 2009, but RCA heard what the hell and i bet she was forced back into the studio. 

 

If anything this is during the clive davis era. 

 

Research him, he's actually not a good guy.

 

He signed a girl group to Arista named Expose fired the original line up for looking different. Hired 3 different girls and basically had them re record the debut album fast.

 

Lewis and Even Jeanette both said That only one song on exposure Exposed to love had the original trio. 

 

Even in interviews with Laurie miller she said the arista contract was super strict. 

 

The image, her choreography and her clothes epuld become property of Arista records and she was fired cos she didn't want to lose her likeness to corporations. 

 

She said Clive fired sandee cos of her weight and muscular frame..

 

She said thos was the 80s after all image was very much important like Instagram, we had to deal with MTV, people forget that MTV also forced an image agenda on girls. 

 

You had to look and act Like Madonna to get played, you couldn't just be yourself at all,  had to be Madonna or whitney Houston. 

 

MTV had a dark side when it came to the videos, it was more thsn just the black artists. females had to act and dress a certain way to get played. 

 

We all know Janet fell victim into this, control era a little heavy set, chubby cheeks still cute. Rhythm nation all that weight is gone, MTV used Paula Abdul against her and It worked 

 

 

[rik]

3 hours ago, Bo Johnson said:

Like someone else said Arista was absorbed by RCA around 07. The Best Damn Thing was her first album on that label. Then she tried to go more grown up, singer/songwriter and RCA said “nope!” and now we have another once promising artist who doesn’t know who she is as an artist anymore. Idk how that label is still afloat when they sabotage their artists like they do.

Agreed 

[Moscow]

Well the thing is that Jive wasn't seeing a very good time from around 2006 actually, Britney made them around 75M dollars in revenue from her first 4 Years. My dad left Jive around 2005 if I remember it correctly, anyway moving on Jive was very small when Britney came around and didn't become insanely big even with Britney they needed more artists to expand. RCA is a very branched out label and they aren't one of the best labels in terms of revenue from Years actually but RCA is still very deeply rooted thanks to Sony! Though I don't know what exactly went down with Jive but it wasn't restructuring this is usually a marketing excuse given by the company its definitely loses incurring. I also don't know what made Britney move to RCA I tried to find it a lot but I absolutely got no clue, but Jive and Britney together were very successful though blackout for that time wasn't a hit but it indeed landed up on IPFI best top 40 selling albums. Jive was always invented in Britney and vice versa but Jive was not seeing good success from long hence I believe RCA absorbed it. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Isla]

40 minutes ago, Spicechinodiva said:

He signed a girl group to Arista named Expose fired the original line up for looking different. Hired 3 different girls and basically had them re record the debut album fast.

WHAT

Also, according to Wikipedia, LA Reid got fired from the label after taking charge after Clive Davis left.

[PokemonSpears]

I mean, I don't know their accounting documents or stuff, but for what I understand it was a matter of the people that got in charge, and specifically, wanting to rebrand RCA Records after the last change.

Thing is, acquisitions, merging, separations, rebranding, occurred throughout the years, prior to 2011, but everything kept "within family" because Barry Weiss was still in charge, until he wasn't, that's when the focus on RCA Records happened.

 

Bertelsmann Music Group (BMG) had acquired Zomba, Jive's parent, since 2002.

BMG had:

• Ariola Records
• RCA Music Group
  • RCA Records
    • RCA Victor Group: The Windham Hill Group, Bluebird Records
  • Arista Records
  • J Records: Full Surface Records, US Records
  • Phonogenic Records
  • The Inc Records
• Arista Nashville
• RCA Nashville
• BNA Records
• BMG Kidz
• Zomba Music Group
  • Battery Records
  • Epidemic Records
  • LaFace Records
  • Jive Records -> Britney was here
  • Music for Nations Records
  • Multitone Records
  • Pinnacle Records
  • Scotti Brothers Records
  • Silvertone Records
  • Verity Records (Gospel)
  • Volcano Entertainment
  • Zoo Entertainment
  • X-Cell Records

But in 2004, Sony and BMG merged into Sony BMG.

 

Now here's the key, I believe. In April 2008, Barry Weiss, who had been in charge of Jive for a long time, became the head of the whole BMG Label Group, but in August 2008, BMG sold his part to Sony, but kept the BMG name, so this half of the merge rebranded as RCA/Jive Label Group. As far as I understand, Barry Weiss still remained in charge of this part.

At this point, all the companies I listed, aka the RCA / Jive Label Group, belonged all to Sony Music. And that actually is still the case to this day.

The thing is, for whatever reason, in March 2011 Barry Weiss left to become CEO of some labels under Universal Music Group. That year, Sony Music also got a new CEO, Doug Morris (founder of VEVO, and ironically, former CEO of UMG), and subsidiary RCA Music Group got a new chairman as well, Peter Edge. I don't know who remained in charge of Jive Records after Barry left, but I think the remaining people clearly didn't have any fondness to Jive, because it was then in October when it was announced that they wanted to refresh RCA Records, absorbing all the artists from Jive, Arista and J. Supposedly, all the artists were informed beforehand and agreed to the transition.

In 2012 was when Barry Weiss was wooing Britney to come with him to UMG, and L.A. Reid also wanted her to join Epic, who was also now part of Sony.

So for what I get, it's not a matter of whether Jive was producing enough money or not, but it's just that the new people in charge preferred to focus on RCA Records, maybe because of its longevity or I don't know.

 

So technically, Jive was never dissolved, it just lost all of its artists to RCA, but Wikipedia says it was still being used as Jive Epic exclusively in France, until 2019.

 

[RebellionSparkles]

7 hours ago, PokemonSpears said:

I mean, I don't know their accounting documents or stuff, but for what I understand it was a matter of the people that got in charge, and specifically, wanting to rebrand RCA Records after the last change.

Thing is, acquisitions, merging, separations, rebranding, occurred throughout the years, prior to 2011, but everything kept "within family" because Barry Weiss was still in charge, until he wasn't, that's when the focus on RCA Records happened.

 

Bertelsmann Music Group (BMG) had acquired Zomba, Jive's parent, since 2002.

BMG had:

• Ariola Records
• RCA Music Group
  • RCA Records
    • RCA Victor Group: The Windham Hill Group, Bluebird Records
  • Arista Records
  • J Records: Full Surface Records, US Records
  • Phonogenic Records
  • The Inc Records
• Arista Nashville
• RCA Nashville
• BNA Records
• BMG Kidz
• Zomba Music Group
  • Battery Records
  • Epidemic Records
  • LaFace Records
  • Jive Records -> Britney was here
  • Music for Nations Records
  • Multitone Records
  • Pinnacle Records
  • Scotti Brothers Records
  • Silvertone Records
  • Verity Records (Gospel)
  • Volcano Entertainment
  • Zoo Entertainment
  • X-Cell Records

But in 2004, Sony and BMG merged into Sony BMG.

 

Now here's the key, I believe. In April 2008, Barry Weiss, who had been in charge of Jive for a long time, became the head of the whole BMG Label Group, but in August 2008, BMG sold his part to Sony, but kept the BMG name, so this half of the merge rebranded as RCA/Jive Label Group. As far as I understand, Barry Weiss still remained in charge of this part.

At this point, all the companies I listed, aka the RCA / Jive Label Group, belonged all to Sony Music. And that actually is still the case to this day.

The thing is, for whatever reason, in March 2011 Barry Weiss left to become CEO of some labels under Universal Music Group. That year, Sony Music also got a new CEO, Doug Morris (founder of VEVO, and ironically, former CEO of UMG), and subsidiary RCA Music Group got a new chairman as well, Peter Edge. I don't know who remained in charge of Jive Records after Barry left, but I think the remaining people clearly didn't have any fondness to Jive, because it was then in October when it was announced that they wanted to refresh RCA Records, absorbing all the artists from Jive, Arista and J. Supposedly, all the artists were informed beforehand and agreed to the transition.

In 2012 was when Barry Weiss was wooing Britney to come with him to UMG, and L.A. Reid also wanted her to join Epic, who was also now part of Sony.

So for what I get, it's not a matter of whether Jive was producing enough money or not, but it's just that the new people in charge preferred to focus on RCA Records, maybe because of its longevity or I don't know.

 

So technically, Jive was never dissolved, it just lost all of its artists to RCA, but Wikipedia says it was still being used as Jive Epic exclusively in France, until 2019.

 

Great research!

[rik]

Hit thread…… no feature…… @Midnight omg

[Isla]

On 3/28/2022 at 6:01 AM, PokemonSpears said:

I mean, I don't know their accounting documents or stuff, but for what I understand it was a matter of the people that got in charge, and specifically, wanting to rebrand RCA Records after the last change.

Thing is, acquisitions, merging, separations, rebranding, occurred throughout the years, prior to 2011, but everything kept "within family" because Barry Weiss was still in charge, until he wasn't, that's when the focus on RCA Records happened.

 

Bertelsmann Music Group (BMG) had acquired Zomba, Jive's parent, since 2002.

BMG had:

• Ariola Records
• RCA Music Group
  • RCA Records
    • RCA Victor Group: The Windham Hill Group, Bluebird Records
  • Arista Records
  • J Records: Full Surface Records, US Records
  • Phonogenic Records
  • The Inc Records
• Arista Nashville
• RCA Nashville
• BNA Records
• BMG Kidz
• Zomba Music Group
  • Battery Records
  • Epidemic Records
  • LaFace Records
  • Jive Records -> Britney was here
  • Music for Nations Records
  • Multitone Records
  • Pinnacle Records
  • Scotti Brothers Records
  • Silvertone Records
  • Verity Records (Gospel)
  • Volcano Entertainment
  • Zoo Entertainment
  • X-Cell Records

But in 2004, Sony and BMG merged into Sony BMG.

 

Now here's the key, I believe. In April 2008, Barry Weiss, who had been in charge of Jive for a long time, became the head of the whole BMG Label Group, but in August 2008, BMG sold his part to Sony, but kept the BMG name, so this half of the merge rebranded as RCA/Jive Label Group. As far as I understand, Barry Weiss still remained in charge of this part.

At this point, all the companies I listed, aka the RCA / Jive Label Group, belonged all to Sony Music. And that actually is still the case to this day.

The thing is, for whatever reason, in March 2011 Barry Weiss left to become CEO of some labels under Universal Music Group. That year, Sony Music also got a new CEO, Doug Morris (founder of VEVO, and ironically, former CEO of UMG), and subsidiary RCA Music Group got a new chairman as well, Peter Edge. I don't know who remained in charge of Jive Records after Barry left, but I think the remaining people clearly didn't have any fondness to Jive, because it was then in October when it was announced that they wanted to refresh RCA Records, absorbing all the artists from Jive, Arista and J. Supposedly, all the artists were informed beforehand and agreed to the transition.

In 2012 was when Barry Weiss was wooing Britney to come with him to UMG, and L.A. Reid also wanted her to join Epic, who was also now part of Sony.

So for what I get, it's not a matter of whether Jive was producing enough money or not, but it's just that the new people in charge preferred to focus on RCA Records, maybe because of its longevity or I don't know.

 

So technically, Jive was never dissolved, it just lost all of its artists to RCA, but Wikipedia says it was still being used as Jive Epic exclusively in France, until 2019.

 

You explained things better than I did. It kinda sucks that things seemed to go downhill after Barry left. I guess the new people in charge clearly saw RCA as more of a priority. Maybe, with the Sony BMG merger, they wanted to see all the former BMG labels 'eliminated' in a way with Sony now fully owning them?

Wikipedia says that Jive is 'inactive', I guess the same applies to J too. Arista was relaunched in 2018.

[PokemonSpears]

Just now, Isla said:

You explained things better than I did. It kinda sucks that things seemed to go downhill after Barry left. I guess the new people in charge clearly saw RCA as more of a priority. Maybe, with the Sony BMG merger, they wanted to see all the former BMG labels 'eliminated' in a way with Sony now fully owning them?

Wikipedia says that Jive is 'inactive', I guess the same applies to J too. Arista was relaunched in 2018.

since we noticed the UMG thing the other day, I went to try to understand what was all about. I still don't understand the UMG involvement with Britney's catalog or brand  but at least I understand a little bit better the whole Jive story. I kinda had to go to the wikipedia page of every record label and CEO to sort of put the story together, so that's what I came up with, but I may be missing some tidbits of info, or maybe I got some stuff wrong, because I couldn't find like a linear time of events. 

[Isla]

1 minute ago, PokemonSpears said:

since we noticed the UMG thing the other day, I went to try to understand what was all about. I still don't understand the UMG involvement with Britney's catalog or brand  but at least I understand a little bit better the whole Jive story. I kinda had to go to the wikipedia page of every record label and CEO to sort of put the story together, so that's what I came up with, but I may be missing some tidbits of info, or maybe I got some stuff wrong, because I couldn't find like a linear time of events. 

Even if it's from Wiki it's still a great deal of research.... although I would never have used Wiki to help with my own essays at school/university hahaha

[PokemonSpears]

1 minute ago, Isla said:

Even if it's from Wiki it's still a great deal of research.... although I would never have used Wiki to help with my own essays at school/university hahaha

those school projects sometimes were the worst, because certain topics that were too specific, you wouldn't find any good info  other than Wikipedia.

Tbh Wikipedia has gotten a lot of bad reputation, and I understand why, because in theory anyone can go and write whatever they want, but the truth is there's also a lot of articles that are watched by moderators and won't allow things that don't have a reliable source. 

There's obviously exceptions like those allowing that author to claim ISBE was an official BJ single just because some random Italian radio station played it once, but many other articles do have a more reliable content. Or at the very least, they list their sources which usually expand on the context that is within the wiki article, so you could do your research directly from there. 

[Isla]

5 minutes ago, PokemonSpears said:

those school projects sometimes were the worst, because certain topics that were too specific, you wouldn't find any good info  other than Wikipedia.

Tbh Wikipedia has gotten a lot of bad reputation, and I understand why, because in theory anyone can go and write whatever they want, but the truth is there's also a lot of articles that are watched by moderators and won't allow things that don't have a reliable source. 

There's obviously exceptions like those allowing that author to claim ISBE was an official BJ single just because some random Italian radio station played it once, but many other articles do have a more reliable content. Or at the very least, they list their sources which usually expand on the context that is within the wiki article, so you could do your research directly from there. 

Yes that is very true. They at least back up certain parts of articles with sources, but at the same time, people can edit it anything they want and it might not even be true....

But even so, I think Wikipedia was discouraged when I was at university. Like we could have a look at it for information at least, but not use it as a 'source' for any essays we wrote (and especially not dissertations).

Edited March 29, 2022 by Isla