When Napster finally took its toll on the music industry back in the early 2000s, there were just as many cheers as there were sighs. Despite the obvious impact it had on artists, many were glad labels were finally getting their comeuppance.
Having taken advantage of artists and fans for decades, many saw the widespread growth of internet music piracy as the just dessert for an industry built on exploitative and convoluted talent contracts, in which artists inevitably end up in debt to the label.
Things are different in this day and age, but back in the day a routine label contract could see a company making bank off an album as the artist received a mere pittance, despite having written and recorded the album itself.
Case in point, legendary UK punk band The Slits are still in debt to their label, Island Records, for $10,000. According to guitarist Viv Albertine, the band never made a penny from the sales of their seminal debut album, Cut.
“How about writing off the Slits’ paltry 40 year debt to celebrate 40 years of punk so we can receive royalties at last?” Albertine wrote on Twitter, addressing the band’s former label in the wake of an upcoming reissue of Cut.
The reissue is being put out by Rough Trade Records and Albertine also tweeted at the label to see if they could help the band negotiate with Island Records and have them finally wipe out the debt, which Albertine claims is farcical.
“Island paid a $45k advance to the Slits in 1979, a sum they have recouped many times over, but because the Slits get only 8% of Island’s profits (after all Island’s costs and repayments) which then goes towards paying off our advance – they say we still owe 10k,” she wrote.
“We do not even have money for a lawyer,” she continued. Cut reached number 30 on the UK album charts when it was first released and is consistently noted as a groundbreaking release and one of the greatest albums of all time.
“Even though many thousands of copies of Cut have been sold and Island are in profit from the record and Dennis Bovell, the producer, got a different deal and gets paid, the Slits have never received any money NOT ONE PENNY from Island for the ‘classic, in their top fifty albums of all time’ record, Cut,” said Albertine.
As The Music reports, a petition has now been launched to urge Island Records to clear the band’s debt and enable them “to receive long awaited royalties”. At the time of writing, the petition has accrued 5,266 signatures.
