Back In The Game Former Interscope and Sony Music president-turned-advertising guru Steve Stoute is returning to music with a digital distribution business that will cater to indie acts: “The music business has notoriously taken from the artist. That shouldn’t be the narrative” By Hannah Karp • Photographed by Meredith Jenks

HREE NIGHTS BEFORE UnitedMasters is intended to be an Stoute an idea, she says, “He’ll make (Motown Records president Ethiopia the 2018 Grammy alternative to the major-label system, it happen.” Habtemariam and Epic Records T Awards, as music-industry providing digital distribution along In his 2011 book, The Tanning of president Sylvia Rhone are rare black executives huddled at with tools to help artists identify their America: How Hip-Hop Created a female executives at the top of major familiar corporate functions around superfans and market higher-margin Culture That Rewrote the Rules of labels — and Rhone doesn’t have the Manhattan, Steve Stoute hosted an products to them. It will cater to the New Economy, Stoute quoted a CEO title of Antonio “L.A.” Reid, intimate dinner party in a private independent acts that, like trailblazers General Motors marketing ex ecutive who left in 2017.) room above the posh Gramercy Park Chance the Rapper and J. Cole, are who predicted — accurately, it now “The idea is really good — if he restaurant Eleven Madison Park. willing to forgo hefty label advances seems — that “digital culture is executes, he’ll have something Stoute, the founder of ad agency in exchange for retaining ownership going to be the next phase of urban extraordinary,” says Apple Music’s Translation and former president of of their music. (In an early test of culture,” particularly through social Jimmy Iovine. urban music at Interscope and Sony the tools UnitedMasters will offer, media. UnitedMasters will be geared Stoute is one of many innovators Music, declared that the gathering was 2 Chainz reported a 60 percent jump to exploit that evolutionary phase. circling the music biz as streaming “about culture, storytellers coming in his merch sales within two weeks, Artists will share a cut of their revenue drives the industry’s first double- together in a room, celebrating says Stoute, earning about $500,000.) that will be based on the services digit growth in 18 years. Milana greatness” — a grandiose statement It’s not an entirely new concept, they want. Playlisting, PR, radio Rabkin, who left her job as a WME that actually seemed fitting when but as streaming revenue balloons promotion and consultation with agent several years ago to co-found one surveyed the guests: Nas, Naomi and major labels see their old-school Stoute will be part of a basic package, and run Stem, a digital distributor Campbell, Colin Kaepernick, Darren contracts with big artists expire, the but he says these services will cost and revenue-collection startup for Aronofsky, Quavo and Migos manager model is riper than ever for success, less than anything comparable on artists and managers, says, “For a Coach K, art dealer Gavin Brown, long time, music was blacklisted by Gucci CEO Marco Bizzarri, artist venture capital, but that has started Hope Atherton and Thelma Golden, to change.” director/chief curator of The Studio Still, investors played it relatively Museum in Harlem. safe last year: Out of the nearly “They’ve all got something to gain,” $2 billion in music-tech funding says Stoute two weeks later in his during 2017, 68 percent went to art-filled Soho apartment, recalling Kobalt, Pandora and SoundCloud, the evening. It’s another broad according to publicly available statement that makes more sense information, the latter two of which when you look, for example, at the have deals with the major labels. deal he brokered through Translation “Once you end up in business with in 2017 for Gucci and hip-hop style the labels, it’s very hard to disrupt the legend Dapper Dan to create a joint labels,” says Stoute. “You have to do it fashion line and open a new Harlem from the outside.” atelier. In Stoute’s most recent act, “You have to be willing to leave he has been determined to deliver — that’s what I recommend to these the recognition and compensation From left: Kaepernick, Dapper Dan, Campbell, Nas and Stoute at the relaunch party for young kids in the record business who Dapper Dan at Eleven Madison Park in New York on Jan. 25. he believes are overdue to culture- want to move the needle,” says Iovine. shifting creators. Ultimately, Stoute believes the Nearly two decades after leaving especially with a marketing guru the market. Currently, about 10,000 problem runs deeper than the lack Interscope at the peak of the music like Stoute, who signed Enrique artists have access to a beta version of of label entrepreneurship: “Artists business to help artists like JAY-Z, Iglesias to Interscope, conceived of UnitedMasters that offers advice on and the traditional record company Pharrell Williams and 50 Cent and partnered on JAY-Z’s Made in maximizing social media engagement model are at odds,” he says. “The sell more lucrative products like America festival and updated the with fans. A new iteration will roll out music business has notoriously taken sneakers through Translation, McDonald’s brand with the Justin around September, but Stoute says the from the artist. That shouldn’t be Stoute, 47, is now mounting a music Timberlake jingle “I’m Lovin’ It.” company isn’t yet at full scale. the narrative.” comeback. He surprised the industry Starting out as the road manager Finance-world and Etsy veteran Nas, who’s signed to Def Jam, last November when he announced for Kid ’N Play, Stoute later signed Kristina Salen is overseeing both says that he hopes to join forces with he had secretly raised $70 million the Men in Black soundtrack at Sony Translation and the 58-person Stoute when he can. “It’s a long story from investors in a round led by Music, clocking “how many glasses UnitedMasters team as CFO/COO many artists tell about experiences Alphabet, Andreessen Horowitz Ray-Ban sold as a result of the music’s while Stoute looks for a president with record companies. I know he and 20th Century Fox for the success — and [how] we didn’t share of his startup. The diverse staff wants to make that different for artists startup UnitedMasters. in those profits.” contrasts with an old-school music and for the fans,” says the rapper, who Soon to be housed in a new “Nobody in this culture doesn’t business still largely controlled is Stoute’s former management client. downtown Brooklyn headquarters know who Steve is — there are no by white men, even as hip-hop “He wants to bring us together in a for his ventures (including an in- other Steves,” says Dapper Dan. dominates the streaming services way that no record company has ever

GROOMING BY LAURA ENNIS. COSTA AT NAS: X. DAVID PRUTTING. house sneaker store, STASHED), Whenever Naomi Campbell brings that are driving the industry’s growth. done. It’s 2018 — he’s right on time.”

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