Oh how Notable it is: Q&A with Music Publishers Damon Booth & Tom DeSavia

**UPDATE 9/01/09: Notable Music and IODA announce new partnership, read the press release HERE

With a diverse and impressive publishing roster that includes music legend Cy Coleman and an amazing Jamaican music catalog, the crew from Notable Music is marking their territory in the new music landscape. The boutique pubco’s Damon Booth and Tom DeSavia recently sat down for a little Q&A sesh with RM 64 knuckleheads Rodel Delfin and Scott Sheldon.

RM 64: Before we get into the inner workings of Notable, share with us your industry backgrounds.

DB: I’ll start considering the guy who moved me to LA from Chicago is sitting right next to me. I started my career working for ASCAP in their Midwest office and Tom (DeSavia) was my boss. When he left to work at Elektra Records in the late 90s, ASCAP moved me to Los Angeles and I took over Pop music membership at the PRO. From there I went to EMI Publishing where I was a Creative exec for a few years and then crossed over to the label side, doing A&R at Warner Brothers Records.

During this period I was introduced to an amazing songwriter who later became my brother-in-law, named Cy Coleman. He was also an independent music publisher as he had never sold his publishing and he had this great American Songbook collection. We ended up becoming very close.

When Cy passed away suddenly in 2004, I left Warner Bros. to keep his little boutique company, Notable Music up and running, thus keeping it a family business. I’ve been doing that for three years now and we moved the company from New York City to Pasadena, CA two years ago. And I was fortunate enough to have Tom come on board earlier this year as VP of Creative.

TD: For me, I started as a music journalist for a publication called Cash Box. I was later asked to interview at ASCAP. I got the gig and ended up staying there for seven years before going to Elektra Records where I did A&R for six years. After that I went back to ASCAP for an additional eight years, heading up the West Coast membership staff.

Over the years, Damon and I have been such good friends that joining him at Notable is really like a kid’s fantasy. To have the opportunity to work together after so many years is amazing.

RM 64: On to Notable, how did it start?

DB: Notable was started in 1962 by Cy Coleman. He was widely considered one of the last of the great American Songbook legends. He was the baby of that group which included Cole Porter, George Gershwin, as well as contemporaries like Sammy Cahn and Stephen Sondheim. He had a couple of huge hits during his early 20’s and wrote for Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr., collaborators who at the time were much older lyricists than him.

A lot of the writers he was working with didn’t want to sign their publishing away to someone they didn’t know, so they signed with Cy. And he kept signing writers that loved him and that he trusted. And they trusted him.

Cy could identify talent really early, but he wasn’t trying to sign anyone and everyone. His philosophy was, ‘I’m a songwriter, I’m going to take care of my own songs and other artists who I trust and want to work with.’ But he had a career writing and performing everyday. And you know, even though the songs were standards, you have to work them just as hard as a new project because they will fade and people will forget them.

RM 64: What were some of your goals when taking over the company?

DB:Things weren’t going the right direction when I came in, so we took over the catalog and moved administration through Chrysalis Publishing, who has been amazing partners. Right away they brought up the idea to do a tribute album of Cy’s work. I thought it was a great idea. They introduced us to Dave Palmer, an L.A. based producer, arranger and musician, and we brought in some contemporary singers to do Cy’s songs in new arrangements. The idea was to present something new to these standards so people wouldn’t expect what they heard. We’re trying to bring in a new audience to match the name with the music and keep the legacy going. The tribute album which will be coming out via New West Records features Fiona Apple, Patti Griffin, Ambrosia Parsley, Missy Higgins and a variety of great artists who knew and loved Cy’s songs.

One of my goals for Notable when I started was for it to be a full-fledged music company. We’re publishers primarily, but if our songwriters need to make a record, then let’s get a record made and find a home for it. Let’s connect music to its audience like we’re supposed to and not be just music publishers. We’re not trying to be bought by a hedge fund and then flipped into something else or be merged into another company. We want to hand this down to Cy and Shelby Coleman’s kids someday. We aspire to do what Jerry Moss and Herb Alpert did with Rondor and A&M Records. What Mo Ostin did at Reprise when Frank Sinatra came to him. We want to follow our heart musically.

RM 64: Where has that led you so far?

DB: We’re a little bit all over the map because we like a lot of different kinds of music. We jumped on an opportunity to work with an iconic reggae catalog from Treasure Isle and High Note that hadn’t been taken care of and had slipped into obscurity in the 80s. We administer both masters and publishing for this amazing and influential reggae music. Our primary job is to collect the catalog’s revenue, clear the samples and solve the big copyright disputes and any pirated-use issues. We’re also working on some remixes, tributes and events to get those two labels to be living, breathing entities again.

We’re also talking to several label partners regarding box sets and vinyl reissues. We’re going to do it the right way from the original tape recordings. We can geek out as A&R guys on the masters, liner notes and help select these really rare songs. It’s a nice balance to the Cy Coleman catalog. There are a lot of artists who are huge fans of his music and now we can give those stems from the multi-tracks and their rehearsals and just go crazy.

TD: Outside of the US, particularly in the UK and Europe, this catalog is really well known. But in America it doesn’t have the same kind of awareness. We almost stopped saying to people, ‘reggae’, even though that’s what it is, but the term ‘reggae,’ especially to Americans, means Bob Marley. These Jamaicans started in the early 50s hearing basically the Platters and Doo-Wop music, and tried to do it themselves, incorporating their own instrumentation and rhythms. It’s incredible. It’s really just Jamaican soul music.

DB: What blew me away about the Jamaican catalog as well as Cy’s, was that both are of such high caliber and very diverse. The careers of the artists in these catalogs span so many years that there are so many pockets within each decade that we can work with, and it inspires us musically. In addition, the catalogs are nothing like each other, so we’re not competing with ourselves. It doesn’t conflict and it’s a nice outlet for not only us but the music that we love.

RM 64: It sounds like there’s a lot of creative freedom and flexibility being a smaller boutique company.

TD: Yeah, the next thing we sign might be an iconic punk catalog or it may be a young singer who we think is great. Damon said to me when we were talking about working together, ‘it’s going to take you awhile to get use to the idea that we can do whatever we want.’ We can just pursue new endeavors that pop up. Both Damon and I get really excited about new ideas and projects. We have this thing between us where we get…’we’re going to do it! we’re going to get this!’

DB: The one thing we want to do that wasn’t always feasible at our previous jobs was when we sign something, we make good promises. We make a commitment to it and if we don’t follow through, it’s absolutely going to kill us, so we have to follow through with what we promise. We are trying to stay nimble and focused and not take on too much too soon. And stay a family-run independent company.

TD: It’s going to sound cliché, but any writer we sign is going be based on that we can’t live without it. Not the fact that it’s been out on radio or it’s a hype thing. Damon and I are constantly turning each other onto different things. It’s premature to talk about it, but the writers that we’re currently looking to sign will not appear to be an obvious play, but I think industry folks who get what we’re doing will respond with…‘oh ok, that makes sense.’

RM 64: What are some of the advantages and disadvantages of being a boutique publisher?

TD: Our goal is in no way to become the biggest company in the world, but we want to be one of the best. Working with music we love, I know it will get as big or small as it’s supposed to be. What we can offer is the attention and the time. It’s something that you can’t do at a big company. As we grow, it will evolve naturally, but for now I think the thing that made us do this was the desire to be a fully functioning company where we can have something that is manageable and do what we say we can do. We’ve seen the best of it with some people who we’ve been fortunate to work with. And we’ve seen the worst of it at the corporate level, where artists get signed for the wrong reasons and/or are just not paid attention to.

DB: I think in general, publishers are in a great position in this climate. If they can do be smart about their role, they can help an artist do anything they want to do. The problem I saw while working for a music corporation was that the different divisions inside the company didn’t understand each other. The record division and the publishing arm didn’t communicate with each other. It was a little bit of a turf thing. There has always been talk of synergy, but I rarely saw it take place.

Running a boutique, we can move fast and we don’t have to wait and be in the back seat to let things happen. And a lot of publishers are being more pro-active and doing development deals (i.e. working with management companies and emerging talent directly). At a small company, you’re not getting bogged down as much. A team working with the same vision can deliver a lot to a roster. I hope Tom and I don’t ever loose sight of that.

RM 64: What happened with publishing catalogs over the last few years? It seems like valuation multiples for catalogs went out of whack and things cost much more than what they are worth. How did that happen? And what’s the landscape like now?

TD: When investment money was readily available during the recent boom years, investors drove up the price of catalogs when several high-profile deals fetched astronomical numbers. It was a reflection of what was happening in the economy overall. Just like the housing market, publishing values were getting inflated. In addition, some catalogs were being purchased primarily for market share.

DB: When the publishing-buying frenzy got so hot and hedge funds started circling in, some of the music companies who were selling had to shed some of their other publishing holdings for the bigger deals to get approved by the likes of say the European Commission. So there was inventory for sale and it fueled the buying even further, thus raising prices. But what I think the big difference between music copyrights versus say, real estate, is that publishing will not increase in value because it sits in your catalog. Value will only increase if the work is licensed and placed regularly.

TD: There are some amazing publishing companies who are doing it right. But we’ve seen some other companies who buy just to hold. I compare it to the last scene in the movie Raiders of the Lost Ark, where the ark is boxed up in a giant warehouse among a million other boxes. And so, there are some publishers who don’t even know what’s in their catalog.

We’ve come across some individuals who have gotten really big offers on their publishing, but have said, ‘I’ve got enough money; I’m not selling it like a baseball card. I just want someone to work it and make good revenue from the catalog.’ And I think that’s what we have. Our pitch as a company is that an artist who signs with us will know that we’re not just collecting and putting things in a vault. Anything we sign will be a lynch pin for our company. Anything we sign will reflect what the image of this company is and what we’re all about.

RM 64: What’s your take on where the music biz is headed, particularly on the creative side?

TD: In all honesty I think it’s one of the most exciting times for music. The rebuilding has already begun. The crash hasn’t finished but the rebuilding has begun. Everyone is talking about how music is not important and ironically I think it’s the exact opposite. It’s just that it’s taken on a new life. There is a generation that is not concerned with buying it. But regardless, it’s just as important as it ever was.

DB: One thing I see happening is that the music business is starting to listen to the consumer. And I think some music companies are now better at listening to their artists. That’s how music companies grew and thrived decades ago and it seems like we are going back to that. Which leads to the question of how do fans want to experience music now and in the future? The recording industry is obviously trying to figure this out. I think there will be a more direct communication than there has been. That’s definitely the most positive thing happening and hopefully it continues.

TD: However this business is going to survive, in whatever form, I don’t think any of us will know exactly what is going to happen.

RM 64: Are you then optimistic about the future?

TD: Yes. In a weird way, I think we’re headed back to a time where there is more emphasis on artist careers and a long-term vision. Back in the day, music was a long-term business and decisions were made from people who were music fans and creative entrepreneurs. There was thought put into writing the song, production and album packaging. And I think that’s starting to happen again. Every format has a promising independent movement and it’s exciting. For example, there’s a cool indie jazz movement happening right now, as well as an exciting indie rock scene.

DB: I worked with a lot of bands early in their career that became platinum-selling artists, in addition to working with established, hugely-successful acts. Meeting Cy, who I consider a genius, was really inspiring. He had it all, but even at 75 years old, he never lost that drive and excitement for the next project. He always had five balls up in the air at one time. He never lost the optimistic spirit of creating something. It just flowed out of this guy, no matter how much success he already had. Years ago he could have just sat around and reminisced. But he never did that. He always wanted to focus and concentrate on the next thing. If I ever lose that, I would stop what I’m currently doing. Again, that thing about Cy was mind blowing to me. And that reinforced the belief of never losing that drive.

RM 64: Amen! Well, that was a very informative and fun session. Thanks for stopping by. And next time, don’t forget to bring some donuts.

DB: Thank you, and yes, will do.

TD: We’ll have Josh Briggs at ASCAP pick up the next tab.

RM 64: Yes sir!