Jonatha Brooke overcomes the major label miasma.

By Janelle Browning
Berklee.edu Correspondent
March 23, 2004

	Jonatha Brooke performs during her Voice Week clinic.
	Farnsworth/Blalock Photography

Brooke told students about her travails with the record industry when she appeared as a visiting artist during Berklee's recent Voice Week. After years of struggle with major labels, Brooke and her manager created an independent label in 1998, and made their first release a live album to test the commercial waters. Finding online success, they struck a distribution deal, and began selling Bad Dog Records' first offering, Live, Brooke's third solo album, in stores.

In 2001, Bad Dog released Steady Pull, which has enjoyed more commercial success than any of the albums Brooke released through a major label, selling 85,000 copies to date. She was pleased with its reception, but explained that had she been on a major label, the potential to sell more would have been greater, given the initial success of the single "Linger." With the increased money and resources of a major label, Steady Pull might have been refashioned in additional formats and been heard by a larger audience.

"You lower the bar...when you start your own label," Brooke said. "You have to decide what is realistic. What is success to me? What is going to be enough? Am I going to be heartbroken if I'm not Britney Spears? I don't think so. I have a career and I have the respect of my peers and I'm able to tour and I love what I do and I love all my records and that is enough."

Ultimately, while Brooke learned a great deal from her work with major labels, it came down to an independent label being a better fit, particularly as an artist in possession of a strong individual vision. Having her own label means that her career is no longer at the mercy of whomever happens to sit behind the desk.

From her start as a recording artist on an independent label, to working with one of the largest labels in the industry, to owning her own label, Brooke had plenty to tell students about her range of experiences when she gave her master class in the David Friend Recital Hall. She spoke to students about the unusual path her career has taken, and performed several songs, both old and new.

She talked about the importance of maintaining one's creative control and the ability to roll with the punches in such a dynamic business. For Brooke, such independence seems to come naturally.

Her musical career began conventionally enough as a student at Amherst College, when she and friend Jennifer Kimball formed the band the Story. They were signed to Green Linnet Records, a small independent label based in Connecticut, where they released Grace in Gravity. It didn't take long for major labels to take notice, however, and soon Elektra re-released the album, and followed it with the Story's sophomore effort, Angel in the House.

This is where the story gets complicated.

A change in executive leadership at Elektra forced the band to look elsewhere for support and a place to make its next album. Then the Story dissolved, and Brooke began her solo career, re-signing with the same producer she had worked with at Elektra, this time at Universal/MCA. She released Plumb, and the first single, "Nothing Sacred," was doing well. Then came another regime change. And another.

Students will get a chance to hear more of Brooke when she plays the Berklee Performance Center with her band on March 26. Farnsworth/Blalock Photography

In total, Brooke weathered three such corporate shuffles, the last in the middle of a national tour. After her producer left Universal/MCA, the label's new administration refused to put out her second solo album, Ten Cent Wings, or release her from her contract. Brooke was forced to shop the album door-to-door at her own label. She managed to get the album released, and toured extensively to support it. Two months into the tour, the label underwent its final regime change. When the option on Brooke's next album came up, she asked for time and the support for Ten Cent Wings that the label had promised. She never heard back, and Universal/MCA eventually dropped her.

Brooke took one last run at the major label circuit when Steady Pull was released. She sent it to several major labels, followed up with phone calls to get their reactions, and listened to comments as honest as they were deeply cynical.

"'Love the record, but how old are you now?'" Brooke said she was told. The then 37-year-old singer/songwriter would repeat her question regarding the album's critical merit, wondering what her age had to do with the value of the record. She was informed that while they loved the record, they "weren't signing anyone over 20 these days, because it's not worth it," she said.

For Brooke, the choice to form her own label has obviously proven successful. She recently recorded two songs for the soundtrack to Disney's Return to Neverland, one an original called "I'll Try," which she performed at the clinic. Her latest effort, Back in the Circus, was released on February 24, and touted by Billboard as "a literate, lyrical and luminous" masterpiece. At the clinic, she performed two songs from Back in the Circus, "Better After All" and "Sally."

At the end of the clinic, a student asked Brooke about the alternate tunings she favors. She laughed and referred again to the limitations that have shaped her career. She explained that standard tuning is too difficult for her.

"I crave dissonance," Brooke said. "I want the tension. I want the major seventh, the whatever-you-call-it, and the sharp whatever pretty much in every chord."

So maybe the "limitations" have actually helped her. "Maybe [the limitations]," Brooke said, "are what creates whatever we are that is original or different."

Links of Interest
•	Women in Music Panel
•	Patty Larkin Clinic
•	James Taylor Visit
•	Voice Department