Savannah-based music label E. Broad Records aims to shake up the business

This past January, Savannah transplant Whit Whitley emerged from a year-long ennui spent playing Bob Dylan’s “Don’t Think Twice” and Fleetwood Mac’s “Landslide” repeatedly on her guitar, to found a new independent record label, E. Broad Records, named after the street she looks out on from her apartment window.

“I’ve probably been working on this label since I was 8 and didn’t realize it,” said Whitley of E. Broad Records, which she co-founded with Amy Porter.

Whitley grew up in Lubbock, Texas (the birthplace of Buddy Holly), where she performed in her church choir and earned a scholarship to study trumpet under the principle of the University of Texas symphony orchestra when she was 16 years old.

Whitley moved to Savannah last June. On her birthday, she received a phone call from her parents where she naturally expected to hear them continue the family tradition of singing her “Happy Birthday.” Instead, she received news that her father had suffered a stroke.

The terrible news sparked Whitley to pick up her guitar, and rather than strum out the same old covers she had been stuck on, she wrote the first original song she had written in years.

“It was so fast,” said Whitley. “I got my phone out and recorded a video and I sent it to my sister-in-law of all people. I don’t know why. I sent her the chorus and she texted back that she couldn’t wait to hear the rest of it.”

Encouraged by the positive response, Whitley wrote ten more songs in rapid succession—the best she had ever written.

“My first thought was, ‘Hell, no one is going to sign me. I’m old now. I’ll just find someone to sing my songs.’ I was just spinning in circles about this.”

Starting the record label

Whitley wrote ideas for a record label in her journal until the name E. Broad Records inspired her to take the next steps.

“I hit the ground running after that,” said Whitley. “I looked for studios around town. I didn’t realize how hard Savannah got hit by the pandemic. A lot of the studios closed down. The ones that were running were not running at a full-time capacity.”

Whitley finally found producer Greg Critchley and began work on her debut album at his Hilton Head studio. Recording under the name whit.love, she plans to release a single soon with the album to follow.

As a woman-owned label, E. Broad records plans to hire as many woman in business roles as possible including producers and engineers. She even hopes to use a well-known female lathe cutter to produce E. Broad’s vinyl releases.

“Woman tend to be under-represented but there are a lot of women out there making amazing albums.”

Recording her album and planning the label got Whitley thinking about her experiences in the music industry, ones that had left her disillusioned.

“It brought up some old wounds from when I was very young,’ recalled Whitley. “I knew I wanted to be a rock star. Not so much the fame and the fortune, but the life of music. When I was a kid in high school, I started learning about the music business, buying the books that look like dictionaries. I thought, well, records happen in studios, so my senior year of high school I did half days and did a mentorship at Digital Services. At that time it was one of the only SSL (Solid State Logic) consoles in the South at the time. This was a world class studio. The Eurythmics were in there to give you an idea. At noon I left school and all hours of the night I was interning at this studio.”

Whitley learned that the technical aspects of sound engineering and producing were not her strength, but she did learn a lot about the music business. Whitley joined a band in college, and when they were approached with a record contract, she learned a harsh lesson about the reality of the record industry.

“I didn’t understand why the music business worked that way,” said Whitley. “Why is it when you get a record deal, the company gets 90% and you get 10%. That part was upsetting, but here’s the part that broke me—when I read far enough to understand that the money they put to your recording budget is recoupable out of your royalties. Basically, if they spend a $100,000 on your album, and then your album starts selling, for every dollar that comes in they get 90 cents, you get 10 cents, but that ten cents is paid back on the $100,000 recoupable advance. When that $100,000 is paid back, from your 10 cents, you’ll get a check.”

Coming back to music

Whitley left music behind and founded a digital marketing company in 2000. She understands that records labels offer more than just money. There are resources, infrastructure, connections and relationships, and everything a business needs to be successful. However, the music business doesn’t operate entirely like other businesses.

“I’ve learned how other businesses work,” said Whitley. “I don’t know of any other businesses that can cut deals like that. And we all know why they can cut deals like that. It’s because musicians, they want more than anything to share their music with the world.”

Whitley is now in a different place in her life and has resources she didn’t have when she was younger. She wants to bring her knowledge of the business to promoting other artists and building up E. Broad Record’s roster of talent.

“My understanding of the music industry is that labels are not developing artists, and they’re looking for people that already have huge social followings. They’ve already done all the development on their own...Now the deal is even more in [the label’s] favor. They don’t even take a chance anymore.

“I thought, if I’m going to do this label, I’ve got to find a way to do it that aligns with my values. I had to ask myself some hard questions because now it’s my money and I’m investing it. How am I going to handle that?”

Shaking up the local scene

The artistic mission of E. Broad Records is to truly develop and support artists who are making new music only they can make.

“To me what the label is about,” said Whitley. “The music we support is a singer-songwriter artist who can’t not write what their writing. Who can’t not sing what they’re singing. Those are the songs, those are the artists I want to look for. I don’t care if they don’t have a social following. I don’t even care if they’ve never released music. I’m interested if it moves me.”

The business mission of E. Broad is where Whitley’s ambitions veer away from long-time industry standards. To be transparent, Whitley is relying on a “360” deal, which, when it is based on the usual 90/10 split, is not very desirable to new artists.

“The reason we’re doing a 360 deal is because I do think it’s very difficult to make a profit from an artist off of royalties from streams,” explained Whitley. “That is stacked against people who aren’t famous. Because of that, I think the 360 deal is a viable alternative. If the label isn’t sustainable, I can’t help anyone.”

Where E. Broad does things differently is in the split of royalties. For passive income such as streams, syncs, and licensing, the split between label and artist will be 50/50. Already an improvement.

Active or non-passive income such as touring and personal appearances will be 70/30 in the artist’s favor, since they are doing most of the work in these cases.

The final part of Whitley’s offer is even more groundbreaking. “We’re offering a non-recoupable record deal, which means we will not recoup our investment into the recording from the artist’s royalties. We’ll recoup it from our split.”

Whitley hopes that this arrangement will make for a more equitable partnership between the label and the artist. The cherry on top is that while the label will own the rights to the recordings, the artists will maintain 100% ownership of their songs.

“That’s gold for them,” said Whitley. “If you’re a songwriter, you don’t want to give that away...I certainly didn’t want to think about giving the rights to my music to some company.”

E. Broad’s first record is by a (yet to be announced) singer-songwriter from Houston, Texas who relocated to Asheville, N.C. Her debut album was recorded at Blackbird Studios in Nashville, with producer and musician Phil Madeira. Madeira is the leader of the Red Dirt Boys, Emmy Lou Harris’ back-up band.

Madeira brought his bandmates Chris Donohue (bass) and Bryan Ownings (drums) into the sessions, while providing piano and B3 Hammond himself. Other artists on the recording include back-up vocals by Grammy nominated Nashville singer Cindy Morgan, a duet with Grammy nominated Australian-American folk artist Jennifer Knapp, and sweet pedal steel by Russ Pahl who has played with Elton John and Dickey Betts.

All of the tracks were cut live in four days and reportedly sound like hi-fi music from the 1970s.

“We cut that record like it was 1972,” Whitley said excitedly. “It was a dream come true. Of course, as executive producer, all I did was sit on the leather couch in the back of the control room and watch everyone make magic. This record is going to be my favorite record in my collection when it comes out.”

Whitley plans to sign local Savannah artists, as well. Whitley describes one artist in negotiations as a singer-songwriter with an incredible voice who writes in the shoegaze and dreampop genres. According to Whitley, the other artist she is working with produces lo-fi chill music and “is like if Bob Dylan and Barry White had an Irish kid.”

Although E. Broad records has signed and recorded their first artist, legal wrangling prevents Whitley from announcing the names on her roster just yet, however an official announcement should be coming soon.

For more information, check out ebroadrecords.com, and stay tuned for coming announcements.

This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: E. Broad Records to unveil first lineup of artists in Savannah GA