Ghazi believes some tales are “higher advised in rewind than ahead.” How EMPIRE — the unbiased label, distributor and writer that he established in 2010 — acquired Dirtybird is one in all them.
On October 20, EMPIRE announced its acquisition of Claude VonStroke’s stalwart dance imprint, which has nurtured an inimitable, off-kilter model of home and techno since its 2005 launch.
Beneath the settlement, EMPIRE obtains possession of Dirtybird’s again catalog and all future releases, for which EMPIRE will now deal with distribution and publishing. The deal — representing EMPIRE’s first stride into the dance/digital house — contains Dirtybird’s clothes and Web3 assets, excluding solely Dirtybird’s stay occasions and competition manufacturers. These rights are retained by Dirtybird CEO VonStroke, recognized by his given title Barclay Crenshaw, who may also proceed to A&R Dirtybird and direct inventive for its attire line. (The rights to Dirtybird’s stay occasions and competition manufacturers weren’t part of the negotiations. “I advised Barclay early on, ‘We’re not an occasions firm at the moment — I believe [the events are] higher served to remain underneath your umbrella than underneath ours,’” Ghazi tells Billboard.)
Although negotiations between Ghazi and Crenshaw’s respective San Francisco-based multihyphenates began in October of 2021, Dirtybird’s enchantment was obvious a lot earlier, in keeping with Moody Jones, EMPIRE’s Senior Vice President of Digital & Inventive, who will lead its dance/digital division.
Because the story goes, properly earlier than he accepted a job as EMPIRE’s Digital Advertising Director in 2018 — a transfer that propelled him from Canada to California’s Bay Space — Jones started producing his personal music. In 2007, he went to a Toronto occasion the place Crenshaw performed a gap set as Barclay Crenshaw, his hip-hop-centric artist mission that predated his launch of the Claude VonStroke moniker in 2006. There, Jones first met Crenshaw. 5 years later in Montreal, Jones performed the first-ever Dirtybird BBQ.
Over time, one slot at a Dirtybird occasion begat one other for Jones, who alongside the way in which fashioned an expert relationship with Crenshaw, his spouse Aundy Caldwell Crenshaw (who serves as Dirtybird’s Chief Working Officer) and the sprawling Dirtybird collective at massive. A buddy of the model with an ear for Dirtybird’s idiosyncratic sound and one eye on enterprise options, Jones assisted the Crenshaws with advising, consulting, advertising and marketing and artist promotion. Their early collaboration — coupled with Jones’ newfound proximity to Dirtybird HQ and his continued closeness with the Dirtybird crew — organically created the circumstances that will underscore the now-17-year-old model as a complementary match for EMPIRE and later help its acquisition.
“I used to be very keen on their enterprise mannequin,” says Jones. “Once we had been out, I’d all the time ask questions and so they’d all the time ask me for recommendation on how issues are executed on our finish. The dialog began shifting from being about advertising and marketing to being about working and scaling. I’d realized a lot from being round Ghazi that lots of the issues I began saying [about EMPIRE] appeared like aggressive benefits to Dirtybird. We [the Crenshaws] started speaking about Dirtybird and what it might take to scale it.”
Thus, when Ghazi expressed curiosity in increasing EMPIRE’s hip-hop-concentrated scope to incorporate dance/digital, Dirtybird emerged as a pure match.
Jones highlighted the similarities of the cultures inside Dirtybird and EMPIRE, Ghazi’s personal homegrown enterprise — which has been accountable for several Billboard Scorching 100 hits and key releases which have raised the profiles of hip-hop mainstays like Kendrick Lamar and Anderson .Paak. Armed with proprietary software program that allows EMPIRE to distribute its music to digital streaming platforms, the hip-hop stronghold has more and more expanded its sonic purview, venturing into Afropop and Afrobeats, nation, Latin, R&B, and now, dance/digital.
“He [Jones] jumped into my workplace and he mentioned, ‘Hey, what do you consider shopping for Dirtybird?’ And I principally responded, ‘Why not? That may be a terrific acquisition for us, a San Francisco firm,’” says Ghazi. “And he proceeded to inform me that there is perhaps a synergy and a risk for us to make the acquisition.”
“Aundy and I spoke to a number of firms on this course of,” Crenshaw tells Billboard of the deal. “EMPIRE was all the time the most effective match, just because Ghazi understands the worth of our model title. We stored each single worker from high to backside, and I nonetheless run the label with Deron Delgado and our killer workforce. I’ve additionally been buddies with Moody Jones for years and years, so it was very reassuring that he was spearheading the dance division.”
“Tons of patrons simply wished to research the catalog and have a look at pure math,” Crenshaw continues. “I’ve by no means been a math man; I’m a vibes man. Dirtybird means one thing particular to its followers, and that’s the reason it’s one in all perhaps one or two U.S.A. home manufacturers that everybody acknowledges by title. Ghazi and Moody perceive that, and I believe we’re going to have much more enjoyable in our new residence.”
Ghazi and Jones declined to reveal monetary particulars of the acquisition to Billboard, however expounded on their motivations for bringing Dirtybird to roost at EMPIRE.
There are a selection of unbiased dance labels that EMPIRE may need thought-about buying. Past the non-public affiliation, why Dirtybird?
Jones: I don’t know if Ghazi would’ve even thought-about Dirtybird [if not for my suggestion]. I used to be at Dirtybird Campout West Coast 2021 with Nima [Etminan, also of EMPIRE], and we noticed the tradition, the fanbase, the loyalty, the vitality, and we knew it had a synergy. I noticed them being hands-on with the whole lot.
Our firm may be very culture-driven. Having an impression on tradition is without doubt one of the pillars for us, and being a Bay Space firm meant a lot to us. We wished to maneuver into dancefloors a little bit bit stronger, and I can’t consider one other firm that will’ve complemented us the way in which Dirtybird does. There’s no different firm that crossed each a kind of containers for us.
And when Ghazi sat down with Barclay and Aundy and obtained to fulfill her, figuring out the folks behind the corporate and the way onerous they work, it [was clear that it] actually was their blood, sweat, and tears that put Dirtybird collectively. That meant rather a lot to us. Household is a giant factor for us, and Dirtybird is actually their household enterprise. Fortunately, we [Barclay and Aundy] had constructed a relationship a very long time in the past — and actually, life simply got here full circle.
Ghazi: It was an ideal match. Our core DNA has all the time been hip-hop, and Barclay had a very sturdy affinity for hip-hop, so there have been lots of synergies between what Dirtybird was doing primarily as a dance firm, and what we have now traditionally executed as a hip-hop firm that’s moved into all these different verticals — like Afrobeat, Latin, R&B, and issues of that nature.
I noticed that there can be this holistic strategy to music. You could possibly simply see all of it mix collectively, merge into one, and be actually impactful, as a result of it makes all of the sense on this planet to have a dance division or a dance arm in an organization like ours. We now have tons of hit data that need to have dance remixes and dance mixes basically, and that goes past even simply the core of what Dirtybird has already completed on their very own.
So, for me, the preliminary thought course of within the very starting was like, “Oh cool, we might have a remix arm.” After which I obtained to spend time with Barclay and see the festivals, the tradition, and the whole lot else, and I used to be like, “Yo, this can be a no-brainer. These guys, by and thru, imply to the dance world what I believe EMPIRE means to the hip-hop house.”
Naturally, it seems like there will probably be a rise within the quantity of hip-hop sound on Dirtybird given EMPIRE’s power on this area.
Jones: In the event you have a look at the sound that Dirtybird has embodied over the past three years, you’ll discover that it’s modified a lot in comparison with the Dirtybird sound that we had early on. They’re shifting into drum ‘n’ bass, they’re doing much more storage, and so they’re doing much more experimental. And Barclay Crenshaw [the artist project] is extra hip-hop-leaning than digital, so I believe Dirtybird will proceed to be experimental. We’re going to proceed to push the boundaries of digital music, however I believe now, we’re going to have the ability to equip Dirtybird with the power to work with extra hip-hop artists and work in several territories to push the sound to much more areas.
Exterior of hip-hop, are there every other genres that you just’d wish to see Dirtybird work with to a larger diploma?
Ghazi: Positively lots of the African music [Afropop/Afrobeats] that we’re doing at EMPIRE, 100%.
On condition that Barclay will proceed to A&R Dirtybird, you’ll be working collectively to advance these sounds. What do you hope this relationship will appear like?
Ghazi: We’re hoping to proceed letting Dirtybird do what they do greatest, however on high of that, rising the quantity and number of releases that they’re doing, and giving them the instruments and sources that they should go even additional. Prior to now, they did just a few albums per 12 months. We wish to improve that quantity considerably, and we wish to have the ability to give them extra music movies — no matter sorts of instruments and sources different genres have been accustomed to. We wish to convey these to bop to present dance the identical highlight different genres have.
Trying forward, what’s the worth of the Dirtybird catalog going ahead?
Ghazi: Positively in syncs, stems, spinoff works, bodily like vinyls and merch, and rising territories the place the music may not have even touched but. I don’t know the whereabouts of the earlier distributor’s attain, however we have now a really far attain, so we’ll ensure that the music is in each nook and cranny in each a part of the world.
Jones: It’s additionally within the re-releasing of lots of merchandise. I believe lots of the Dirtybird sound was forward of its time, and I believe lots of these albums and singles can resurface once more and be repackaged and delivered to an viewers that’s prepared for it at this time which may not essentially have been prepared for it again then. Plus, there are lots of [digital-only] releases which may have [worked well on] vinyl.
EMPIRE is a powerful proponent of artist empowerment. What are a number of the sources at EMPIRE that may assist empower Dirtybird artists in ways in which may not have been beforehand potential?
Ghazi: We now have an enormous facility in San Francisco the place we do lots of inventive work. We simply did a writing camp there just a few months again for an African album we’re about to launch. I might love to have the ability to do writing camps within the dance house, and I might love to extend the output of music movies with each our in-house video workers and the sources and the relationships that we have now throughout the video sphere within the market.
Moreover, extra strategic advertising and marketing, extra digital advertising and marketing, and larger transparency on analytics — as a result of we’re a provide chain distribution firm by design, so I believe empowering the artists with analytics and data goes to present them larger perception into market their music. We’re a really highly effective advertising and marketing firm, and there may very well be a momentous shift onward and upward for the Dirtybird aspect of the corporate and for dance as an entire for EMPIRE.
Jones: One of many final issues we’re engaged on — and I don’t wish to give away an excessive amount of too quickly — [is changing the nature of label deals in dance music]. One of many issues I’ve observed is that lots of genres [have changed] by way of the offers that labels have with artists, and I really feel dance is without doubt one of the final ones to make that change and have extra transparency in offers and provides higher splits.
With the help of EMPIRE, I believe we might help revolutionize the entire dance scene — not simply Dirtybird — by bringing this sound onto all of the digital streaming platforms, and giving artists extra favorable offers. I believe [the deals] are a purpose why, up to now, lots of artists haven’t been loyal to their labels. You understand, when each launch is with a unique label. However I believe we might help revolutionize that and construct a correct dance tradition with the artists as properly.
