Tell Me Again How There’s No Monopoly in the Music Industry

Adam Marx
1 min readMar 23, 2015

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The Big Three Record Labels and Their Subjects

Most all of the record labels you know are owned by three major parent corporations: SONY, Universal Music Group (UMG), and Warner Music Group (WMG). Even Sub Pop, the once-famous Seattle independent label, is now owned by WMG. The only pseudo-famous label not on here is K Records, which became famous around the same time as Sub Pop for releasing off-beat alternative music in the ’90s. But for most everyone else, it’s just a question of which corporation you have pulling the strings. Tell me again how there’s no monopoly in the music industry.

SONY (in blue):

  • SONY/ATV
  • RCA
  • Epic
  • Columbia

Universal Music Group (in green):

  • EMI
  • Virgin (owned by EMI)
  • Island
  • Motown
  • Def Jam
  • Republic
  • MCA
  • Capitol
  • Geffen
  • Interscope

Warner Music Group (in red):

  • Reprise
  • Atlantic
  • Elektra (owned by Atlantic)
  • Roadrunner (owned by Atlantic)
  • Atco (owned by Atlantic)
  • Sub Pop
  • Fueled by Ramen
  • Parlophone

Originally published at adammarxsmind.wordpress.com on March 23, 2015.

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Adam Marx

🎙️ Founder & Keynote Speaker @Zero2OneNetwork 🚀 | I Help You Build Massive Networks 📈 | Consultant, Advisor, & Coach 😎 | Published @crunchbase + more✍️