BRUMMEL RANTS!

As everyone paying attention already knows, Victory Records head Tony Brummel is mighty peeved about Taking Back Sundays’ album being certified gold by the RIAA after the band jumped from Victory to Warner Bros. The albums were sold when the band was still on Victory—and Brummel contends Warner Bros. had no right to have the RIAA certify the album.

Well, the drama continues. HITS obtained the following e-mail that Brummel fired off last night, shortly before midnight, to WMG’s Lyor Cohen, with copies sent to Edgar Bronfman, Liza Joseph, Michael Fleisher, Jac Holzman, Seymour Stein and Tom Whalley:

From: Tony Brummel
Sent: Wednesday, August 24, 2005 11:52 PM
Subject: Now I've had it....

Warner illegally certified my Taking Back Sunday album.

Some employees of mine came home to gold TBS albums that I did not pay for or certify nor did they want.

Fucking with me and playing games is one thing. Attempting to make me look stupid is another. Desecrating the Victory brand and the years of sacrifice and hard work that many employees and artists have contributed to is not allowable.

Where is the leadership? Where are the mentors? Jac, I read your book "Follow The Music". Fuck, I read it three times. Earlier this evening, I went into my alley, pissed on it and threw it away.

The fledgling Warner Music Group has made an enemy for life.

Whalley, if you are such a record man, quit your job and go indie like me.......... Get your fucking hands dirty, you overpaid and pampered putz. Overpaying for damaged goods is not A&R.

Victory Records means something to many people around the world. It is a brand. It is something that they can count on. It has meaning.

Warner Music means nothing. It is a soulless corporate monicker tarnished by meaningless characters that raped it for their own inflated sense of self importance and ego masturbation.

I am part of something that the consumer actually cares about. Consuming product is one thing. When the consumer actually cares about the corporation that produced and helped develop the product you have something much more powerful and special.

That is what makes me different from all of you. Aside from the fact that I cannot be fired. I won't develop cataracts either as I squint at the TV praying that the scrolling ticker on Bloomberg says that the share price is up.