Big & Rich have released six studio albums: four on Warner Bros. and the last two — including 2017’s Did It for the Party — on their own Big & Rich Records. Now that Big Kenny and John Rich have experienced the creative freedom they have by doing it on their own, they have no plans of ever releasing music any other way.
“Any artist who is on a record label … the record label a lot of times has the ultimate decision as to what songs go on the record and then what songs are singles. But you’re on Big & Rich Records, you decide what’s on your label,” Rich explains to The Boot. “We have 100-percent marketing freedom, creative freedom. We determine the budgets. We determine what move to make and when to make it.
“I think, at the end of the day, that’s the best place you can possibly be, because if you lose, at least you lost on your own terms,” Rich adds. “Nothing will make you crazier than losing because somebody else made a call.”
Still, Rich acknowledges that it takes a lot of hard work, and plenty of risk, to be both the artist and the CEO; however, it’s a challenge that he and Big Kenny gladly tackle head-on.
“Everything takes a lot of hard work, unless you’re lazy,” Rich says. “Lazy people never get anything that’s great; they just have things that are mediocre. But if you’re going to do something great, the very real possibility of failure is constantly looking at you. When you step off a major record label and you start your own record label, you are now battling every record label in Nashville, and you don’t have their weapons, and you don’t have their of chess board, you don’t have their money and all that stuff, but what you do have is extreme passion for what you’re doing, and knowing that you can make the calls.
“You sleep better at night with failure as long as it was your call,” he concludes. “If somebody else makes a bad call and your music suffers for it, that will make a guy mad for years and years and years.”
Did It for the Party is available for purchase on Amazon and iTunes.
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This Article Was Originally Posted at www.TheBoot.com
