The Record Industry Since 1954

In 1955 Electrical and Musical Industries, the parent EMI company, lost the long-established licensing arrangements by which American recordings from the Radio Corpora- tion of America (RCA) and the Columbia Broadcasting System(CBS) had reached the Australian market. The Aus- tralian Record Co. (ARC) gained the Australian rights to CBS recordings. These could no longer be called Columbia in Australia, where that name belonged to EMI, so ARC launched the Coronet label for them. RCA had its own subsidiary here to market RCA Victor records. Other new international labels in Australia in the 1950s were Capitol� EMI acquired Capitol Records in the USA in 1955�and Philips from the Netherlands.

New domestic labels were also established in the 1950s and early 1960s, including Ampersand, Astor, AWA and Wattle. The variety of labels resulted in a wide-ranging musical repertory. Many of the smaller companies were run by enthusiasts for special interests - Swaggie for jazz, Score and Wattle for folk music.

Paul Frohlich, an Austrian immigrant, founded the non-profit Recording Society of Australia in 1956 to pro- duce recordings of Australian artists and composers. Its LPs bore the Brolga label.

Rock around the clock, sung by Bill Haley behind the credits of the film The blackboard jungle, generated a rock- and-roll boom in 1955. Festival sold 150000 copies of Haley's record of Rock around the clock by September 1956.

Festival profited further from songs in American styles written and performed by Johnny O'Keefe, Col Joye and Digby Richards. O'Keefe's The wild one was the first Australian recording to enter the national radio charts. At the end of 1958 Festival was simultaneously selling 23 EPs, 12 LPs and two singles of O'Keefe. By then 45s had surpassed 78s as popular singles.

In 1958 four million 45s were manufactured in Australia, and most of them were sold to teenagers. The introduction of stereophonic sound in 1958�59 signalled the end for the 78rpm disc.

The success of rock music catapulted the record indus- try to newheights in the late 1960s, and the major recording companies, especially EMI, Festival and RCA, grew spec- tacularly. Other international musical trends also became driving forces, including jazz, folk music, surf sound and music associated with novelties such as the hula hoop and the pogo stick. Crazes in social dancing such as the twist, the limbo and the Madison also contributed to the growth of the record industry.

From the late 1970s one of the most inf luential expres- sions of popular music was disco. Deejays brought young people back to dance halls, clubs and pubs by spinning their favourite discs. The international record industry produced music especially tailored for this market, such as the disco music of the Bee Gees. The disco period was followed by the deepest worldwide sales slump in the history of recorded music.

Compact discs

As the cost of manufacturing compact discs in Australia decreased it became possible for musicians to produce recordings independent of record companies. Recordings under independent labels flowed steadily onto to the mar- ket. Some, such as Tony O'Connor's new-age releases for Steve Parish Publishing and Brett Neilson's Big Toe label, became volume-selling catalogs. The ABC also established itself as a prolific producer, with a catalog spanning classical music, jazz, children's music and "world music".

By the 1990s the retail side of the record industry was in trouble. The country's major dealer, Brashs moved into self-liquidation and was ultimately bought by a Singapore company that later sold the remaining Australian shares to the Japanese retailer Daichi. Virgin Records sold its Austral- ian retail chain to the American Blockbuster chain. EMI established the HMV chain.

By the end of 2000 the Sanity chain of Brazin Ltd., which acquired many Brashs stores, had more than 200 stores, online marketing, and almost 30 per cent of the retail market. Other giants, HMV Music, Kmart and Big Wheld about 30 per cent.

Slump in sales

In addition to ARIA, which represents more than 80 record companies, there are four more key bodies in the complex network that forms the record industry. The Aus- tralasian Mechanical Copyright Owners' Society represents more than 75 music publishers; the Australasian Performing Rights Association represents composers; and the Phono- graphic Performance Co. of Australia represents creators of recorded works. In 2000 the Association of Independent Record Labels was established.

In 1998 the federal government, responding to complaints about the high prices of compact discs, amended the Cop- yright Act 1968 to deprive record companies of the exclusive right to import their own products and permit parallel importing. This resolved an issue that had faced the indus- try for some years. International piracy and challenges to copyright from transmission of music by digital systems were issues that remained. The federal parliament passed the Copyright Amendment (Digital Agenda) Act in 2000.