Record Labels (BIG and small) (JONNY)

Virgin Records

Virgin Records is a British record label founded by entrepreneur Richard Branson in 1972. Virgin Records owes its fame to Mike Oldfield who arguably flung Virgin Records to fame after releasing his multi platinum single 'tubular bells' with the label. Virgin Records were sold to EMI in 1992 to fund Branson's airline business.

 Virgin have a wide mix of artists from many different genres including David Guetta, The Kooks, Deadmau5, Emeli Sande and many more! Although Virgin Records does not have a specific 'image' with such a diverse range of genres all Virgin businesses try to brand themselves as a fun and youthful organisation.

 Virgin Records is a large record company in its own right yet is owned by EMI a record company 10 times its size with numerous record labels to its name some which are much more genre specific such as EMI Nashville which specializes in American country music. Being with a large label like Virgin means that there are no problems with the cost of producing an album or creating the publicity for it, these people know exactly what to do.  The problem is that these record labels are likely to care more about the profit made from the musician rather than the musician itself,   

Disturbing London Record Label

Disturbing London is a small independently owned music record label run by Patrick Chukwuemeka Okogwu aka Tinie Tempah and his cousin/ manager Dumi Oburota who are both founders and CEO's of the company.


The record label was originally set up to facilitate Tinie's music however has since signed new artists all with the similar genre of pop/
hip hop. In recent years up and coming artists such as Sasha Keable and Dot JR have been signed to the record label.The benefit of being a part of this record label is that they are far more likely to have the musicians best interests in mind considering the fact that it is run by a musician who has experienced many of the same situations before. When Okogwu was asked why they set up Disturbing London he explained "We wanted to have a platform to put out our music and there wasn't any Def Jam or Roc-A-Fella label equivalent in England. [Also] I wanted to create a major independent label with quality artists. I felt like the major labels had lost the passion for music." Disturbing London brands itself as a quirky yet high end record label recently expanding in to the designer clothes market figure headed by Tinie.

 The clothes line looks to be just as high end as the record label with a Disturbing London T-shirt likely to set you back £70 or so. What I like about Disturbing London is its genuineness. A record label run by a musician for musicians, they really care about the artist and its music, something which may be difficult to find at EMI.