Scooter Braun And Scott Borchetta Talk Big Machine's Future After Controversial Sale

It's been a few weeks since Taylor Swift took direct aim at music manager Scooter Braun and the CEO of her former record label, Scott Borchetta, in a heartbreaking note on Tumblr. It was a nearly immediate response to the news that Braun's firm, Ithaca Holdings, had bought her former label Big Machine Label Sort for a whopping $300 million, thus giving ownership of Swift's master recordings from her first six albums to Braun, whom she wrote had subjected her to "incessant, manipulative bullying." It was also news that left the future of Big Machine in doubt. Nevertheless in a new exclusive interview with Billboard released on Thursday (July 25), Braun and his new agency partner Borchetta talked the future of Big Machine and their objectives to build "an ecosystem that permits artists to go right after their dreams."


However Braun didn't address his feud with Swift directly, he did say the pop star briefly while discussing how his friendship with Borchetta first developed. It all began in 2009, any time Swift invited Braun's client, Justin Bieber, to open up for her on her Fearless tour. "Our stories were similar," Braun told Billboard. "Everyone at Big Machine — Taylor was kind, Scott was kind — each person was kind to me and Justin any time we were doing that show, and you also don't forget those things. I never didn't remember that, and we began a friendship." And although the two businessmen talked about possibly merging years back, the time just didn't feel right — that is, up until right now. "I never felt like it was exactly the correct time or the correct fit," Borchetta explained.


According to Borchetta, how to approach the next era of Big Machine weighed heavy on his mind. "I promised myself, and our artists and executives, it was going to be one of two things: Either I'm out — and I had no wish to be out — or I'm going to find a possibility that is truly additive, that can give us more arms and legs and levers than we have right now To him, teaming up with Braun meant he chose the latter, and for Braun, buying Big Machine was basically a no-brainer. "Scott runs an extraordinary firm, and we're attempting to build an artist-first environment and — in a climate with plenty of players — get the leverage we need to help our creators go right after their dreams," he explained. "By mixing what Scott had with what we had, we feel like we're in a unique position to fight the good fight."


Moving forward, though, both Borchetta and Braun don't want people to think that Big Machine underwent any major changes fundamentally. And while the sale may have made it seem like the label was going corporate, Borchetta insists that's actually not the case at all. "We have very specific agreements coming into this: Big Machine Label Order will continue to operate exactly as it has been. I have been fiercely independent — I pick to be fiercely independent — and Scooter is the same way. This is going to be a bigger corporation, nevertheless it's not going to be a corporation; there really are things we can do on a dime," he said.


So what about all of the artists signed to Big Machine — Taylor included — whose masters were included in that sale? Well, according to Braun, their intentions are nothing however pure. "These corporations are add onto people making sacrifices for their families, and we value that," Scooter mentioned. "If Scott sold the corporation to someone else, then they would have done what typically happens, which is you take the catalogs, you strip it all down, people get laid off — and that's not right, those people put us in this position." As a substitute, Braun mentioned no that no one would get laid off in the process.


Braun and Borchetta also mentioned that their artists are thrilled about these changes. Why? Because, according to them, it can help streamline the corporation side of things. "The artists that we've spoke to — they mention they love it because there's such a upside to being able to talk with one 'artist team' as an alternative opposed to feeling like there's a wall between artist, label and management," Borchetta mentioned. And despite Taylor's comments, Borchetta couldn't speak more rather of Braun. As soon as I told everybody at our personnel meeting ... I mentioned, 'Please welcome my new partner, Scooter Braun,' and also you would have thought The Rolling Stones just walked in. They gave a standing ovation that went on for what felt like a few minutes. He and I looked at each other like, 'This is right.'"


Read the full new cover story over at Billboard.