Background
The U.S. arm of Britain’s Decca Records was established in New York in 1934[1] In 1937, the owner of Decca, Edward R. Lewis, chose to split off the UK Decca company from the U.S. company (keeping his U.S. Decca holdings), fearing the financial damage that would arise for UK Companies if the emerging hostilities of Nazi Germany should lead to war – correctly foreseeing World War II. Lewis sold the remainder of his American Decca holdings when war did break out.[2] U.S.-based Decca Records kept the rights to the Decca name in North and South America and parts of Asia including Japan. UK Decca owned the rights to the Decca name in the rest of the world. After the war, British Decca formed a new U.S. subsidiary, London Records. During this time, American Decca issued records outside North America on the Coral Records and Brunswick Records labels.
The early years
In 1962, MCA, a talent agency and television production company, entered the recorded music business with the acquisition of American Decca, which became a wholly owned subsidiary. As American Decca owned Universal Pictures, MCA was forced to exit the talent agency business in order to complete the merger. MCA assumed full ownership of Universal and made it into a top film studio, producing several hits.[3]
In 1966, MCA formed Uni Records[4] and in 1967, purchased Kapp Records[5] which was placed under Uni Records management.[6]
Brunswick and Coral were replaced by the new MCA label, which was used to release U.S. Decca and Kapp label material outside North America.[7][8] Initial activity as MCA Records was based in London and MCA Records UK was formally launched on February 16, 1968.[9] Among the early artists on the MCA label, around 1971, were groups Wishbone Ash, Osibisa, Stackridge and Budgie, and solo artists Tony Christie, Mick Greenwood and Roy Young.[10]
Early MCA UK releases were distributed by Decca, but moved to EMI in 1974. As the U.S. division of MCA Records was not established until 1972, the earliest UK MCA Records material was released in the U.S. on either Kapp or Decca. MCA UK also issued American Brunswick material on the MCA label until 1972, two years after MCA lost control of Brunswick, after which American Brunswick material was issued in the UK on the revived Brunswick label. Uni label material was issued on the Uni label worldwide
On May 21, 1998, Seagram acquired PolyGram (owner of British Decca) from Philips and merged it with Universal Music Group. Unlike several labels under PolyGram and UMG, who faced closure and job cuts of employees, MCA was the only label that was not affected by the merger.[32] When Seagram’s drinks business was bought by France-based Pernod Ricard, its media holdings (including Universal) were sold to Vivendi which became Vivendi Universal which was later renamed back to Vivendi SA after selling most of the entertainment division (which included Universal Pictures) to General Electric. Morris continued to head the combined company, still called Universal Music Group.
MCA label phaseout
On January 16, 2003, Jay Boberg resigned from his position as president of MCA Records.[31] Boberg’s resignation arrived in the wake of slumping sales at MCA, which had seen the label’s overall album market share decline to just 2.61% in 2002, down from 9% the previous year.[33] His demise was hastened by the relative commercial failure of Shaggy‘s Lucky Day, released in October 2002, which MCA hoped would sell well enough to turn around their declining fortunes.[34] Richard Nichols, manager of The Roots, felt that MCA had been attempting to spend lots of money on different projects, and subsequently many acts on MCA were “underfinanced” by the label, leading to poor sales.[35] Rob Hitt of Midtown (who was signed to MCA through Drive-Thru Records) stated that MCA had lost a substantial amount of money that year from investing in several unsuccessful bands.[36]
Management of the label was subsequently handed over to the Interscope Geffen A&M umbrella label and Jimmy Iovine, although UMG chairman Doug Morris promised that MCA would continue to operate as a “full-service, free standing label”.[31] Craig Lambert, previously the vice president of the label, was named as the interim head of MCA, with a successor expected to be chosen within a few months.[31] Following Boberg’s resignation, it was rumoured that MCA could possibly be merged into Universal Records, something which would have given the latter, New York City–based label a stronger presence in the West Coast of the United States.[33]
On May 20, 2003, insider sources at Universal reporting to Billboard revealed that the MCA label was to be absorbed by sister UMG label Geffen Records by the end of the year. The reported reason behind the MCA brand phaseout was due to declining sales, as well as the MCA brand becoming “tarnished” by “a history of acquisitions and mergers”.[34][37] On June 9, 2003, MCA laid off 75 of their staff, equivalent to a third of their personnel, although no employees from Geffen were let go.[38] Geffen’s president, Jordan Schur, was named president of the newly merged entity, which continued under the Geffen branding. In the subsequent months, the MCA name was phased out entirely.[35][39] The last album to be released under the MCA Records branding was Twisted Method‘s Escape from Cape Coma, which was released on July 15, 2003.[40]
Today, Interscope Capitol Labels Group and Universal Music Enterprises manage MCA’s rock, pop, and urban back catalogues (including those from ABC Records and Famous Music Group) in conjunction with Geffen – UME and Geffen have re-released various albums from MCA in the years since, as well as several compilations. Its country music label MCA Records Nashville is still in operation, and is one of the only businesses using the MCA trademark as of 2016 along with MCA Records France (imprint of Universal Music France). MCA’s jazz catalogue is managed by Verve Records (through the Impulse! and GRP imprints, depending on whether the recording was acquired from ABC or not), while its classical music catalogue is managed by Deutsche Grammophon. MCA’s musical theatre catalogue is managed by Decca Records on its Decca Broadway imprint.
Following a lengthy two-decade hiatus, Universal Music Group rebranded its country music subsidiary company as MCA, marking the return of the Music Corporation of America to the UMG umbrella once more.
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