One of Sony BMG Music Entertainment’s top radio promotion executives is exiting his post in the wake yesterday’s disclosure that the major label will pay a $10 million fine to settle a payola investigation by New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer.
Sources say long time Sony alum Joel Klaiman is out at Epic Records where he most recently served as executive VP of promotion since 2004.
Klaiman could not be reached for comment. Sony declined comment.
Spitzer’s subpoena cast an unfavorable light on the use of pay-for-play tactics by the promotion departments of Epic and other Sony BMG labels.
Among the documents in the email and paper trail that Spitzer released yesterday:
– An April 2003 email from Epic Records staffer telling a Clear Channel programmer that in exchange for playing the Audioslave single ‘Like A Stone,’ “Whatever you can dream up I can make happen!!!” “You have an Epic promoter saying name your price,” says Spitzer. “It shows you how brazen they are in trying to influence what goes on.”
– An August 2004 inter-office email among Epic executives outlining a plan to use trips and overnight spins to influence airplay for Franz Ferdinand, Good Charlotte and Gretchen Wilson.
– A February 2003 memo from Columbia Records to programmers and indie promoters outlining an official policy on what stations and in which contexts the label will work with radio on payola promotions, and how much money they would spend pay-for play initiatives. “They’re saying choose your illegality,” says Spitzer. “This how formal and how structured this entire promotion this process has become.”
– Multiple cases of Sony BMG staffers attempting to acquire consumer electronics products and clothing “Walkmen, lap top computers, games, televisions” on behalf of radio programmers and indie promoters.
Spitzer says that the pervasiveness of the activity reaches to “the very top of the industry” in both the radio and recording industries.
“This process of adding and paying extends to all of the major labels and our investigations go way beyond Sony BMG,” Spitzer adds.
In related news, sources say the company is in the process of identifying candidates for a new compliance officer position, created to monitor promotion practices at Sony BMG.
> For full coverage on the Sony BMG / Spitzer settlement visit Billboard.Biz/spitzer.
