"People are having big songs, but big artists are not coming through" – former Columbia Records UK boss on the outlook for breaking into the mainstream

Former Columbia UK President Ferdy Unger-Hamilton has revealed that he thinks it's harder than ever for music acts to break through into the mainstream.

 “We're not breaking as many acts as we should be at Columbia, but no one is at the moment," he told Cambridge Audio's Made By Music podcast. 

 “Acts aren't breaking – big acts that matter. People are having big songs, but big artists are not coming through. Central Cee is an exception, you know, Dave is, but he came a long time ago. PinkPantheress has done really well [and] Sam Fender. But it's harder than it ever was.”

Unger-Hamilton has had plenty of experience to draw from during his years as an A&R talent spotter with indie label Gobi, signing Gabrielle and Portishead, then Island, Polydor and heading up Virgin Records and Columbia. He's worked with The 1975, Laura Marling, Haim, Take That, Robbie Williams, Rag'n'Bone Man, Ellie Goulding, Foo Fighters, Harry Styles, George Ezra, Ozzy Osbourne and Adele.

Later in the interview, Unger-Hamilton was candid when he revealed that Columbia's failure to break more new acts was connected to his departure from the label in 2023 after six years, despite the ongoing success of the label's established names. "What you want someone like me for is to find you great new acts, and when I'm not doing that it's like a footballer that's not scoring goals. That's what it is and I think it's happy thing for everyone because I started to build my own world – I had a publishing company and the other act that's done really well is on my publishing company… Fred Again, who I signed about seven years ago really as a writer, before he was Fred Again."

So he's going to be ok, but he's also not completely despondent about the fortunes of upcoming acts in the music industry. “There's a lot that's good about now," adds Unger-Hamilton. "As an independent artist or label, you're not held back by distribution," he notes. "You don't need a truck, you don't need to press any records or CDs. You can release music pretty easily – but it's very hard for anyone who's not established to get space."

And this is the rub; a lot more music being released, but potentially without an audience to support it, or label to market it and enable musicians to thrive and make a living from their work. But labels themselves could be the ones squeezed too. 

"You've got big business – Google, Spotify etc. You've got Amazon [and] Apple," notes Unger-Hamilton. "Then I think you've got the little guy, and the little guy can go directly to big business himself. Then you've got the middlemen, who are the labels,. And I think that's tougher actually. I understand the big companies, and I understand the entrepreneurs – or the artists shall we call them, but it's quite hard for the middle man because the middleman has to promise you a better time and more visibility when you go into the bigger [label] space. And I'm not sure that's as easy. 

"So I'm now running a small label and what our USP or artform is, is going back to what it was originally. Which is to find better people… it is ambitious but I still hope that if you find someone who's really good, you're going to get them discovered."

Asked for his advice to young people looking to get ahead in the music industry as a musician, Under-Hamilton's response is the old adage still holds true.

"Artist, I just think be really good. Play an instrument – really learn your craft because the people that I've known who are amazing, are amazing because they've really given their time to it."

Check out the full podcast episode above and the whole Cambridge Audio Made By Music podcast series exclusively on Spotify.