New Ams Records is a unique and relatively new label that does things a little bit differently than the rest of the industry. The owner, Thomas de Raad, positions the label as a natural extension of his music management business. “Working with VIRPP will be an adventurous musical discovery for us and the producers.”
Tell us about the origins of New Ams Records?
“In my career as artist manager I’ve noticed that it can be incredibly hard for new talent to get a foot in the door with record companies. Encountering this issue, I came up with the idea of starting my own record label so I would not be dependent on others regarding the output of our music. We’ve been doing this for a year and have booked great results so far. I know a few things about new talent development because of my former A&R and management jobs at CTM Publishing and Protocol Recordings. When I started my own company, I wanted to combine my knowledge on publishing, records and management into a hybrid company. We support new artists and songwriters by setting up writing camps and develop their music before they can potentially sign to the management side of the company. To maximize potential, I work with CTM on the publishing side and with Kartel Music Group in London for the label side.”
What kind of artist are a good fit?
“Creative people who have a long-term vision and want to fight for claiming their space in the saturated music industry. We’re not in it for a quick hit but we want to develop and nurture careers. We partner with artists to realize their dreams. Right now, we are working with three musicians (Daimy Lotus, Maya Mae and Ruben Pol) in their specific genres: Pop and R&B.”
Is long-term the only focus?
“Yes and no. Recently I’ve launched a new record label named New Ams Radio. The perfect place for so called one-offs – cool new music that comes across my desk and is interesting, but not yet something I can commit to straight away for the long-term development. For this label, I work with ADA, the distribution company of Warner Music. New Ams Radio is a breeding ground for new talents and it is a perfect fit to VIRPP users.”
What kind of VIRPP-artists are you looking for?
“Nowadays, it is hard to talk about one specific genre. Talents are combining styles and sounds to create new genres. When you look at the things we have released in the past, New Ams is leaning more towards pop, dance pop and R&B. We see VIRPP as a producer platform. I love the idea that we can reach new talents with competitions and I think we found a pretty cool way to organize these. New Ams wants to give all the VIRPP subscribers access to stems of songs from our publishing catalog and ask them to create their own productions. I’m looking forward to different interpretations in all kind of genres. Approaches that will surprise me and things that I never would have thought of myself. This will be an adventurous musical discovery for us and the producers.”
New Ams is a Dutch company. Are you guys going to consider talent from outside the Netherlands?
“With VIRPP, I hope to engage with new ideas, sounds and producers. Their [producers’] work is so important for the future of the music industry, and definitely something we are eager to develop. Right now, the world is a global village. Wherever the talent is from, we are open to work with them. The cool thing about that is that every foreign producer brings their own local flavor to music. Nowadays, it is also technically possible and kind of normal to work from home and communicate with your colleagues over Teams or Zoom. For example, I am working with a producer who lives in Barcelona and we communicate mainly over Zoom sessions. In short, it doesn’t really matter where you from as we’ll be looking at every entry.”
