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VIDEO CASE 3-1 Flyte Tyme Productions, Inc.: The Best Idea Wins!
"Terry was looking for a keyboard player to be in the band he was just starting," remembers Jimmy Jam of Flyte Tyme Productions, Inc. "I had sort of rebelled because I had first thought of myself as a drummer," says Jam. But after he listened and heard how good the drummer was, he told Terry, "I'll be the keyboard player."
The conversation took place a few weeks after Terry Lewis and Jimmy Jam met at a summer math program for gifted junior high school students, sponsored by a local university. The two came to prominence in the early 1980s as members of the funk band "The Time" that appeared as the opener on many of Prince's early tours. The pair still credit Prince for much of their tenacious work ethic and eclectic musical tastes. After leaving the band, Terry and Jimmy started a music production company-Flyte Tyme-creating the new name by adapting the old one. Now in their early 40s, the two have worked together for 20 years, most of it in Flyte Tyme Productions (www.flytetyme.com), where their clients include Mary J. Blige, Boyz II Men, Mariah Carey, Janet Jackson, Michael Jackson, Patti LaBelle, Usher, TLC, and many others!
THE MUSIC
Sunglasses, fedoras, and sharp suits are Jam and Lewis's signature image, but-curiously-they have no signature sound. Instead, their approach is to tailor tunes for each artist. Janet Jackson's steamy bedroom ballads don't sound anything like Patti LaBelle's big Diane Warren ballads. They also work in a wide variety of music genres-from gospel (Yolanda Adams) and reggae (Shaggy) to jazz (Herb Alpert) and pop (Mariah Carey).
Flyte Tyme's successes are impressive. Recently they produced Usher's No. 1 pop hit "U Remind Me," which held the top spot on the charts for four weeks. They also produced Sting's Oscar-nominated song "My Funny Friend and Me" for the filmThe Emperor's New Clothes. And their work on Hikaru Utada's album helped it climb to the top of Japan's pop charts, selling 4 million copies in two weeks!
These and other hits put Flyte Tyme in extraordinary company. Having produced 16 No. 1 singles onBillboard's pop chart, they are second only to the producer for the Beatles (with 23) and tied with the producer for Elvis Presley. Flyte Tyme has managed to stay at the top throughout the 1980s, '90s, and '00s, thanks in large part to Janet Jackson-nicknamed "the Franchise"-who accounts for 10 of their 16 No. 1 songs. Recently, they wrote and produced their fifth successive album for Janet Jackson, which set an industry record when "All For You" became the first single to be played by 100 percent of the pop, R& B, and rhythm radio stations reporting to trade publicationRadio& Records, in the first week after its release.
THE TEAM AND ITS FORMULA FOR SUCCESS
How have Jam and Lewis stayed at the top of the music game so long? Janet Jackson's answer: "There are no egos involved." Terry Lewis echoes this and says about his relationship with Jam: "He's the best partner a person could have. We've never had a contract-we've never had one argument in twenty-something years, not saying we don't disagree about things but our attitudes are the best idea wins. Not the right, not the wrong, but thebest!"
"What we try to do is get everybody relaxed-check the egos at the door, that kind of thing. We find that we do it a lot more with new artists than with the older, more established artists," explains Jam. "Psychology is a big part of producing. Some artists like to work right away, others like to play pool, have lunch, talk on the phone, then they mosey in and record," he says. "If you think of Janet Jackson or Mariah Carey-the people who you would think of as superstars, you would think that they would bring a superstar ego with them. But it's almost the opposite," says Jam. "New artists often come to Flyte Tyme with a feeling they have to prove something. And what happens is, you don't really get a natural performance," says Jam.
Another of Flyte Tyme's special strengths: adapting the music and lyrics to an artist's unique talents, not the other way around. Their interest in many types of music and their experience with many artists allow them to add new ideas to the creative process. Still, Flyte Tyme may work on several different versions based on its perceptions of what radio stations or MTV will play.
Jam and Lewis work on both the music and lyrics for many of their songs, but Jam leans slightly more toward the melodies and Lewis toward the vocals and lyrics. In fact, Lewis keeps "The Book of Titles," and any time someone says something clever or in an interesting way it goes into the book. "Music is the soundtrack of life," says Lewis. "The inspiration for words I just take from watching people, and life has a lot of verses in it," he adds.
MARKETING, DISTRIBUTION, COMPETITION
Selecting the best music ideas requires an instinct to find the right blend of art and business. The elements of the art include a huge respect for and understanding of the artists, an interest in a broad palette of musical sounds, and a good ear for melodies and vocals. The business components of their formula include understanding many of the factors-such as marketing, distribution, and competition-that influence their business.
Music artists walking in the door of Flyte Tyme receive an array of services: A studio facility with Jam, Lewis, and an experienced staff providing ideas, direction, and focus-"trying to get things out of them they didn't know they had in them," says Lewis. Flyte Tyme Records, the marketing arm, develops the artist's image, the marketing plan, advertising, and distribution-everything to get the record or CD on the rack to be sold. "If you have $100,000 to spend on promotion, you can do a nice music video and then you can spend a lot of time trying to get it played on MTV or BET or VH1 or any of the appropriate video channels," says Jam. Or sometimes the music calls for a different strategy, Flyte Tyme's "groundhog approach." For example, in the early 1990s with one of its bands, Flyte Tyme piled the band in a Winnebago and hit college campuses.
Today Flyte Tyme creates a lot of that same groundhog buzz with its website, where the music audience can learn about Flyte Tyme's artists and activities. Jam and Lewis note that Napster was a great tool in exposing music to the public. The delivery system-buying an album at a retail store, downloading music from the Internet, or burning a CD-doesn't affect the process of Flyte Tyme's making the music in its studio. But Lewis and Jam are concerned that the people who write the songs and the artists who deliver them get compensated fairly. "The record companies and everybody will eventually work it out," says Jam. "They have to because it's too valuable a commodity not to."
