Robbie Williams’ ringing endorsement must be music to the ears of David Enthoven and Tim Clark.
The founders of management company ie:music are like many other business owners. They rely heavily on one client in particular – it just happens that theirs is the UK’s most successful solo artist.
So when Williams sent a video message from Los Angeles for the Music Managers Forum awards, last month, to congratulate the pair on winning the Robertson Taylor ‘Peter Grant’ Award for outstanding achievement in management, there must have been keen interest in what he would say. He didn’t disappoint, teasing that it gave him the perfect opportunity to break the news of his decision to leave their stable. Clark and Enthoven wouldn’t have squirmed – it’s fairly obvious their most valuable client is going nowhere.
“I just want to express how much I love you and how much you mean to me,” Williams gushed to the camera. “Ie:music is the best kept secret in the music industry. As luck and fate would have it God put me in the hands of two of the most capable men in the industry today. I definitely wouldn’t be as healthy as I am today if it wasn’t for you. When I grow up I want to be like you. I will never go anywhere else. You’ve got me for life.”
The industry might be known for fickleness and its temperamental characters, but you get the impression this union is sincere. It’s down to the success of Williams – his albums to date have sold 32 million in total – that Enthoven and Clark have been able to nurture less commercial acts, such as Sia, Craig Armstrong, The Casuals and Archive – an unfamiliar roster to most.
PEDIGREE
As the award they secured suggests, Clark and Enthoven have been in the industry a good while. And for those less enamoured with the talents of Robbie Williams, they have a curriculum vitae boasting a host of performers more acclaimed by the critics.
Enthoven managed and named T. Rex, while also taking on, among others, Brian Eno and Roxy Music. He did this with EG Records, the company he co-founded. His impressive career then went off the rails. But after a 12-year period indulging in drink and drugs, he returned to the industry to guide old friend Bryan Ferry. Clark, as managing director of Island Records, oversaw the careers of Bob Marley, Cat Stevens, Steve Winwood, Jethro Tull and Mott the Hoople, among many more.
It wasn’t until 1992 though that they paired up officially, despite knowing each other since the late 1960s. Clark remortgaged his home and Enthoven borrowed heavily to raise the necessary capital. Their first significant business win occurred when Virgin asked them to take on Massive Attack and their success with the Bristol-born, triphop group alerted the former Take That star Williams. He was champing at the bit to go solo, attain a new image and an older fanbase and was set on securing their ‘remodelling’ services, having been labelled ‘most likely to fail’ post-Take That.
It was in Clark and Enthoven’s interests too to find an artist to build their business around, although a major risk given the cost of producing and promoting albums and Williams’ poor reputation, with no track record as a songwriter.
Their first meeting was inauspicious. “When Rob first came to us he clearly had extraordinary presence. He walked into the office and made heads turn even though he wasn’t in great nick – he was in the midst of a binge period,” recalls Clark. Williams had released a cover of George Michael’s Freedom, but Clark and Enthoven wanted to know he was capable of producing his own material. Unconvinced, they agreed to meet again. “The second time he was in worse shape, but knew it was not the way to go. He knew he’d finish up in a casket and wouldn’t realise his dreams. We finally ran out of things to say. Nothing he’d played or chatted about seemed to be something we could do anything with. Then he started reciting his poems. And if you can do that you can write songs,” states Enthoven.
Like taking on a sizeable customer with a questionable track record of meeting debts, they took a punt. After announcing they were managers of Williams they enlisted songwriter Guy Chambers to help Williams get his ideas down as lyrics. “In his first session he wrote Angels and Let Me Entertain You,” says Enthoven. They also provided the personal guidance Williams appeared to need, proving strong personal relationships with clients reaps commercial rewards. “We’ve been through it all and seen it all. Rob knows he can discuss anything, with David in particular,” says Clark. “If you’re on a course of self-destruction you need a different way of living. Rob knew it was mad at 22 and addressed it.”
After a quiet start, the sales started flowing and Williams’ contract has effectively been a sustainable business model since. His contribution to the company’s turnover, which now amounts to 80%, is made up largely of the deal with EMI. Signed in 2002, it is thought to be the UK’s biggest record deal and Paul Gambaccini described it as the ‘deal of the decade’. While the figure reported by the media is £80m, for which Williams has to deliver a further three albums, Clark and Enthoven claim it has been overstated.
Nonetheless, it helped the company record a turnover of £6m last year, with an expected drop to around £3.5m this year. With Williams on board revenues for the business rocketed each year prior to that, growing 68% a year between 1999 and 2002, with turnover rising from £734,000 to £3.5m over that period. Those figures secured a slot in the Sunday Times Fast Track 100 in 2003.