Odd Future Start Their Own Label with Sony

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The controversial Los Angeles hip hop collective Odd Future have partnered with RED Distribution and Sony to form their own label, Odd Future Records. The deal will cover all artists associated with the group – including Tyler the Creator, Frank Ocean, Hodgy Beats and Earl Sweatshirt – and provide them with total creative control.

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Odd Future manager Chris Clancy said in a statement released to Rap Radar that the deal is "based on getting the distribution deal we’ve always envisioned that allows the group to 'sign themselves' to their own company and keep their masters." According to Clancy, "RED and Sony know that it's in everyone’s best interest to maintain the group’s authenticity and control."

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Odd Future leader Tyler the Creator is set to release his second solo album, titled Goblin, through a one-off deal with XL on May 10th. The first release on the group's own label has yet to be announced.

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Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

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