Dominating Hollywood: Starting with Scarlett

Chapter 21 Freshly released
  After Raymond's MV was completed, everyone immediately sat in the Face Music Company and gathered around the TV to watch.

Badman, Raymond, Davis, Barley, Becks, Jimmy and the rest of the staff were all there.

Of course Tang De was also there, sitting on a chair with his feet up on the table and watching them comment on the MV.

In fact, when the MV started playing, they already started to admire the tone.

"Wow! It's so cool! This blue is beyond imagination!" Raymond was the first to say. As an actor, he has never seen a monitor, so he doesn't know how the shooting effect will be.

So when I saw the beginning of the scene, the quiet and deep blue behind the door, I suddenly felt that someone was tickling my itch, and I whistled.

Immediately after the MV officially started, Ramon, who was wearing a gorgeous formal suit, sat on one side of the long table, facing off against another in a black leather jacket. There was a huge floor-to-ceiling window beside the two of them. The outside was dark blue and they could not see clearly the surrounding environment. The only thing that was bright was the gorgeous chandelier above their heads.

While Raymond was confronting others, the prelude music began to play. The camera then cut to a close-up of Raymond, but the next second someone suddenly put a plastic bag over his head. After a brief struggle, he lost his breath and fell to the ground.

Then the music rhythm entered the main song, and the man in the black leather jacket who killed Raymond also took off his hood to reveal his true face.

Unexpectedly, it was Raymond himself.

"cool!"

"handsome!"

"It's so explosive!"

Damai Xiaobei and the others all exclaimed. Although they couldn't quite understand the content in the picture, the unique colors and unexpected plot still captured their hearts.

Badman also nodded. He had never seen such an attractive MV. It felt like the beginning had the quality of a suspense movie. It was much better than those MVs that were also hip-hop albums but just featured monsters dancing on the dance floor.

He even doubted whether the audience could understand this MV, it was too advanced!
  But then the MV entered a normal rhythm. Raymond sang and walked in the corridor holding a cross that emitted pink light. His face was covered with a faint blue light, and most of his body was covered by shadows.

At the same time, there are also shots of him constantly destroying those luxurious decorations, chandeliers, wine racks, and ornaments, all of which he smashed with crosses, full of hidden religious meanings.

What follows this indoor shot is the Porsche 911 parked in the garage, and the scene of Raymond sitting in the car and driving and singing.

The music also came to an end, until the taillights of the Porsche 911 disappeared from the road, and the entire song came to an end.

"Wow!" Jimmy was the first to applaud and shouted, "I can't believe I actually made such an awesome MV!"

"Yeah! He's so damn handsome, so cool!" Davis also shouted. Although he hated Tang De, he hoped that Raymond's album would sell well, so he died suddenly after Raymond's single I have been depressed ever since.

But now after seeing how cool the MV and song are, he has renewed hope.

"Arkady doesn't understand what she missed!" Davis has always been worried about Arkady's departure.

However, no one cares what Davis thinks now. Everyone is discussing what kind of sales this MV can achieve.

"I fucking love the blue in it."

"That cross is so cool, it's pink! It looks like the one sold in an adult product store..."

"A blockbuster, a complete blockbuster!"

"But what does the MV mean? Why don't I understand it?"

"Silly bird, of course you can't understand it if you haven't gone to college."

"Have you ever had sex with me?"

"Me neither, but cool is enough, who cares about the plot!"

Listening to the lively discussion, Badman also looked at Tang De and said, "It seems that I saw the right person."

Tang De smiled and said: "Of course." "I will contact the people at SBK Records as soon as possible. I believe they can change their minds after seeing the MV."

"hope so."

Badman quickly took the CD to SBK's office in New York, but the news Tang De and Raymond received the next day was not good.

"FXXK, greedy goblin! Bullshit SBK!" Badman unleashed a burst of output on SBK in front of the two of them. He didn't sit down until he choked and coughed.

Then he took out a cigarette, lit it, and took a few puffs.

Raymond couldn't bear his temper and asked first: "What happened? Badman, didn't SBK watch my MV?"

"..." Badman was silent for a moment and said tiredly: "No, they watched it."

"What's the problem?" Tang De asked.

"They said that if this song was to be released by them, they would have to give in on the royalties, because that damn Beast star had wiped out Ramon's commercial value. Now if they want to re-release Ramon's album, We have to spend a lot of money on publicity!”

Badman looked unwilling. When he asked SBK to watch the MV, he could see the fleeting excitement in the expressions of the hyenas.

But precisely because of this, SBK's serious price reduction made him even more annoyed.

"So how much is it?" Raymond asked.

Generally speaking, after deducting the tax that needs to be paid, the publisher's copyright fee is about 5%, which does not seem like much, but the average price of each single is about 6- US dollars. As long as the sales volume reaches the target, the copyright fee will be Selling hundreds of thousands of copies is equivalent to millions of dollars in revenue for SBK Records.

However, now SBK's appetite is even greater.

"They want 40% of the royalties, and a 50% reduction in mechanical reproduction royalties!" Badman banged the table, seeming to hate SBK's greedy face.

"Mechanical copying royalties?" Tang De and Raymond were both a little confused and didn't know what this was.

After all, it is no exaggeration to say that the tax industry in the United States is the most developed in the world. There are various tax items, and paying taxes reasonably is definitely a big problem.

Not to mention that in order to collect taxes, the United States has also created tax agencies such as the IRS (Internal Revenue Service).

"Only death and taxes are eternal in this world." This is a famous saying in the United States.

But what people like to say in private is - mess with no one but don't mess with the IRS.

Because these guys do everything they can to collect taxes, Tang De knew that the IRS was connected to various gangs and gangs in the United States, because in their view, no matter what business you are in, even the proceeds of crime must be taxed. Pay taxes to the IRS.

And the communication channel between the two completely avoided the supervision of the FBI and the judicial department.

This is the magical status quo of America where taxation is paramount.

When Tang De asked, Badman also explained to him.

"Mechanical copying royalty means that record companies have to pay us a certain amount of royalties when they turn music into vinyl, tapes, CDs or MP3s. Although the money is not much, only 9 cents per song. But the water keeps flowing, 伱Think about it, if this song can only sell half a million dollars now, what will happen ten or twenty years from now?”

There is no doubt that this is an astronomical figure, especially after the advent of the Internet era and songs being put on major music platforms.

At that time, a classic old song can easily have tens of millions of downloads, or even hundreds of millions of downloads.

This is endless wealth to enjoy! How could you give up so easily!
  Therefore, it is understandable that Badman loses his temper.

But no matter how angry he is, he can't refuse outright now, but he already has other plans.

Badman put down the flue: "I will go to other record companies to check the situation and hope for a good result."

(End of this chapter)