John Black (music manager)

John Black (born in Aberdeen, Scotland) is a British music manager.

Background

Having worked in the oil industry in Aberdeen for 10 years where he owned a graphic design company, in 1999 John Black decided to change career to work in music and relocated to London to start building websites and provide online PR for artists such as 5ive, Destiny's Child, The Beautiful South, D-Side and All Saints. At this time many artists didn't have websites, and John was key in creating ground breaking sites for the artists he worked with, he was the first person to include video messages from artists on their sites, the first being boyband 5ive, other acts then followed by adding their own videos to sites.

John then slowly moved over to artist management where one of his first acts was the Irish boyband D-Side, who had a three top ten singles in the UK then under Black's management released 3 albums and a greatest hits in Japan on the Avex label where they had great success.

In 2005 John started co-managing Scottish singer Sandi Thom who in 2006 had a number 1 single and album in the UK following a series of webcast shows from her basement in Tooting,^[1] London, Black was key in the success of Sandi Thom. In 2007 John started managing Stevie Appleton who signed to RCA Records. Appleton featured in a Smart Car TV campaign several countries including Japan where he went on to have success under Black's guidance had one of the biggest radio hits in Japan in 2009.^[2]

In December 2010 John joined Craig Logan in his new venture, Logan Media Entertainment ^[3] managing Cher Lloyd, Russell Watson and Anastacia looking after both domestic and international activity. In March 2013 John worked with The CAN Group to setup the music division and signed Oritsé_Williams from the British boyband JLS. In 2014 John was instrumental in creating a new sound and look for UK artist Peter Andre, who is also a CAN client. John was A&R on Peter's Big Night album and put the band together for his Big Night tour while also making a Christmas album, the lead track of which is an original song which featured on the Iceland Foods Christmas TV campaign in 2014.

In January 2015 John launched Black Gold Music Management, ^{[4] [5]} a joint venture between himself and Cooking_Vinyl. Clients include A*M*E, Stevie Appleton a new indie band Desert Planes and a 17-year-old DJ/producer based in Melbourne, Australia called RZJ who signed to Ministry of Sound in May 2015.

References

1. ↑ Elliott, John (5 March 2006). "Sandi, singer in the basement, plays the World.". London: Sunday Times. Retrieved 23 May 2010. 
2. ↑ "Stevie Appleton". Chart Stats. 2009-05-16. Archived from the original on 2013-01-19. Retrieved 2011-12-31. 
3. ↑ "Sony backs RCA boss in new venture". Music Week. 2010-03-25. Retrieved 2013-02-24. 
4. ↑ "Indie Label Cooking Vinyl Launches Music Management Arm". Billboard. 2010-02-06. Retrieved 2015-02-10. 
5. ↑ "Cooking Vinyl and John Black launch management venture". Music Week. 2010-02-05. Retrieved 2015-02-10.