In its nascent days, Big Machine Label Group had a mantra: “Start at crazy and work backward.”
“It happened very early on in some of our marketing meetings, where, as a young label, we didn’t have a lot of marketing money, and so it was like, ‘What’s the craziest thing we could do? Let’s define the mile marker and work backward from that,’ ” BMLG founder and chairman/CEO Scott Borchetta remembers.
“It’s a very liberating concept and construct,” he continues. “I love working with artists who think big or people who see things in such bright colors. That’s when I feel I do my best work.”
Related
And for 20 years, Borchetta and his team have done their best work developing artists from scratch and taking established stars to new heights, including Taylor Swift, Reba McEntire, Thomas Rhett, Garth Brooks, Tim McGraw, Florida Georgia Line, Rascal Flatts, Mötley Crüe, Dolly Parton, Carly Pearce and Riley Green.
Borchetta started BMLG in September 2005 as a sister label to Toby Keith’s Show Dog Nashville (while that partnership dissolved six months later, Keith held equity in BMLG until 2019). Following in his father’s record-company footsteps (Mike Borchetta worked in promotions for Capitol Records, RCA Records and Mercury Records), the junior Borchetta became highly regarded for his promotional prowess at both MCA and DreamWorks, at a time when country radio was king.
After MCA parent Universal Music Group (UMG) bought DreamWorks, Borchetta decided to leave and start Big Machine, which takes its moniker from both the Velvet Revolver song of the same name and a reference to the “big machines” he drives as a sports car driver in the Trans-Am Series. (Borchetta also owns NASCAR Xfinity Series team Big Machine Racing.)
Big Machine’s initial roster included Jack Ingram, DreamWorks artist Danielle Peck and, thanks to his early discussions with her while at DreamWorks, a teenage Swift. Borchetta promised her that if she was interested, he would sign her as soon as he got Big Machine off the ground, and he made good on his word in 2005.
Borchetta and Swift at the 44th annual Academy of Country Music Awards in 2009.
Ethan Miller/Getty Image
Nearly a decade-and-a-half later, Scooter Braun’s Ithaca Holdings bought the UMG-distributed label in 2019 for a reported $300 million. Then in 2021, HYBE bought Ithaca for $1.05 billion. Despite no longer owning Big Machine, Borchetta says he retains creative control.
BMLG operates four imprints: Big Machine Records, The Valory Music Co., Nashville Harbor Records & Entertainment and Big Machine Rock (which HYBE sold to Gebbia Media in May, but the imprint remains under Borchetta’s remit). In 2012, the label group launched publishing company Big Machine Music, which includes such powerhouse writers as Jessie Jo Dillon (George Strait, Maren Morris) and Laura Veltz (McEntire, Kane Brown).
Helping guide BMLG from day one are Borchetta’s wife, executive vp of creative Sandi Borchetta, and president Andrew Kautz. Other key team members are COO Mike Rittberg and executive vp of A&R Allison Jones, as well as Nashville Harbor Records & Entertainment president/CEO Jimmy Harnen, The Valory Music Co. president George Briner and Big Machine Records executive vp/GM Kris Lamb.
Twenty years in and with 185 No. 1 songs, 76 Grammy Award nominations and more than 225 million albums sold, according to the label, the mission remains largely the same, Borchetta says: “It’s all about cutting through the noise.”
What made you start your own label?
There was one really polar moment. Sandi and I were on vacation with Reba [McEntire] and [then-husband/manager] Narvel [Blackstock] in Cancún [Mexico], and he goes, “When are you going to run one of these things?” I thought, “Wow, if Narvel thinks I could do it…” That was really a boost to my thought process. There were certain mile markers on how I was thinking about the business, and one of the big things was Napster. When that came out, it scared everybody. It was a terrible time for the record industry. We’re suing college students and grandmas, right? “Is it a weed or a flower? Let’s just kill it.” That was a dead reckoning of [the conventional record industry not] seeing what the future is. Realizing that physical distribution at scale was a dead man walking over the next several years, it’s like, “I don’t see anybody getting ahead of this.” And that was the moment. It’s like, “There’s a lot of land out there that nobody’s claiming. Let’s go claim it.”
McEntire and Borchetta at the Music Biz 2017 Awards Luncheon in Nashville.
Rick Diamond/Getty Images
Your first release was Danielle Peck’s “I Don’t,” which reached No. 28 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart. Then, the label’s second single, Jack Ingram’s “Wherever You Are,” went to No. 1. Were you thinking, “Man, this is easy”?
If you look back to 2005 [and] that era, radio was still king, and I was the best in the business in promotion. I knew that I had a honeymoon period [and] that my first three or four records would get a chance. We really expected the label to be successful. I wanted to get our systems working before we got to Taylor [Swift] because I felt like that was going to be very special.
Taylor Swift launched as MySpace was taking off and you really harnessed the early power of social media. You also helped create the Great American Country TV series Short Cuts, which went behind the scenes. Tell us about launching her.
Out of nowhere, on May 1, 2006, Taylor starts showing up once an hour [on GAC] with these one-minute shorts to show her songwriting, her in the studio, her performing, etc. We intentionally didn’t release the first single, “Tim McGraw,” until the beginning of June because I wanted to see how hot we could make it. By the time we shipped that single, we were watching her MySpace increase [by] double-digit percentages week over week. When we shipped the record, I would call radio stations and say, “We have you surrounded and you don’t even know it.” It was just the beginning of a forest fire. We went everywhere because I knew she could back it up.
Did having a big star that early change the label?
A big lesson I learned at DreamWorks is Toby [Keith] got so big that we didn’t have anything else to balance it out and it became really challenging. As Taylor started to become the superstar that she became, I wanted to make sure that the label couldn’t be completely defined by one artist. Before you know it, we’ve got Rascal Flatts, Tim McGraw, The Band Perry, Florida Georgia Line. Reba McEntire comes over. We built out a superstar label because that was the only way I felt we would be taken seriously. We couldn’t be a one-trick pony.
In 2012, you became the first American label to receive performance royalty rights at terrestrial radio, starting with iHeartMedia. How important was that to you?
In that moment, it was extraordinarily important, and we came so close to getting a blanket license, so to speak, for the industry. It’s a shame that it didn’t happen because we would be sharing in global terrestrial performance rights around the world. It was something that I realized really early on that we were going to have to do in the private sector. We were not going to get this done through a political pathway. This all started with a conversation that I had with [iHeartMedia chairman/CEO] Bob Pittman… [We were] able to go to all [our] artists and say, “We just got you another income source.”
You and your team seem much less risk-averse than a typical label. You launched Nash Icon with Cumulus in conjunction with the company’s country radio format of the same name, a rock label in partnership with fashion designer John Varvatos and a label with Blac Noize!, all of which are gone now. How do you decide what to take the risk on, and how upset are you if it doesn’t work?
Hey, everything has seasons. Nash Icon was incredibly successful not only with Reba, but Hank [Williams] Jr. and Ronnie Dunn. With John Varvatos, it just got to the point where rock is so hard to do, but we had a nice season with that. Everything doesn’t last forever. Sometimes they’re just moments, sometimes they become a movement. Even though the Blac Noize! imprint didn’t last that long, out of the box, you had a huge hit with GloRilla and a Grammy nomination. We have this new joint venture [Ascend Music] with [industry executive] Joel Klaiman, who brought a killer act, Marfa. This is really the key for these other joint ventures. It’s A&R opportunities. It’s like, “What do you see out there that we don’t see?”
Spotify started in 2006 and now streaming is the dominant means for people to listen to music. How has it changed how you do business?
It changed everything. We’ve gone from selling a CD to Walmart and Target for $12.02 to [song streams generating] 0.004 [cents] around the globe. It’s how you get [artists] to scale because now we have things that are doing real business that aren’t at radio. At the end of the day, we want it everywhere, but I don’t know that you have to have it everywhere. Does it change how we sign artists? It does. Is this going to stream or not? You’ve got to have a social story. You’ve got to have a streaming story. You’ve got to continually remain interesting. And it’s probably harder than ever for these new artists.
Scott and Sandi Borchetta at Big Machine Label Group’s celebration of the 58th Annual CMA Awards last year in Nashville.
Brett Carlsen/Getty Images
How do you look at terrestrial radio now?
It’s still very important. If you look at our more mature artists, it’s super important to reach their fan base, and not as important to the younger artists.
Swift’s deal with Big Machine ended in 2018. How much pressure did you feel to try to make up that market share?
Business as usual. “Let’s go to work.” You can’t just say, “Oh, let’s go get the next one.” There isn’t another one, right? There’s her. To this day, we still do great business. It wasn’t like, “How do you make that up?” Because if you got so focused on that, [other] parts of the business would fail. The best thing we could do is get up and go to work every day and do our best work.
When you sold Big Machine in 2019, you’d had a ton of suitors before. Why was it the right time to sell?
I felt like it was the right time to sell with where the market was at that point, with Taylor leaving and the writing was on the wall for Florida Georgia Line [the duo went on indefinite hiatus in 2022]. I’m thinking to myself, “I built this to win Super Bowls, and we won Super Bowls. And so now it feels like it was the right time to do it.”
You took some pretty nasty slings and arrows from Swift and her fans, as did Scooter Braun. How did you personally navigate that?
I know that I’m true to myself. I never did anything to intentionally hurt any artist. I never expected that kind of response, but it happened. It’s unfortunate, but again, I have to live with the decisions that I make and I know I’m a good person. The people around me are good. We didn’t die that day. It’s perseverance… You’ve got to be resilient in this business. You get knocked down and get back up. It’s not the first time you’ve been knocked down. Probably won’t be the last.
In 2021, HYBE bought Braun’s Ithaca Holdings. How did that change how you operate your company?
For Big Machine Label Group, I am the sole decision-maker. They’re not involved in our A&R. Obviously, we have to be fiscally responsible to them and we work on very specific projections. But that’s just the business side. From a creative [standpoint] and all that, that lives in Nashville.
You were in a near-lethal car racing accident in 2023 and had to learn to walk again. Did you think about leaving the label, or did it help you to have a goal to get back to?
I was very aware that I was pretty much dying in the ambulance. At that point in the ambulance, I couldn’t breathe and then I split up blood. I said, “Just give up.” I don’t mean give up living, just go to the pain and let it go. If you’re dying, then you’re dying and just accept it. And my mantra became “Get to the next minute,” because I knew as soon as I got to the hospital — whether I was dying or not — I’d be out of pain. So I went into this meditation. When I woke up and saw how busted I was head to toe, I’m like, “Well, I survived this and there’s no way in hell I’m going to let this define the rest of my life. I’ve been so blessed. There are so many people I’m responsible for, so how quickly can we start the healing process?” From that day to today, it’s “I will not lie down, I will not go quietly.”
So you did not think about leaving the label?
I didn’t think about not being me. And this is me.
As you look ahead to the next 20 years, how much longer will you stay?
I’m going to stay until I don’t want to stay anymore. I’m still really excited about being a student of this game. I’m learning stuff every day. I equate [artificial intelligence] somewhat to how Napster was. Nobody knew what it was. They were predominantly just afraid of it. [I’m like], “Well, let’s jump in there.” I look at the opportunities that we have to use [AI] as a marketing tool and in a creative way and to encourage our artists and our creators to get their arms around it. That’s exciting to me.
The Band Perry performs during the Big Machine 20th Anniversary concert this August in Nashville.
Catherine Powell/Getty Images
In August, Middle Tennessee State University named its College of Media and Entertainment after you even though you went to school in California. Why was that important to you?
That’s how I started my speech. I said, “You need to know that I dropped out of college after two semesters. And here’s the reason why: This didn’t exist.” There wasn’t a path to learn the record business 40 years ago. Now there is.
Also in August, to celebrate its 20th anniversary, Big Machine held a concert in Nashville that included Rascal Flatts, Riley Green, Sheryl Crow, Brett Young and The Band Perry. Why did you decide to make it free, and how did you decide on the performers?
I wanted everybody invited. I wanted the biggest party possible. I didn’t want any restrictions. Danielle Peck came back and opened the show with our very first single. Jack Ingram came back and did our first No. 1. I was filled with pride the whole day, and then the night was just magical. I’ll never forget it. It didn’t rain. It was a perfect day.
This story appears in the Nov. 15, 2025, issue of Billboard.
