Mammoth Moves On

The move prompted lamentations from artists, music aficionados and community leaders. But now that the dust has settled, the company, its former employees and the area musicians it once sponsored are not slowing down.

"All the staff is fairly new, and looking forward to (running the label)," said Mammoth representative Giovanna Melchiorre from the company's new New York headquarters. "It's pretty much going in the same direction."

Jay Faires, who founded the independent label in 1988 and negotiated its early success, sold Mammoth to Walt Disney Co. in 1997. Disney fired Faires last February and decided to reorganize the label, relocating it in May.

After 12 years as a mainstay of the local music scene, the departing company left almost 50 local employees jobless and several area bands without a label.

Of the few acts Mammoth retained after the move, the only local group is Chapel Hill's hot jazz heroes Squirrel Nut Zippers, which was and remains the most successful band on the label.

The Zippers are now on tour promoting their newest album, Bedlam Ballroom, which was released in late October. They are scheduled to appear at Cat's Cradle on Dec. 7.

Other local bands that signed with Mammoth when it was still based in Carrboro, including Raleigh's Far Too Jones and Chapel Hill hip-hop group Tyfu, have had to look for new alternatives.

Luckily for local music fans, it's easier than ever for a band to put out an album without the help of an established label.

"It was definitely a good situation for us, getting free from Mammoth," said Tyfu's John Hackner, a.k.a. Hack. "But it was also an opportunity that we lost to get a little more nationwide audience."

Tyfu recently released its second album, Out Of Control, on the band's independent Ill Gore label.

He said individual members might seek deals with major labels in the future but that Tyfu would probably remain independent.

Far Too Jones was in the midst of recording an album when Mammoth closed shop in Carrboro and dropped the band. The record, Shame and Her Sister, finally appeared Nov. 7, released on Far Too Jones' own Aszams Records.

Vocalist Chris Spruill said discussions are in progress with other major labels, but the process is a slow one.

"We're not turning our back on major labels at all, but it's going to have to be the right situation," he said. "The whole experience with Mammoth has made us a bit smarter than we were three years ago."

Raleigh's alt-country act The Backsliders, which released two albums on Mammoth, has remained inactive since the move.

Melchiorre said the company's organizational structure had changed, but its spirit remains the same. Mammoth now operates with only 14 employees, and former Hollywood Records executive Rob Seidenberg serves as its president.

"It's almost like a new beginning," Melchiorre said. "The roster has been pared down. All the staff is fairly new, but they seem to be signing some rootsy stuff, the same type of thing (as when the company was based in Carrboro)."

Spruill said that in Far Too Jones' case, the parting of the band and the label was a mutual decision.

"We had a meeting with the new president and basically told him if we were not going to be a priority as we had been before, then we didn't want to continue with the label," he said. "The new Mammoth regime was polite and honest. There was no animosity, just each of us wanting to move in different directions."

Mammoth's former Carrboro employees also have found that life goes on without the company. Steve Balcom, a Mammoth executive who lost his job with the company when it moved, said he felt no resentment.

"There's no hard feelings, just sadness in the way it went down and disappointment," Balcom said. "I think most of us still believed in ourselves and the artists we were working with."

Balcom and two of his former co-workers founded a marketing company called the Splinter Group, where they use marketing techniques they developed at Mammoth, he said. Far Too Jones is among its clients.

Melchiorre said Mammoth plans to expand its lineup. Several groups have already joined up since the move: folk singer/songwriter John Wesley Harding, the Seattle indie pop act the Young Fresh Fellows and rock group A.

"We're looking to sign a lot of bands," Melchiorre said. "We have complete support by Disney for that."

The label's current lineup is filled out by the Zippers, the Freestylers, Joe Henry and California pop band Fu Manchu, all of which Mammoth retained from its Carrboro era. The label also put out the soundtrack to the summer movie "Jesus' Son."

In the wake of Mammoth's departure, both the company and the local music scene it once enhanced look not to the past, but to a very much alive future.

"It's going to be fun to get back (on tour)," Spruill said. "I want to keep moving forward."

The Arts & Entertainment Editor can be reached at artsdesk@unc.edu.