In the dance and hip-hop field, record labels come and go as quickly as the music trends they promote. Just to stay in business is a major achievement. For Tommy Boy to survive for so long, releasing music that managed to be both revolutionary and incredibly successful, is a miracle. "I feel very fortunate to have played a part in bringing a culture to the forefront," says Monica Lynch. Staying on top of the constant changes in hip-hop style and music technology, pushing the boundaries of sampling practice or using small budgets to create groundbreaking videos and marketing campaigns, Tommy Boy has nurtured some of the most significant artists of the past 20 years.
Having come this far, Tom Silverman is looking to the future by learning from methods his company used in the past - methods that threaten to become endangered species in the corporate atmosphere of the late Nineties. "We used to put records out really fast," he says. "We used to put out answer records. There were a lot of things we used to do that were fun to do. We're looking for things that are gonna be significant. They have to stand out. Whatever genre they're in, they should push the envelope, they should have an edge." At Tommy Boy, home of the greatest beats, music has always had the edge.
TOMMY BOY 2001: IT'S WORKING