*Since the 1970s, music executive TC Thompkins has been one of the most influential marketing, promotional, and strategic masterminds in R&B, soul, and pop music. He has engineered hundreds and hundreds of campaigns to successfully market and promote the songs of dozens of best-selling, award-winning recording artists, overwhelmingly Black.
Thompkins has recently released “When Radio Was King,” a provocative 358-page book chronicling his storied life, times, and music journeys – good and bad – working for such record labels as CBS, Epic, ABC, Stax, and Capitol, to globally promote such artists as Sade, Michael Jackson, Luther Vandross, Teddy Riley, Chaka Khan, the Gap Band, SOS Band, Gladys Knight, Patti LaBelle, George Duke, Teena Marie, Mtume, The Isley Brothers, Teddy Pendergrass, and more.
Thompkins is straightforward in writing about his vast experiences in the recording industry, where he said blatant racism was prevalent at various levels.
In a recent interview with Lee Bailey of EURweb.com, Thompkins described a couple of examples of racist comments made about Black recording artists. Thompkins said when CBS first hired him, he attended a music industry convention in London, where a label executive called singer Billy Paul the N-word.
“There was a big meeting about it, but nothing was done,” said Thompkins. “I don’t think there was even an apology. They just said that it wouldn’t happen anymore.”
Thompkins recalled another instance when he asked a VP of sales at Epic about national layout plans for Luther Vandross’ new album, “Never Too Much.” Thompkins told Bailey that the VP said, “What do you want us to do, put records in every shoeshine shop in America?”
Despite racism rearing its ugly head in the record industry, Thompkins pressed on to do what he loved: promoting and marketing music to elevate Black artists and their careers. Thompkins spoke fondly of his professional and personal relationships with Michael Jackson and Sade.
“I started really getting close to Michael during the release of ‘Thriller’ on Epic,” Thompkins said. “We worked together earlier on ‘Off The Wall’ but had a casual relationship. Developing a relationship with Michael took a while because he was very cautious and standoffish in general.”
During the recording of “Thriller,” Thompkins saw some things Epic was doing that he didn’t like related to Michael. Thompkins said he had a “big fight” with the record label over how Michael was being represented. The music executive said he approached “The King of Pop” and later met with him at Michael’s mother’s home to discuss Thompkins’ concerns.
“We had constructive conversations and developed a friendship from there,” Thompkins recalled. “We talked all the time after that. He would call me even after I left Epic Records.”
Thompkins, in his book, writes glowingly about his relationship with Sade, including sealing the deal to sign her with Epic after other high-ranking label executives didn’t know what to do with her and didn’t have a clue how to promote and market her style of singing and music across America.
“I volunteered to take on the project and flew to London,” said Thompkins. “I presented her with my marketing plan, which she did not agree with. She thought it was a mistake, but I proved her wrong. However, we became very close. I traveled all over the country with her. My relationship with Sade was very special.”
Thompkins said after signing Sade and following the release of “Diamond Life,” her debut studio album, some executives at Epic thought he and the Nigerian-born British singer were sleeping together because of the closeness the two exhibited. Thompkins told Bailey, at one point, Sade wouldn’t do anything the label executives asked unless he talked with her first.
Thompkins said he was highly pissed when a top executive at Epic took full credit for breaking Sade’s music and the artist herself in America.
“In a Time magazine article written on Sade, my name was not mentioned,” Thompkins told Bailey, which is also in the book. “Instead, the article talked about a White executive and his marketing plans of breaking Sade against all odds. The article pissed me off and pissed Sade off as well.”
Many industry insiders knew the truth that it was Thompkins’ promotional and marketing campaign that paid big dividends for the songstress’ “Diamond Life” album. The album, which earned Sade a Grammy, sold 10 million copies, making the album one of the best-selling debut LPs ever released by a British female singer.
“Epic would not allow me to take a bow on the success of Sade and her music,” said Thompkins. “One of the main reasons that I wrote this book is because I wanted to memorialize my efforts working with Sade and Michael Jackson and many other of the biggest recording stars in the history of the music industry. It’s not printed anywhere of what my participation was for the development of the Epic Records becoming the successful monster which it became.”
“One thing I can say about TC…there would be no Sade’ in America if it wasn’t for TC.”…said Clarence Avant, the legendary music executive known as The Black Godfather.
“Even when the world wasn’t ready, TC Thompkins knew great talent when he saw it and used his knowledge of radio promotions, tenacity, self-confidence, and decisive action to orchestrate the campaigns of Sade,’ Michael Jackson, and countless other icons,” said Susan Blond, former VP of Publicity at Epic & Associated Labels.
While the book talks about Thompkins’ fingerprints of success placed on dozens of legendary recording artists’ careers, his literary work also reflects on his life as a child and teen. He writes about his adult life as a husband, father, and Vietnam veteran, how he got into the music industry, and his rise and experiences in numerous executive roles. Thompkins is also candid about his uphill battles with the drug culture, which ran rampant in the music industry.
“It’s a brutally honest book because I don’t pull any punches,” Thompkins said. “I talk a lot about my screwups and expose a lot of stuff but really expose more stuff about myself and left others out. I’m the kind of person who will die with secrets.”
As for titling his book “When Radio Was King,” Thompkins said radio was once king because it was the primary vehicle that brought artists’ music to the people in their homes, cars, and other places. With the inception of the internet, streaming, and digital platforms, people now get their music differently.
“Radio is not king anymore, and radio is not really interested in being king anymore,” said Thompkins, who now heads the Texas-based TC Thompkins LLC, a full-service music promotional and marketing company offering worldwide radio promotions and music streaming campaigns. “And I understand why. Radio can’t compete with the internet, so why try.”
For more information about Thompkins’ book “When Radio Was King,” log on to www.whenradiowasking.net. Also, WATCH TC Thompkins’ interviews with RadioFact’s Kevin Ross, HERE, and The Madd Hatta, HERE.
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