Speech Debelle has announced that she is sacking her record label, blaming Big Dada for the poor sales of her debut album. Speech Therapy never rose above No 65 in the charts, despite winning the Mercury prize in September.
"I wasn't disappointed that it didn't sell well, I was disappointed in the people I was working with," Debelle told BBC 6 Music. "I wasn't on a big label and the machine wasn't there. So even though the album won the Mercury it was still only able to do what the label was capable of doing, which just means that I'm more prepared for next time."
Speech Therapy was released by Big Dada, a wing of London-based indie label Ninja Tune – which also represented previous Mercury nominees Ty and Roots Manuva. Debelle has praised Big Dada in the past, saying they "provided the best tools for me to craft my skills", but she now claims that their distribution network let her down.
Post-Mercury, the rapper's sales were expected go to "through the roof". And yet despite winning one of the country's largest music prizes, Speech Therapy has only sold about 10,000 copies. Compare this to the 300,000 shifted by last year's winner, Elbow's The Seldom Seen Kid, and you begin to understand why Speech Therapy has had the worst-ever chart showing by a Mercury winner.
Of course, poor distribution doesn't explain why many of Debelle's post-Mercury gigs were sparsely attended. But Debelle, whose real name is Corynne Elliot, insists that it is label incompetence – and not the music – that has prevented Speech Therapy from becoming a blockbuster. She cites sales figures on Amazon, alleging a 4,000% increase after the Mercury win. "The Mercury Prize was on a Tuesday, and the Friday there were no more physical albums in the shops," Debelle complained. "So on the Mercury weekend, which would have been my biggest-selling weekend, people couldn't get it."
With Big Dada out of the picture, Debelle is already courting other record companies. "One thing I've learned is that having bargaining power is important. It's important to walk into a record label and say, 'This is what I have, and these are the kind of terms I want,'" she said.
Speech Debelle will soon return to Australia, where she recorded her first album, to begin work on the follow-up. "I want it to be a mix of Ray Charles, a song like Georgia, I want it to have the atmosphere of Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon and the drums of J Dilla." She will again be working with producer Wayne Lo-Tek, as well as Faithless singer Maxi Jazz and British rapper MC Rodney P.
"Amazing what a bit of success can do ..." said DJ Food's Kevin Foakes, on the Ninja Tune forum. Big Dada has yet to comment on Speech Debelle's departure.
