Sellout: The Major-Label Feeding Frenzy That Swept Punk, Emo, and Hardcore (1994–2007)

by Dan Ozzi

A line was drawn in the sand: any band signing with the Big Six—Sony Music, EMI, MCA/Universal, BMG, PolyGram, and Warner Music Group—was doing business with the devil. They risked being banished, ostracized, or forever branded as sellouts.

Whether a band had gone major or stayed true to their indie roots became a defining characteristic in how they were perceived by their peers.

Too often, when art is viewed through the lens of capitalism, it is reduced to a gamble that either pays off or doesn’t.

Punks, like anybody, are sometimes so narrow-minded and conservative in their viewpoint that they don’t want a band to grow at all, or be anything other than what they were when they initially discovered them.

To me, selling out would be saying, ‘I don’t have what it takes.’ Fuck that. I’m gonna keep swinging for the fences, until I die.”