Paper tiger

Atlantis Music Conference staffers speak of a very special piece of paper.

Through stacks of CDs, tapes and file boxes, it hangs like a shining talisman or a sacred parchment, centered above the main desk in the conference’s cramped Marietta offices. For the organizers, who for the last four years have put together the local three-day music-industry convention and showcase of unsigned bands, the weathered old 8 1/2-by-11 sheet serves as a constant reminder, a testament to the fruits of their labor.

It contains a running list of Atlantis bands that have gotten record deals. According to Ryan Wexler, Atlantis’ assistant conference manager, there are more than 30 names now on the list. “Each year as we find out more and more bands getting signed directly from Atlantis,” he says, “we add their name to the wall.”

Though few outsiders have seen the list, its information has made its way outside the office, via Atlantis’ extensive marketing and promotional efforts. “Since its inception, the Atlantis Music Conference has played a key role in the signing of more than 30 artists to major labels,” reads one press release, while other dispatches offer variations on the theme.

It’s a very impressive claim — perhaps Atlantis’ most potent endorsement. Another popular variation — that one out of every 18 bands playing Atlantis have been signed — is enough to convince just about any aspiring act to pay the $20-$25 application fee to be considered for an Atlantis showcase slot. It might even be enough to convince rock-star wannabes to pay the $100-$200 registration fee to attend the conference’s daytime panels and nightly performances, where they can schmooze music-industry folks with the power to make their dreams a reality.

But who are these 30-plus bands, and how did Atlantis play “a key role” in their signings? After repeated requests to Atlantis for a copy of the list, the conference’s PR representative Tara Murphy sent CL an e-mail she acknowledges was incomplete, containing 21 “signed bands from Atlantis.” Later, we requested the complete list from Mark Willis, co-founder of the conference. He said he’d have someone copy the list on the wall into an e-mail, though no e-mail arrived.

Of the 21 acts and corresponding record labels Atlantis did provide, CL made attempts to contact the appropriate A&R (artists and repertoire) representative — the person in charge of finding new talent — at each record label, and successfully gained information about the signing processes behind 13 of the groups.

“Josh’s signing had nothing to do with the conference,” says Daniel Glass of Artemis Records, who released the debut album by Atlanta bandleader Josh Joplin in January.

“Signing Peter really had nothing to do with Atlantis for me,” says former Time Bomb A&R rep Pete Giberga, who inked a deal for the label with singer/songwriter Peter Searcy.

“I didn’t meet them through the conference. I’ve known Johnny for years” says Dan McCarrol, A&R rep for Elektra Records affiliate TMC, which recently released the debut album by Johnny Colt’s band the Brand New Immortals.

“To be honest, no ... I didn’t see them during Atlantis,” says London Records A&R rep Greg Glover, of local rock act Billionaire, who he signed in 1999.

“Atlantis didn’t really have anything to do with me signing them,” says MCA Records’ A&R vice president Tom Sarig, who signed Atlanta heavy-rock quartet DoubleDrive in late 1998. (Sarig, in case you wondered, is my brother).

Of the 13, in fact, only the signings of two bands — Injected and the Tender Idols — linked directly to an Atlantis performance. How, then, to account for Atlantis’ claims of 30-plus success stories? A product of wishful, even fanciful, thinking? False advertising?

According to Atlantis’ Mark Willis, the answer lies in part with careful wording, and in part with the definition of what “playing a key role” means. Technically speaking, it’s no lie to say in the same sentence that certain bands played the conference, and at some later point those same bands got record contracts. “That’s not to put out there that we got them signed, that’s to put out there the quality of talent that we have in our lineups,” Willis says.

Still, it’s hard for Atlantis to make the clear implication — and, sometimes, explicit pronouncement — that a direct cause-and-effect link exists between those bands playing the conference and getting signed. Or, at least, one would think.

“I do think there’s a cause and effect,” says Willis, “but I don’t state that if you play the conference you’ll get a deal, and I don’t state that because you played the conference you got a deal. I state that since they played the conference they got a deal. I think it absolutely helped in a lot of cases.

“I think that absolutely you get out of [Atlantis] what you put into it,” he adds. “In no other time of the year will you be in Atlanta with all of these industry people in town. I think there’s cause and effect, because most of the bands who do [Atlantis] have done plenty for themselves, and they know this is a great tool and a great opportunity.”

No doubt, it worked for local modern-rock quartet Injected, who were signed by Island/Def Jam last year after playing Atlantis in 1999 and 2000. Diana Fragnito, who works in A&R for the label, recalls the first time she’d ever heard of Injected was at their Atlantis showcase.

“It was Saturday night, literally one of the last shows of the conference,” she says. “I happened to be there seeing some other band beforehand. I had seen so many bands at that point, and I was a little bit burnt out. But I stayed and thought they were really cool, really energetic. It just so happened that I was at the right club and the right time.”

Fragnito also met Injected’s attorney at that showcase and stayed in touch with the band. She liked the demos she received, but wasn’t ready to move on signing the band until the following year, when Injected played Atlantis again. “That was the confirming moment for me, the hair on my arms stood up, and I was ready to sign this band,” she says. With Injected’s debut album recorded, Island/Def Jam plans an early 2002 release.

There’s also the case of the Tender Idols, another Atlanta rock act. Christoph Rücker, co-founder of New York-based start-up label E-Magine Entertainment, had heard the band’s self-released CD but had never seen them live. He was curious to find out more, but it wasn’t until seeing them at Atlantis in 1999 that he was impressed enough to offer them a deal.

The label reissued the band’s first CD last year, then put out a new one this past April.

And of course, there are other ways in which the conference can help a band. In the case of local rock trio Marvelous 3, Willis acknowledges that the band already had a deal in the works by the time it played Atlantis in 1998. But, he says, “because they were playing the conference — because the record company knew [other labels] were coming and it was going to be a label frenzy — they hurried up and got the deal done.”

Willis also points out that in-person access to music-industry people can bring a band one step closer to a deal, even if no offers result from the group’s showcase. “Peter Searcy didn’t even play the conference, but because he came and handed out his material to a lot of the A&R people, he developed his relationships and got permission to send in his material directly due to that.”

Time Bomb’s Giberga recalls that, in fact, he never met Searcy at Atlantis when he attended in 1998, but instead ran into him in California soon after. However, he says, “The only Atlantis I went to had so many good bands for how many they had involved, I was kind of shocked. Though I didn’t find Peter from there, I would’ve tried to sign him on the spot had I seen him play. It’s a good music conference.”

Artemis’ Glass allows that, while he’s never been to Atlantis, it’s possible the people who turned him on to signing Josh Joplin — 99X program director Leslie Fram and, later, Joplin producer Shawn Mullins — might have discovered Joplin through the conference. “I have a feeling ... that’s how you get to the Leslie Frams,” he says. “That’s why these conferences are very important, each region protects and publicizes their own. I don’t want to lie and say I had a direct connection to it, but I bet I do have a connection to it in a way that I don’t know.”

Besides, Glass says, in the process of getting a band signed, all sorts of factors and influences come into play. And any number of individuals can somehow justify taking credit. “It’s like a hockey game,” he says. “Did you ever see the puck go in? Nineteen people raise their sticks, they all got the puck in.”

But given the numbers, it’s hard not to see that mythical piece of paper in the Atlantis offices as more than just an inspirational symbol to the staff. Perhaps it’s something closer to a golden calf: Reassuring as a tangible symbol to some, but ultimately forged with questionable judgement.

Additional reporting by Charles Bethea.

The Atlantis Music Conference is held Aug. 1-4 at the downtown Atlanta Hilton and a variety of local venues. For more information, see www.atlantismusic.com.??