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So far in 2025, the No. 1 slot on the Billboard 200 albums chart has regularly been filled with some familiar faces: SZA, Lil Baby, Bad Bunny, The Weeknd, Kendrick Lamar, Drake, Lady Gaga, Ariana Grande. So this week’s chart — with Swedish hard rock band Ghost, as shadowy and mysterious as its name implies, coming in at No. 1 with its latest album Skeletá — may seem like an anomaly to most casual music fans in the U.S.
But it’s not a surprise to Ghost’s longtime fans, nor to its label, Loma Vista. And for those paying attention to the group’s growing lore over the years, it seems like it may have been a long time coming. Since first debuting on the Billboard 200 in 2013 with Infestissumam (No. 28), the group has steadily climbed up the chart with each subsequent full-length studio album: 2015’s Meliora (No. 8) was its first top 10, followed by 2018’s Prequelle (No. 3), 2022’s Impera (No. 2) and now, Skeletá’s chart-topping debut, which marked the group’s biggest sales, streaming and equivalent album unit mark in its career so far. And with that steady growth, not to mention the big album week, Loma Vista director of marketing Todd Netter is Billboard’s Executive of the Week.
Here, Netter breaks down the band’s growing fan base, the clever marketing tactics that went into Skeletá’s rollout and what this could mean for the band, and the hard rock genre, overall. “There are a ton of decisions, small and large, that go into a successful marketing campaign,” Netter explains. “A successful album marketing campaign really is a series of interconnected decisions, tied together by strategy, creativity and execution.”
This week, Ghost landed its first-ever No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 with Skeletá. What key decisions did you make to help make that happen?
With Ghost, our goal is to always make creative decisions with clear intent at very pointed moments, like which songs to lead with and what the vehicle is for rolling those songs out and when; how to eventize the album announcement to generate maximum attention and enthusiasm amongst their large global fan base; and how to rev up that fan base going into release day. An example of such a decision was committing to creating “The Satanizer” — a first-of-its-kind music video experience for fans who wished to be “Satanized” — which was the title of Ghost’s first single, launched alongside the album announcement. “The Satanizer” morphed its users into characters featured in the song’s melodramatic music video.
With a quick upload of their photo, “The Satanizer” sent out a personalized music video clip featuring the participant, who in turn could share via social media that they too had been “Satanized.” Strategically, it was a decision to create a moment at the launch of the campaign that personalized the experience of new Ghost music while simultaneously encouraging fans to create UGC on their socials. A powerful one-two punch that drew die-hard fans in while inviting other more casual music fans to pay attention. And, most important, it was a decision to have fun with this album campaign from its very launch.
This is the band’s fourth full-length top 10 album in the past decade, with each release achieving a higher position each time. What has gone into helping them build their career to get to this point?
We at Loma Vista fundamentally believe Ghost’s music and their vibrant fan community is for everyone. They have a sound and general appeal that draws people in. So we’ve made a very concerted effort at developing their passionate and creative fan community. It’s an immersive fan experience, rewarding for the most committed of fans and welcoming to the curious. An experience rich in storyline — we call it “lore” — chock full of creative content, loaded with call-to-action drivers for the fan base, and all culminating in real-world activity for the fans to attend, be it pop-up events, concerts — aka “rituals” — or feature film cinema screenings. It’s a fan-focused experience that is constantly evolving, mysterious, fun and always centered around the music of Ghost. And this has proven great for attracting more fans, be it by word-of-mouth, or simply by being a beacon to those who feel misunderstood but are proud of their creative and unconventional points of view in terms of music and culture. Focusing on Ghost’s fan community has allowed us to expand their audience size and the impact of the band, album over album, for the last decade.
The album also made a global impact, debuting at No. 1 not just in the U.S. and in Ghost’s native Sweden, but also in countries like Australia, Germany, Belgium and Switzerland, and at No. 2 in the U.K. How did you set it up to make such a big debut worldwide?
It starts with our unwavering belief that Ghost’s music is universal. We’ve always seen our marketing campaigns for Ghost albums as worldwide endeavors. As a label, we have a global footprint with label marketing teams located in key cities across the globe including London, Berlin, Toronto, Mexico City, Sydney and Tokyo, allowing us to strategize, prep and execute globally. So any time we cook up an initiative or fan activation, we have teams positioned around the world to help us ensure the idea is executed properly in local territories, be that via social media, real-world events, or via hybrid experiences where we blend the two things.
A great recent example of that in our Skeletá album campaign were the Midnight Sales and the complimentary online album countdown event that we staged to celebrate the release of the new album. I knew we had a global fan base, one that loves to dress up and participate with other fans. I also knew Ghost’s sound and aura can harken back to previous eras of rock’n’roll, and that the album’s release was heavily anticipated by the band’s passionate fan base. We created Skeletá-Eve Midnight Sales, a series of events at 150 independent record stores around the globe, where fans could gather, listen to the album together for the first time and purchase it the minute the clock struck midnight. And for fans not near one of these many stores, we created Skeletá Rockin Eve, a global live stream event where fans tuned in at midnight locally to count down together the release of Ghost’s new album and hear new music. Coordinated timing-wise, thematically complementary, and global in scope. An example of how our strategy and execution allow us to cultivate a global fan base and have a major impact with Ghost’s music around the world.
Ghost has a very particular aesthetic and look. How did the marketing campaign for this album differ from prior releases, and from other acts on the label?
Ghost are the most unique-looking band in music. They stand out, and the way they look is an instant attention-grabber for any onlooker. But it’s not just sensational — their appearance has a very strong creative point of view and a sophisticated design intent. They challenge norms and push boundaries in terms of rock’n’roll presentation, and music fans gravitate toward that.
That said, I’m not sure our approach on this album cycle differed so much as it evolved. Their photos, wardrobe, stage design and overall aesthetic continue to elevate, album over album, and so our marketing campaigns aim to match that elevation. We look at every visual facet of our marketing campaign, be it vinyl jacket materials, music videos, band photos, band store merch, social media platforms, magazine covers, out-of-home billboards, etc., as an opportunity to establish Ghost’s creative point of view, to leave a meaningful impression on their fans and the public in general. As the band’s growing popularity collides with loftier opportunities coming their way, it enhances our ability to enrich the band’s overall aesthetic, music presentation and visual world. Our marketing campaigns have always been heavily integrated with the band’s aesthetic, so it was an evolution on Skeletá, not a different approach.
The album represented Ghost’s biggest sales week ever, but also its biggest streaming week ever. How did you balance each to get such a big debut?
The easiest explanation is the band’s audience grew a ton. Following a very successful IMPERA album campaign, viral TikTok moment for “Mary On A Cross,” and a No. 1 feature film, Rite Here Rite Now, the band simply had a lot more fans. That said, the Ghost fan base is not a monolith, nor is the music consumption landscape these days. I knew we needed a comprehensive plan to tackle all the different ways people listen and consume music these days, to best understand what motivates people to listen and how they choose to do so.
We had specific marketing plans for each streaming service, with specific platform targets and goals so that we could best position the band and their music. We took a similar approach with physical formats, creating 30 vinyl formats worldwide, as well as multiple CD and cassette formats, working with specific retailers from independent record stores to big box stores to boutique online retailers. The final component was creating a really rich and rewarding experience on the band’s webstore, offering special formats and early access to drive home the connection between the band and their fans. The music consumption landscape is fractured these days. We understood we’d never be able to funnel fans to one place, so instead we dug in and really catered to every platform and retailer’s strengths and customer base, to reach Ghost fans where they were.
This is also the first time in four years that a hard rock album has reached No. 1 on the Billboard 200, since AC/DC’s Power Up in 2020. What is the significance of that for the genre, and what can you take away from that?
I’m a little hesitant to wax poetic about knowing exactly what Ghost’s accomplishment can mean for a whole genre of music. Nor do I think of Ghost as simply a rock band. I do think their music, presentation and overall appeal transcend genre — they’re simply Ghost in my mind. But so far as I can offer a little professional and personal insight into what this means for hard rock, it never hurts when a band achieves something big like this for other bands in their genre. It shines a light on a sound and puts the genre in the zeitgeist alongside arguably more popular genres and artists. The spotlight should open doors for other bands and labels looking for opportunities, as it’s “proof,” in an industry validation sort of way, that the sound and genre have some cultural cachet.
I think with real people, average music fans and listeners, genres are becoming less and less important. Most people’s tastes bounce all over the place and artists are constantly crossing genres and audiences. More anecdotally speaking, and where my optimistic side takes over, maybe Ghost hitting No. 1 on the album charts inspires some young kids to pick up a guitar or learn to play the drums, instead of opening up a laptop, and a whole new generation of bands are formed.
This is Loma Vista’s first-ever No. 1 album on the Billboard 200. What does that mean for the label?
It’s terrific! We made a promise to our roster of artists that we’d match their vision and aspirations for their music and their careers. And this might sound cliche, but this team of people wakes up every morning with that artist commitment front of mind. None of us are personally motivated by accolades or awards. Instead, Ghost debuting at No. 1 drives home what we believe as a label: that with great music, strong creative vision, a commitment to collaboration, hard work, and an unwavering belief that anything is possible, special things will happen. A No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 reinforces that we’re right about the philosophy we take when signing and working with artists. And if I’m honest, it’s also just a really fun week for a record label when one of their artists goes No. 1.
When Tom Becci joined Concord in the newly-created role of CEO of Concord Label Group last August, he arrived with a background split between the record labels — first as a label executive in New York, then later in Nashville, ultimately as COO of Universal Music Nashville — and management, where he had spent the prior seven years at Red Light under Coran Capshaw. That gave him a view into both sides of the artist equation. “I have an understanding of what an artist needs from their standpoint, and an understanding of what a label can deliver for that artist,” Becci tells Billboard, in his first interview since taking the top job across Concord’s global recorded-music operation. “And putting them together, I think, really is what I bring to the table for the label group.”
Becci’s role in the past nine months has been one of learning and shaping, as the collection of labels and artists under his purview have reached new heights. Concord’s frontline portfolio includes Rounder Records, Concord Jazz, Fantasy Records, Fearless Records and the Kidz Bop franchise, as well as joint ventures in Loma Vista with Tom Whalley; Easy Eye Sound with Dan Auerbach; and PULSE Records with PULSE Music Group; while its catalog holdings include legendary labels like Stax, Fania, Prestige and Telarc, among others.
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It’s a lineup that already had plenty going for it: during his tenure, Killer Mike swept the rap category at the Grammys in February with his Loma Vista release Michael; Fantasy’s Allison Russell won the Grammy for best American roots performance for “Eve Was Black”; HBO announced a documentary on Stax Records called Stax: Soulsville U.S.A., which premiered in May; and Tommy Richman’s “Million Dollar Baby,” released via PULSE/ISO Supremacy, exploded out of the gate to reach No. 2 on the Hot 100 and No. 1 on the Global 200, to name a few successes.
Amid that run, Becci began to restructure parts of the label group, naming Stephanie Hudacek as the new president of Rounder Records; promoting Joe Dent and Jill Weindorf into executive vp roles overseeing operations and marketing, respectively, across the whole group; and bringing in Brad Clark to oversee a combined data analysis and streaming team, hoping to provide key, real-time insights for each of the artist campaigns that the teams are running. He’s also introduced what he calls a “portfolio approach” to catalog and frontline marketing, with each lifting the other — even if Concord doesn’t own one of their frontline artist’s catalogs, or if it owns the catalog but doesn’t have the artist signed to a frontline, as with Creed and its viral Super Bowl commercial for Paramount Plus.
Now, as Becci continues to shape Concord into a global player for all types of artists, he’s constantly looking for ways to set the company apart in an increasingly-crowded ecosystem.
“Concord sits somewhere between the major labels and the other independents and distributors,” he says. “We deliver for our artists — there’s one center of the picture and the artist belongs in it. That’s a philosophy that I want everyone to believe and feel and have the passion for. And we provide the resources to really make a difference in the musical landscape.”
Billboard: When you first started at Concord, what did you come in wanting to do?
Tom Becci: When Concord hired me, we wanted to really focus even more on the frontline business that is in place. We have a boutique label approach, but a really large infrastructure that supports each label, so there’s a unique contact point with the artist and their vision and what they want to do. And now we’re continuing to build out the team to deliver for those artists and their vision. Concord has this global footprint with direct presences in all the major markets in the world. So what I want to do is develop a frontline business with that boutique approach that delivers for artists globally.
How have you begun to restructure the company, and each label individually, to achieve that?
One of the first positions I hired, which we just recently announced, was Stephanie Hudacek, who comes from a phenomenal background of being an entrepreneur but also worked as a sound engineer and in management, so she brings that approach — not unlike mine — into Rounder Records and its presence in Nashville. Jill Weindorf, who is a 17-year veteran at Concord, promoting her into this executive vp of marketing role to really solidify these global marketing efforts to deliver for each label. Joe Dent, one of the best operators I’ve been around, promoting him and giving him responsibility over all the operations of Concord and delivering the information and resources that we all need to do our jobs. Recently, Brad Clark, who I’ve known for many years, we brought him in to oversee data analysis and streaming; they were run separately, but in today’s marketplace, having them under one leadership is really important, using what we do in data analysis and what we do in the frontline streaming world. And having them in lockstep in terms of release planning and strategy was really critical to me.
You mentioned your focus on frontline. Several of your frontline labels have had significant success lately. What do each of them bring to your portfolio, and what sets them apart?
Loma Vista, a joint venture with Tom Whalley and run by his son Ryan Whalley — bringing Killer Mike to the table and sweeping the rap categories at the Grammys is, for Concord, a huge moment in that genre, where we never had the opportunity to do those things. Ryan talked to me when I first started in September about his goals to really deliver nominations, and maybe one win, and I supported him in that vision with resources, and the results were unbelievable.
On the other side of the table, there’s Tommy Richman at PULSE — it’s the No. 1 global song. It just landed at No. 3 on the U.K. charts, which is a first ever for a Concord song. So that’s a specific vision in terms of the R&B/hip-hop music sensibilities to Concord, which builds on what Loma’s done with Killer Mike. So it’s become more of a core competency of what Concord does, and I’m proud to say we’re delivering for both those artists.
What Andy Serrao’s done at Fearless and developing that as a brand for those types of artists like Pierce the Veil, the Pretty Reckless, Wage War and on and on — there’s nowhere like it in the business, and we’re able to deliver for him as well with services. Rounder, it’s a 54-year-old legacy label in the folk/Americana/bluegrass arena, and I think there’s more for that label to do now. I think Stephanie is going to curate a roster that rivals any label in Nashville, and any in the business.
We have Easy Eye, our venture with Dan Auerbach, and we have this band Hermanos Gutierrez, which is an amazing talent; I just saw them at the Ryman last week and that was an incredible show, in terms of what they can deliver on that front. At Fantasy Records, we’ve taken an incredible A&R legend in Mark Williams and another legend in the marketing arena, Margi Cheske, and put them together as a formidable frontline duo that can deliver on both new and developing artists, and bands like Offspring and Seether and Nathaniel Rateliff and take Allison Russell to the next level. They were swimming in the same pond, and I think together they’re going to own the pond.
Where do you want to see Concord lean into, genre-wise? Further into R&B/hip-hop, or deeper into Nashville, or somewhere else?
Well, both. I think leaning into singer/songwriter and country-adjacent or alt-country, folk, Americana — genres are much more fluid today than they were when they were based on radio playlists. There’s much more fluidity now. But I do think Rounder has the ability, being based here in Nashville, to really make a statement in the singer/songwriter, alt-country, Americana genres. PULSE is already making an impact in pop contemporary music. Loma is a very eclectic label — we have the Ghost theatrical movie coming out, which is growing by the moment, and you put it with Killer Mike and Denzel Curry, that’s a highly-curated and really special roster. And I believe that what we can do with Fantasy and Concord is be not about a specific genre, but about being where you can find and develop phenomenal talent and bring it to the world.
In recent months, several label groups and companies have combined their frontline and catalog operations to streamline them better. What’s your approach to marketing your catalog and boosting sales and streams there?
This is a process that’s evolved since I’ve gotten here with the catalog, and it’s really about taking a portfolio approach, not unlike from the financial world where you have marketing experts and teams responsible for delivering for a group of artists, whether it’s a reissue, whether it’s on Spotify. But they’re in tune with each artist within their portfolio. Even if it’s a band that’s not on a Concord frontline label, but they’re going out on tour, that [our teams are] reaching out to the manager and saying, “Hey, we’ve got your catalog, let’s do things together, what are your plans for the tour?” So it’s more of a portfolio approach than managing the catalog top-down. Each pod is responsible for 25, 30 artists in that portfolio.
When we have a frontline artist and we also have their catalog, we put them together, and the frontline team, with the catalog expertise, manages the catalog so the artist knows that we’re in lockstep. Catalog and frontline can help boost each other; they go together in terms of marketing. When you have the catalog, you have the ability to warm the plate for the new meal, and that’s what I’ve seen be really successful, especially in the streaming world. And then we have an artist like Creed, where the Texas Rangers adopted “Higher” as their World Series song and it translated into a phenomenal sync in a Super Bowl commercial, then there’s a reissue of Human Clay in the summer, and the streaming growth is exponential — that’s the power of what we can do in marketing a catalog in combination with the artist. We don’t have their new record, but we’re working with them on their new release by energizing the catalog, and vice versa.
You guys also have the HBO documentary on Stax. What are you doing around that with the Stax catalog?
We’re looking at different elements of the catalog and how we can tie it into the attention brought to the Stax catalog by the documentary, and I think it’s a story that everyone is going to really love. It just gives us the ability to reignite some of these artists and re-familiarize people with these artists that they love, or they will love.
How do you guys differentiate yourselves from the majors, or even large distributors, when approaching a deal?
We take a very boutique approach. Each label has their A&R staff and their core marketing staff, and it’s small, it’s intimate, they can ask the artist, “Where do you want to go?” And then I’ve created a team in the middle that can deliver on that question, with Jill Weindorf leading the marketing efforts, Brad Clark leading the streaming and data efforts, Karen Kloack on the sync side. And we have a global reach. If you’re signed to Concord, you have a global company. You have people in the U.K. that all know and work your record. In the major world, they have different labels in different territories that your record works through. Our labels have a global footprint for each artist.
How are label deals changing — and is it getting more competitive?
Label deals have evolved dramatically from when I started to now. Data analysis identifies artists much earlier. So someone sitting in Nebraska can be identified as a burgeoning artist because of the data and what is happening on their socials and streams. So in that sense, it’s become very competitive, yes, because once it hits the data metrics everybody knows about it. So you have to approach it from, “Why are we special compared to the other record labels?” And what positions us differently is that small label approach and personalization to the artist, and then the global resource and passionate footprint that we can bring to a team, which I believe is unmatched.
You mentioned Tommy Richman. What lessons can you take from a song that just exploded out of the gate like that?
We saw a spark that weekend. Over the weekend I was firing off emails to our team, like, “We need to mobilize.” It was released on the Friday, and I was in Berlin with our head of the European team, and all we did Monday was talk about what we could do in the different marketplaces. We had data to tell us it was starting in English-speaking territories and moving outward to Germany, France and the Nordics. We were able to move very, very fast — we’re nimble, we’re quick and we’re reactive — and I think that’s the lesson we’ve all learned across the team: when you have something, you mobilize, you focus, you put your energies into taking a spark and turning it into a bonfire — and a No. 1 global hit.
How difficult is it to break new artists these days?
It’s always been difficult, because it’s always about finding talent that’s special, that has something to say that people want to hear. What is challenging today is just grabbing attention, because there are so many ways to get people’s attention — a television set, a game, things like that. But I also think there are more ways to do it than there ever were. We used to have a funnel called terrestrial radio; now we have terrestrial radio, satellite radio, social media platforms, YouTube. There are more ways to present music. But you have to still grab attention. You saw it with Tommy Richman — he grabbed attention, and people want to be part of that. It’s not harder or easier, it’s just different now.
What challenges do you see in the future?
Finding, signing and developing talent is a challenge. It’s been a challenge since I started in the music business in New York City, and it’s a challenge today. AI presents a challenge; the legislation passed in Tennessee, the ELVIS Act, is a way of protecting the creator and original works and require a license to use someone’s creative works, and I’m an advocate for the artist, the songwriter, the creator. If we’re just really diligent, AI is going to be a part of our world, but it’ll be a good and licensed part of it.
I’m really looking forward to this Tommy Richman record, which we’re trying to nail down the release of. There’s a Lindsey Stirling record, an Offspring project, a Seether record, a Nathaniel Rateliff record, looking forward to this Ghost soundtrack, the Killer Mike project, taking Hermanos Gutierrez to the next level. I love working with artists and being a part of them realizing their vision and their dreams.
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