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Victory Records is a Chicago-based record label founded by Tony Brummel. Industry Profile: Tony Brummel , CelebrityAccess Industry Profiles. It operates a music publishing company called "Another Victory, Inc." and is the distributor of several record labels. It has featured many prominent artists including Thursday, Hawthorne Heights, Silverstein, Taking Back Sunday, Bayside, Streetlight Manifesto, and A Day to Remember.
In September 2019, years after acquiring a portion of the label's catalogue, Concord acquired Victory Records and Another Victory for $30 million. Craft Recordings has been managing Victory Record's catalog since Concord acquired the label. Victory has not signed any new bands or released any new records since its acquisition. The label now operates solely as the distributor of the label's alumni, in addition to reissues.
Victory's catalogue includes 4,500 master recordings and 3,500 compositions through its publisher Another Victory.
In early 2002, twenty-five percent of the label was announced to have been sold to MCA Records. MCA acquires 25% of Victory Records, PunkNews, April 17, 2002 However, later that year the deal was terminated by Victory. MCA / Victory deal falls apart, PunkNews, October 20, 2002 Victory is currently partnered with and distributed by Sony's RED Distribution.
It was announced in April 2014 that the label would be sponsoring a Victory Records stage for the entirety of the Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival featuring five of their artists: Emmure, Ill Niño, Wretched, Islander and Erimha. They would continue to sponsor the stage through the eighth annual festival with five of their artists to be announced.
Representing a catalog of over 5,000 songs, Another Victory has landed a multitude of big-name placements for its artists tracks various movies, games and advertisements including "Chain Gang" by Close Your Eyes in NHL 15, "Like LaMotta" by Emmure on Secrets and Lies (U.S. TV series), "All I Want" by A Day To Remember in , "Die Knowing" by Comeback Kid on , and "Let Me Teach You How To Eat" by The Reverend Horton Heat on Ridiculousness (TV series).
In July 2012, it was announced that Victory would become the distribution home for Boston, MA based record label, We Are Triumphant. On May 10, 2013, Victory announced they will be distributing I Scream Records. Victory To distribute I Scream Records, ChristianPost, May 10, 2013 On September 9, 2014, Famined Records signed a distribution deal with Victory. On February 9, 2017, it was announced that Wilhelm Records will be exclusively distributed through Victory Records.
Former Victory band Thursday has had a conflict with the label, citing issues with royalties. The band also cited an incident involving the Victory Records marketing staff producing whoopie cushions for the promotion of their 2001 album Full Collapse, against their wishes. Thursday stated in the DVD accompanying their compilation album Kill the House Lights that they chose to go to a major label (Island Def Jam in 2002) and after fulfilling their contract, Tony Brummel and Victory Records welcomed Thursday "back with open arms."
In a 2021 podcast interview, Atreyu guitarist Dan Jacobs spoke ill of Victory and the label's founder, saying they had issues with "Tony Brummel and his awful, scummy ways".
On July 12, 2015, Wil Francis of Horror Punk band Aiden posted on their official Facebook that they sold 500,000 albums total through Victory Records and were not paid.
Despite the controversy, relations between Victory Records and its bands have not been all negative. Close Your Eyes and Ill Niño have mentioned positive relations multiple times in interview. Emmure has said specifically "Victory does good business, and if you're a band that is expecting more than what you get, then you're going to feel cheated and robbed."
In October 2006, a Chicago judge dismissed two of the three main claims in the band's suit, ruling that the trademark and copyright violation allegations were unfounded. On March 5, 2007, a federal judge in Chicago ruled that Victory Records does not hold exclusive rights for the band's recording services and that the band can record for any label. Specifically, the judge stated: "The agreement contains no exclusivity provision, nor does any of its language appear to prevent the from recording elsewhere during the life of the agreement". The judge later reaffirmed this ruling on May 17, 2007, stating that Hawthorne Heights is still contractually bound to deliver two albums to Victory, but may record albums which are released elsewhere.
In January 2008, Victory filed a lawsuit against EMI alleging that "Virgin/EMI improperly induced platinum-selling band Hawthorne Heights to repudiate its contract with top independent label Victory Records", including allegations that Virgin/EMI funded the initial phase of Hawthorne Heights' lawsuit against Victory. The suit sought actual damages of $10M and punitive damages of $25M.
On October 5, 2013, news outlets reported that A Day to Remember had been given permission to self-release their new album Common Courtesy without any involvement from Victory. The album was released digitally on October 8, 2013. Victory and the band released statements in response to the court ruling.
On November 26, 2016, A Day to Remember won the lawsuit against Victory Records. The band was given $4.02 million and won three of the four issues they were suing Victory for fulfilling the band's contract, controlling the band's publishing, and digital royalty withheld from the band. Victory won the band's master recordings.
On October 20, 2015, media outlets reported of a $1,000,000 lawsuit filed by Victory Records against lead vocalist Tomas Kalnoky. The lawsuit was filed in regard to the band not fulfilling their record deal of four studio albums to be released under Victory. The band released five albums while on the label, however Victory claims that "... the band agreed not to count this album as one of the four albums under its contract to receive a $10,000 emergency advance." Victory also claims that the band's album does not count towards the contract due to it being a covers album. The lawsuit claims the $1,000,000 is to be paid for Streetlight not fulfilling their 4 album record deal, as well as damages for copyright infringement relating to the release of their last album The Hands That Thieve in which Tomas Kalnoky released an acoustic version of the album under his pseudonym Toh Kay titled "The Hand That Thieves". The Toh Kay release was officially cancelled, however the release was later made available online.
On April 19, 2017, the band announced on their social media pages that a settlement had been reached with Victory Records. As part of the settlement, Victory Records sold all Streetlight Manifesto master tapes back to the band.
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