First, disabuse yourself of the notion that good music will sell well. Music may be art, but records are products, and the failure to make that distinction has caused a lot of musicians a lot of sleepless nights.

Morrissey said in a recent interview that he wants to be "in the game," that he doesn't want to make (I paraphrase) "private records for a private audience." So clearly he wants a major label, which can offer artists (among other things) a large enough advance to afford a major producer (the Steve Lilywhite's of the world don't come cheap) as well as the publicity muscle that is usually required to get a record played on MTV or mainstream radio.

Does Morrissey need a major? Yes and no. If he wants any of the singles to chart on Billboard, he probably does-- I can't remember when the last time I saw an indie release on there, excepting perhaps a rap release. AOR and adult alternative radio (ie, your typical "modern rock" station in your average city) rarely play indie releases, which is usually a prerequisite to charting, obviously. (No airplay=no sales.)

(As for the other side of the charting/sales coin, distribution, no one can beat a major, but there are a number of good independent distributors out there, and a lot of the smaller labels are in fact distributed by major conglomerates.)

That said, a major label isn't required to reach respectable sales, though I don't know of many indie releases that have made it all the way to gold (500,000 copies). Liz Phair's "Exile in Guyville," released on Matador (which I think would be a great label for Moz), sold something like 250,000 copies over two years-- a stunning success by indie standards, and far better than most major label bands can manage.

But there are a few problems with going the independent route. The first is that most of the independents aren't really independent any more-- "controlling shares" of the more successful independents (like Matador) were bought up by major labels (was it Sony, in this case?) in the mid-nineties. So many of the independents are now the equivalent of an "imprint" of a major book publisher-- a different name on the sleeve, yes, but the profits go to the same large company. How much control the majors have over these semi-independents is up for debate, but when it comes to the size of a contract for an artist such as Morrissey, they probably have at least veto power.

Does Morrissey want too much money? I don't know, I have no idea how much he wants, but you might be surprised to know that the large figures you hear don't just go into the artist's pocket. About a decade ago, I was in a band that was in talks with Epic (a division of Sony), and one of the deals that was considered was $1 million for six albums. Sounds great, right? We're all rich now, right? Not really. Out of that million dollar advance, the band would have to pay for the recording of the albums (minimum of $80,000 each, at the time) plus the videos ($25,000, for each video, minimum) plus the promotional copies, plus the lawyer... the short of it is, what sounds great from the outside can look quite bleak from the inside. Advances disappear quickly, and not into the musician's pocket, and it can take a long time to recoup what the record company has "lent" you out of your own future earnings.

(As a general rule, an artist makes about $1 per record sold, in what is called mechanical royalities. These are then split among the performers, though they don't have to be split equally. (Your real money is earned through publishing.))

So should Morrissey just ask for a smaller advance? No way, if for this reason only: if a label gives a large advance, they have a vested interest in seeing that artist succeed, because the artist needs to sell a lot of copies to pay back the large advance to the label. Thus, the label gets the marketing minions out in force, pressuring radio stations to add the record to their playlist, shipping displays and posters to record stores, putting ads in major magazines