No Man is an Island

Or so the saying goes. But when I watched the recent BBC documentary celebrating 50 years of Island Records, I decided that Chris Blackwell probably was Island.

In a fantastic, and at times whimsical journey through the label's inception, highs, lows and transition to mainstream corporate, Chris Blackwell's influence, ethos and free-spiritedness was evident throughout.

The uber-cool bands and artists waxed lyrical about the environment that brought out the best in them, gave them freedom and space to be creative and make music in their own time. I couldn't help but contrast this happy recollection with some of the headline grabbers of unhappy marriages over the years, think Prince and Warner Bros, George Michael and Sony.

Now, I'm sure it wasn't all sweetness and light every day, at Island Records. But there certainly seemed to be something magical about the formula. And I'm pretty sure that this was fundamentally down to Blackwell. Bono summed it up well when he said "it was about the culture, not the money". How many businesses would love to create something that is successful, exciting, fun; a company that has people clamouring to work there. For me, the answer lies in one of the many myths of business - that people go to work to make money, not to have fun, and that the two are mutually exclusive. Call me naive, but I disagree, and Island Records was a sassy beacon of light in an ocean of dull and dreary corporate ocean. Island - we salute you!