[mlrtime]

Worse than that, I remember reading articles about how some artists didn't "make" a single dollar from their first album that sold millions. It all went to the record company and paid for marketing and advances.

Sometimes they didn't begin to see revenue until 2nd or 3rd albums.

[Fnoord]

Labels did scum stuff like have sublabel go belly up (oops no royalties anymore), not paying royalties, not giving artists royalties when on VA album, and downright piracy, and enforcement of centralization via signing rights away to (equivalent of) RIAA. These are just examples from memory talking to artists.