It was supposed to be just another bumper year for the record business. The industry was firing on all cylinders and growing exponentially; CD was king and bringing in phenomenal sums of money. The good times, culturally and financially, were rolling. Yet by December 1999, at the dawn of the new millennium, a bomb had been set squarely under the core business—the arrival of digital as we know it today.
The story of 1999 is one of control: who had it, who lost it and who wanted more. It was a year of chaos for an industry that had shaped the 20th century, had grown complacent and was quickly having to adapt to a very different and an infinitely less certain future. It was one of the most pivotal, lucrative, exciting and turbulent years the record business has ever experienced.
