Corporations lend a hand to hip-hop and R&B artists

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/07/06/business/tunes07.php

The consumer-goods giant {P&G} is part of a wave of companies getting into the music business to promote their own products, essentially becoming record labels themselves.

Procter & Gamble, for example, is joining Island Def Jam in a joint venture called TAG Records, a label that will sign and release albums by new hip-hop acts. Unlike most music labels, it is named after a brand of body spray that P&G acquired when it bought Gillette.

"It's not about money," said Sarah Tinsley, a global marketing manager at Bacardi. "It's a branding exercise."