Jay-Z Advises Music Industry on Survival

In an interview with BBC Newsbeat, Jay-Z spoke out about the music industry saying that record labels need to be "smarter" in order to survive.

The rapper, who recently scooped the award for Best International Male at the Brits, explained that less is more when it comes to succeeding.

The rap superstar set up his own Roc Nation music business, a joint venture with gig promoters Live Nation to manage artists, which looks after their tours as well as putting out CDs and downloads.

So far there are only a handful of artists on his watch, including British acts the Ting Tings and Sugababes.

"Records are not selling as many as they were before and you've still got to go out and pay the Bentley bill," he explained.

"People have to be smarter about how they A&R and what they put out, record companies need to catch up to that, someone needs to send them the memo."

He added: "I remember the first year I was at Def Jam we put out 56 artists. There's not 56 great artists in the world, and this is one company. One company operating for like, 80 artists in a year, that's just too many."

Meanwhile, Jay-Z has announced two UK arena shows in Manchester and Birmingham in June, and will headline this year's Wireless festival.