HISTORY MEETS POSSIBILITY

TO REINVENT Motown Records, Ethiopia Habtemariam wants to start by going back in time. “I remember being a young kid and seeing how massive acts like Boyz II Men were,” she says, noting that in the Sixties and Seventies the label was a formidable launchpad for black artists to become global superstars.

Motown, back then, had everything — a film and TV division, a comics team. Habtemariam, who has just been promoted to the company’s CEO and chair, after spending the past decade ushering the legacy label out of the shadows, first as a VP and then as president, has a vision to bring that crossplatform entertainment brand back. Under her leadership, Motown will find new revenue streams for its 50-year-old catalog of hits from the likes of the Jackson Five and the Supremes, while also seeking to break fresh rappers and R&B stars. It’ll continue to court partnerships with hot new labels like Quality Control and Blacksmith Records, two important relationships brokered by Habtemariam that have brought Migos, Lil Baby, Lil Yachty, Vince Staples, and City Girls on board.

Habtemariam, who started her music career as an intern at Atlanta-based LaFace Records more than two decades ago, is also well aware that she’s only the second woman, after Epic Records’ Sylvia Rhone, to lead a major record label — and so she’s got a second, unofficial job as a role model for the entire record business, which is undergoing seismic racial change for the first time in its own ranks.

“I’m hoping this opens up the door for a lot more that happens for people that look like me, and have done the work, and deserve to grow to this level in their careers,” Habtemariam says.

The seasoned exec believes the streaming era highlights, rather than threatens, the importance of labels to young artists. “It’s really competitive,” she says. “But our industry as a whole is in such a healthy place now. We’re back at a place where we have to create the new generation of superstars.”