TVT Records to claim Chapter 11 bankruptcy?

On Tuesday, TVT Records reportedly fired all but 20 staff members without a dismissal wage in preparation of filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy by the end of the week.

Even as recently as 2006, TVT was named Billboard’s number one independent label, according to the label’s site. In the days since Steve Gottlieb founded TVT in his New York City apartment, circa 1985, the label has seen a wide range of artists such as Nine Inch Nails, Lil Jon, Guided by Voices and the Polyphonic Spree bear its insignia.

But it hasn’t consistently been with pride, it seems. In recent days TVT recording artist Pitbull was especially vocal in expressing his distain toward the label.

“I'm out here working like a slave, doing things that other artists don't even know how to do,” the rapper said during an interview with a Los Angeles radio station (via Billboard. “A label’s there to further and promote your career, but it feels like they just keep holding me back.”

This is not the first time an artist has become fed up with TVT. Most notably are the issues with Nine Inch Nails, which seemed to solidify Trent Reznor’s abhorrence of the way the recording industry works in general. Just last November Reznor, for lack of a better catch-phrase, pulled a Radiohead.

Reznor’s opinion of the latest TVT news on NIN.com is short and not-so sweet: “Not ALL news about the music industry is bad these days” (courtesy of The Daily Swarm). Ouch.

Invariably, it seems this label is not going down without a fight. No word yet on what will happen with Lil Jon’s forthcoming release Crunk Rock, or anyone else’s for that matter. Although quite a bit of artist shuffling seems to be inevitable, Gottlieb tells Billboard.com, “This is not the end of TVT.”

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