Major definition changes on the way for labels.

Live Nation's potential record deal with Madonna is a major break from the record company norm

How the definitions are changing. Ten years ago, the options for an established artist looking to sign a record deal were limited. There were the majors and a handful of independents with the infrastructure to cope with an international campaign. And that was about it.

Whatever the truth underlying the reports, it is a sign of the times that Madonna is now widely reported to be considering signing a record deal with Live Nation. And it is all the more significant that it sounds so plausible. It wouldn't, after all, be a first.

Prince is, for all practical purposes, signed in the UK to AEG. Of course, he has a global deal with Sony BMG, but that was undermined (for the moment) in the UK by his decision to distribute his album to all the readers of The Mail On Sunday, in addition to the attendees of his AEG-promoted gigs at The O2.

Madonna, of course, is at a different stage of her career, which has sustained much better into her third decade as a recording artist than Prince's. As someone who has a career-long relationship with Warner Music, she also has ...