AWAL promotes UK executive team

01 August 2025 - Press release

AWAL has promoted its UK executive team—Matt Riley will now be President, while Victoria Needs and Sam Potts will move into new roles as co-Managing Directors.

The promotions follow a series of recent successes for the global recording business under their steadfast leadership:
Breakout musician James Marriot hit the top spot on the Official Albums Chart with his second studio LP Don’t Tell the Dog, his first with AWAL, beating out competition from Sabrina Carpenter and Oasis; Little Simz’s latest album Lotus debuted as a career best week one album sales and chart position at #3—the rapper has been releasing music with AWAL since 2015. Irish singer-songwriter CMAT continues to soar, having recently performed a career-defining set on Glastonbury’s Pyramid main stage to an estimated crowd of 80k, and receiving a clean sweep of 5 star reviews including from Rolling Stone UK who says, “come the end of 2025, she’ll be the artist who defines the year.” Her highly anticipated forthcoming album EURO-COUNTRY arrives August 29 via AWAL, featuring the hit single “Take a Sexy Picture of Me” (18M+ streams to date). While Grammy-winning Icelandic-Chinese superstar Laufey had three songs in the UK Top 40 singles chart last Christmas 2024, with “Winter Wonderland,” “Christmas Magic,” and “Santa Baby.”

Matt Riley joined AWAL in 2014, and has grown with the business, first spearheading artist development in the UK via various A&R roles before leading the UK AWAL Recordings business from 2023 with Sam and Victoria. A journey which began with success working with artists such as Tom Misch and Rex Orange County has now seen AWAL’s UK team under Riley with an incredible roster of talent such as Jungle, Little Simz, Wasia Project, CMAT, kwn, Wretch 32, James Marriott, Luvcat, Chloe Slater, Tom Cooper and many exciting prospects coming through.

Matt explains, “It is immensely rewarding to have been part of AWAL's story for the past decade and most of all a huge privilege to work with such a special bunch of people and artists. Thank you to Lonny and Paul for their leadership and experience and of course Sam and Vic, with whom I feel we have created a formidable team. We go into every single day working hard to make AWAL the most culturally exciting, successful and forward thinking home for artists and executives it can be.”

Victoria Needs had over two decades of experience including international roles at EMI, Warner and Sony before joining AWAL in 2020. Her teams at AWAL have been responsible for global campaigns for artists such as Djo, Little Simz, Jungle and Laufey, as well delivering domestic success for artists such as CMAT and James Marriott, alongside building artist development campaigns for Wasia Project, Chloe Slater and Luvcat.

Victoria notes, “AWAL has always stood for doing things differently - whether that’s empowering artists, being deeply committed to artist development, or standing at the forefront of industry change. It’s incredibly energising to lead a label full of team members that are as ambitious and committed as the unique artists that we build global careers with. Thanks as always, to Lonny and Paul for their backing.”

Following time at Warner Bros and over a decade at Columbia Records, Sam Potts joined AWAL in 2019 in a forward-facing promotions role that included driving global streaming strategy as well as overseeing traditional media. Sam’s team has subsequently evolved and now covers creator relationships as well as global commercial and digital partnerships, reflecting the ever evolving promotional landscape.

“Being part of AWAL’s growth and developing uncompromising independent artists on the global stage has been exhilarating. There is an entrepreneurial spirit that runs through everything we do and it puts us in the best possible place to navigate the dynamic music ecosystem we operate in. We’re just getting started,” Sam explains.

AWAL COO, Paul Hitchman says, “These promotions for Matt, Vic and Sam are very well deserved after a sustained period of success for AWAL in the UK. Their collective leadership has been transformative for AWAL’s UK business over the last few years, and we are seeing the fruits of that work now with new artists breaking through to global success, and established artists achieving career highs. AWAL's UK team has never been in better shape and the UK leadership team have all the skills and experience to drive continued growth and success for AWAL and its artists into the future.”

AWAL CEO, Lonny Olinick adds, “It is a privilege to recognize the amazing work of our UK leadership team. Matt, Sam and Vic work selflessly as a leadership team, always putting aside any ego to do what's best for each other, our artists and our AWAL team. They are music lovers who care deeply about our artists and the art that they create. They are the unique team that is constantly pushing the envelope, making sure that our artists realize every ounce of their potential. Their results speak for themselves and we are fortunate to have such a strong team in a market so central to AWAL's past, present and future.”