Have you got the Passman book? ( I have a lot of music industry "advice" books, and his is by far the best) He talks about the fact that, like it or not, the contracts always favor the recording companies, and you have to use whatever leverage you can (which, at least to start, is not much) to trim them back to something, if not reasonable, at least liveable.

The most leverage you can get is to record an "independent" record that gets airplay and creates interest.