Appetite For Disruption

Music Licensing Revenue Drops in 2007

I saw this story and wanted to highlight the relevant passage for my readers:

"Music fell by the largest margin (5.5%) to $125 million from $132 million in 2006..."

I've highlighted this before, but let me address this issue again.  This is no time for any artist, songwriter, label, or music publisher to be turning down revenue-enhancing opportunities.  This is no time to rest on one's laurels when a licensing request comes in and sit on it until the requestor is forced to go to another party to get what they need.  There is a glut of quality music supply, so the licensee, the buyer, holds the upper hand, not the licensor.

But licensees, as George Costanza might say - you've got hand.

The Bottom of the Pile

HITS magazine has been posting the manifestos of Terra Firma head Guy Hands re: the company's recent purchase and now management of recorded music giant EMI.  I liked this one in particular (free registration required).

Among the ways Terra Firma states it will add value to EMI is listed this:

Exploiting assets Moving the prioritization of the exploitation of the catalog from the bottom of the pile to the top

I find that statement both laugh-out-loud funny and cry-out-loud tragic.  Funny, because that's what record companies and music publishing companies ought to be doing every day in the first place.  Tragic, because these labels can't maximize catalog exploitation until they are able to license each and every artist's catalog they own at will, and that is unlikely to ever happen.  Every artist contract is different, and those artists who retain artist consent clauses will be loathe to give up their rights just for the sake of the record company's financial health... but unless the record companies make the attempt to make licensing and exploitation a more seamless process, then the catalogs of the major cash cow artists those labels control will never be able to be maximized financially.

I applaud EMI for stating that a change needs to happen going forth in order for the company to maintain financial health... but why did it take until 2007 for one of the major labels to realize this new reality?

Moderating Panel Tomorrow Night in NYC

I'll be moderating a great panel tomorrow night in New York being presented by the Film Music Network on the use of music in corporate imaging and branding.

Check out the event and please pass the word on to any marketing people of musicians/composers you think might be interested in attending.

Thanks.  I'll let you all know how the event went later this week.