EPISODE · Apr 19, 2023 · 40 MIN

Buying Catalogues - A Primer

from Ongoing History of New Music · host Curiouscast

There is a new gold rush going on right now—but this one is different...it has nothing to do with minerals or oil or any other traditional commodity...it’s not what we’ve seen with crypto currency...it may have to do with stock markets, but not always...and yet it’s a form of investment, one that should continue to pay off for decades to come...  I’m talking about the rush to buy up song catalogues, the rights to material created by some of the biggest artists on the planet...you’ve probably heard of some of these transactions...  Everyone from the killers to Barry Manilow to Silverchair to the Beach Boys to members of Alice In Chains have cashed out...Imagine Dragons netted $100 million...Justin Bieber, $200 million...the Chili Peppers, $140 million...Bruce Springsteen sold his music for over half a billion dollars...  There are about a dozen well-capitalized companies in this game...they’re spending billions of dollars hundreds of thousands of songs...who are they and where’s the money coming from?...  If someone is buying, who’s selling?...who sets the price?...if you’re a successful musician, what are the advantages to selling you’re life’s work?...how long has this been going on?...and what do these big catalogue says mean for the future?...  Let’s find out...this is a primer on the stampede to buy (and own) the greatest music of all time... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices