Bruce Springsteen is a master of rock ‘n’ roll, but it appears the boss has sold his masters.
So it is going to Sony Music, his masters, which, for example, when you just played “Born In The U.S.A.”, that is the recordings that people know.
It just means that Sony does not get any of the revenue that he gets from playing live other than they will earn royalties when he plays these songs live.
You have these artists when you – all of these artists that you mentioned are 70 years old, at least, and they are wondering who’s going to take care of my music after I’m gone? Maybe their heirs don’t want to take care of it, and they’re like, OK, I want the money now.
CORNISH: But at the same time, you’ve got someone like Taylor Swift out there – right? – like, embroiled in this drama about her masters.
So there are artists who do not want to give up their catalogue no matter what, but it’s a very different thing from you being in the driver’s seat and saying, I’m ready to sell versus guess what? It’s being sold and you have nothing to say about it.
So even if you’re a songwriter who does not have a catalogue like this – and as you said, 1% of 1% do – you probably are going to get to see a bump because these multiples are just going up and investors see catalogues as an extremely good proposition right now.
NEWMAN: I think with Springsteen, you’re definitely going to see they’re going to be good stewards because, remember, he still records for Sony.
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