{"id":689,"date":"2021-02-27T14:12:37","date_gmt":"2021-02-27T13:12:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/2021\/02\/27\/record-companies-have-me-on-a-dartboard-the-man-making-millions-buying-classic-hits\/"},"modified":"2021-02-27T14:12:37","modified_gmt":"2021-02-27T13:12:37","slug":"record-companies-have-me-on-a-dartboard-the-man-making-millions-buying-classic-hits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/2021\/02\/27\/record-companies-have-me-on-a-dartboard-the-man-making-millions-buying-classic-hits\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Record companies have me on a dartboard\u2019: the man making millions buying classic hits"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hit songs can be a better investment than gold \u2013 and by snapping up the rights, Merck Mercuriadis has become the most disruptive force in music<\/p>\n

Merck Mercuriadis had a good Christmas. On Christmas Day, the No 1 song in the UK was LadBaby\u2019s Don\u2019t Stop Me Eatin\u2019<\/a>, a novelty cover version of Journey\u2019s 1981 soft-rock anthem Don\u2019t Stop Believin\u2019<\/a>. It replaced Mariah Carey\u2019s All I Want For Christmas Is You, which had topped the chart 26 years after its original release. Both songs are unkillable, evergreen hits, which are closing in on 1 billion Spotify streams apiece. Both songs are among the 61,000 owned, in whole or in part, by Mercuriadis\u2019s investment company, Hipgnosis Songs Fund<\/a>, and epitomise the thesis that has made the 57-year-old Canadian, in less than three years, the most disruptive force in the music business.<\/p>\n

Put simply, Hipgnosis raises money from investors and spends it on acquiring the intellectual property rights to popular songs by people like Mark Ronson<\/a>, Timbaland<\/a>, Barry Manilow<\/a> and Blondie<\/a>. In a fast-growing market, what sets Hipgnosis apart from competitors is its founder\u2019s bona fides as a veteran A&R man, manager and record label CEO. Like an old-school music mogul, Mercuriadis sells his brand by selling himself. Unlike those moguls, he\u2019s a buff, teetotal vegan with spartan tastes. \u201cThe only material thing that I really care about is vinyl,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd Arsenal football club.\u201d He looks rather like a rock-concert security guard: shaven head, burly torso, plain black T-shirt, hawkish gaze. Mark Ronson calls him \u201cthe smartest guy in the room\u201d.<\/p>\n

Continue reading…<\/a>
\nHit songs can be a better investment than gold \u2013 and by snapping up the rights, Merck Mercuriadis has become the most disruptive force in music
\nMerck Mercuriadis had a good Christmas. On Christmas Day, the No 1 song in the UK was LadBaby\u2019s Don\u2019t Stop Me Eatin\u2019, a novelty cover version of Journey\u2019s 1981 soft-rock anthem Don\u2019t Stop Believin\u2019. It replaced Mariah Carey\u2019s All I Want For Christmas Is You, which had topped the chart 26 years after its original release. Both songs are unkillable, evergreen hits, which are closing in on 1 billion Spotify streams apiece. Both songs are among the 61,000 owned, in whole or in part, by Mercuriadis\u2019s investment company, Hipgnosis Songs Fund, and epitomise the thesis that has made the 57-year-old Canadian, in less than three years, the most disruptive force in the music business.
\nPut simply, Hipgnosis raises money from investors and spends it on acquiring the intellectual property rights to popular songs by people like Mark Ronson, Timbaland, Barry Manilow and Blondie. In a fast-growing market, what sets Hipgnosis apart from competitors is its founder\u2019s bona fides as a veteran A&R man, manager and record label CEO. Like an old-school music mogul, Mercuriadis sells his brand by selling himself. Unlike those moguls, he\u2019s a buff, teetotal vegan with spartan tastes. \u201cThe only material thing that I really care about is vinyl,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd Arsenal football club.\u201d He looks rather like a rock-concert security guard: shaven head, burly torso, plain black T-shirt, hawkish gaze. Mark Ronson calls him \u201cthe smartest guy in the room\u201d. Continue reading…Technology | The Guardian<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hit songs can be a better investment than gold \u2013 and by snapping up the rights, Merck Mercuriadis has become the most disruptive force in music Merck Mercuriadis had a good Christmas. On Christmas Day, the No 1 song in the UK was LadBaby\u2019s Don\u2019t Stop Me Eatin\u2019, a novelty cover version of Journey\u2019s 1981 …<\/p>\n

\u2018Record companies have me on a dartboard\u2019: the man making millions buying classic hits<\/span> Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":690,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/689"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=689"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/689\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/690"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/costops.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}