Is Paul McCartney About to Get His Music Back?
The 60s was a rough time to be a songwriter, even for a Beatle. As the result of a series of very bad business deals following the death of manager Brian Epstein in 1967, the Beatles lost control of Northern Songs, the publishing company that handled the rights to a huge chunk of their catalogue. The machinations are complicated, but suffice it to say that the Beatles got shafted.
In 1981, Paul McCartney had a chance to repurchase the songs in a joint venture with Yoko Ono. Things were going well until Macca and Michael Jackson began talking about the financial value of music publishing during their recording of the duet “Say Say Say.”
Taking his advice, Jackson outbid Macca and purchased that Beatles catalogue out from under his nose. Nice guy.
To add insult, Jackson then okayed the use of songs like “Help!” and “Revolution” for use in TV commercials.
In 1995, Sony got involved and merged the Beatles material with Jackson’s, dissolving Northern Songs. But when Jackson ran into financial problems in 2006, he sought a loan from Sony and used his song publishing holdings as collateral. That eventually led to Sony taking control of an even bigger chunk of the Beatles catalogue.
Macca hadn’t stopped trying to regain control of his creations. His company, MPL Communications, did manage to acquire the rights from some songs from EMI, but the lion’s share remained unavailable. Until now.
Because of the 1978 US Copyright Act states that the rights to songs must return to the songwriter after 56 years, Macca will most likely start getting his music back beginning in about five years. By 2026–McCartney will be 84–he should have money coming in from most (if not all) of the Beatles songs. About time, no?
