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01 Feb 2011 22:59

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Biz, Music: Citigroup owns EMI: Will they start selling CDs at bank branches?

  • 2007 In one of the most un-rock-‘n’-roll moves a major label has ever done, private equity firm Terra Firma, led by financier Guy Hands, buys EMI for $6.7 billion, $4.3 billion of which was loaned to Terra Firma by Citigroup in a deal which looks really stupid in retrospect.
  • 2011 A few years after the financial crisis made that deal look like a really stupid idea, the musical home of Radiohead, Blur and The Beatles was just taken over by Citigroup. Which means that the company that runs your ATM also sells the Beastie Boys’ catalogue. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

09 Jun 2010 11:27

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Music: Thom Yorke says what we were all thinking about the music industry

  • When the corporate industry dies it will be no great loss to the world. So don’t tie yourself to the sinking ship because, believe me, it’s sinking.
  • Radiohead lead singer Thom Yorke • Discussing the fall of music industry capitalism in a British textbook. He seems to have a good handle on this. He left his big corporate label, EMI, just a couple years before they fell into particularly dire straits. EMI is now the property of private equity firm Terra Firma, and since the 2007 acquisition, they’ve had massive debt and restructuring problems. (via Pitchfork) source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

14 Mar 2010 20:56

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Biz: EMI could be pulled in half by two different suitors

  • music Warner Music Group wants a
    piece of EMI’s recorded output,
    which includes such archive artists
    as the Beatles and such current
    artists as Coldplay.
  • lyrics KKR, a private equity group,
    would much prefer the half of EMI’s
    songs which are worth more in
    royalties, the publishing arm. EMI is
    broke, by the way. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

11 Mar 2010 22:40

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Music: Dark Side of the download: EMI can’t split up Pink Floyd’s albums

A court told EMI that they couldn’t take Pink Floyd’s beam of light and turn it into a rainbow using the prism of the iTunes Music Store. Bad news, guys. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 1 Comment • Permalink

05 Nov 2009 09:34

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Music: Can they work it out? EMI sues some site selling the Beatles online

  • Some Web site you’ve never heard of, BlueBeat.com, starts selling Beatles songs for a quarter a piece based on a strange bastardization of copyright law. source
  • The rights holders, EMI, are just like, “nuh uh,” and sued the company. You know, EMI, if you put the Beatles catalogue on iTunes, it could be awesome. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
 
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