Library Sold! Now what?

[PeterD]

An exclusive library (TV Film Trax) has been sold to a private investor.
Any ideas as to what happens to the music? Can it be recycled?
Thanks,

[Len911]

I'm just guessing, but if your contract is with say ABC corporation, it probably doesn't matter who the shareholder(s) are, and if there were no assets (song contracts), what would there be to buy or sell?

There have been many cases of record company sales, and sometimes contracts aren't renewed, or if there are mutually agreed upon renegotiations, or contract buyouts, but I don't think it's an automatic contract cancellation just because of a sale.

[cassmcentee]

Peter, have you tried contacting them to get the lowdown?

[Len911]

Sounds like it might have been handled more like a bankruptcy than an ownership transfer!

[Casey H]

From what I read on line (a quick Google), this was not a bankruptcy, it was an actual sale.

Many, if not most, music library contracts have a clause that says (to the effect of) if the ownership is transferred, the contract also is transferred to the new owner. So the new owner most likely owns the catalog.

One of many reasons libraries prefer exclusive is an exclusively signed track is a true "asset" should they sell the company. Some library owners build an exclusive catalog and then sell the company to take the profit from what they built.

This is a tough one because the private investor appears to be unnamed. If it was another library, it would be reasonable that the library would exploit the tracks acquired. I can' t think of anyone buying a catalog without the intent to exploit the tracks.

Taxi probably has a good relationship with the original library owner. Maybe you can see if they can contact him and find out if it's possible to get your tracks released from the deal, assuming that's what you want.

Good luck!
Casey

[Cruciform]

Peter,

See if your contract with the library spells out what happens in the event of the business being sold to a third party. It doesn't have to be a bad thing. For example, I had a collection of tracks with
an exclusive library. They were utterly useless and totally non-responsive to emails. I wrote the whole thing off. Some years later they sold out to a major and I received a small cheque (maybe $200-300, can't remember)
and the royalties have been slowly but steadily increasing.

[PeterD]

Interesting replies, gents. Thanks!
Funny, any updates through the years were about former owner Brian's success - nothing more. haha!

Oh well ... The "all about him" show, I guess.
Time to check through the contract to see if there's anything in there.

[admin]

My opinion and educated guess is that no investor buys a catalog to let it sit on a shelf and make no money. The investor would likely sell it to a larger publisher or exploit the catalog him or her self. I think it would be extremely unlikely that any investor would buy anything without having a plan to profit from the purchase in advance.

Brian sold the company in late 2016, if memory serves correctly. He had not returned several of my calls during the back half of last year, and that would explain why. I had called to let him know we were getting complaints from members that he wasn't returning their calls or emails. BTW, almost any library owner would tell you they're not in the business of hand holding, they're in the business of pitching to earn income for themselves and their composers.

Here's my guess, and understand that this is purely speculative on my part:

Brian had a very credible history of getting lots and lots of placements with his music. Like many people with long track records, opportunities cross their doorsteps that they don't have the right music for, and they start a library with other composers who do what they don't. All well-meaning and totally legit.

They start getting placements for the people in their library (which Brian did - we had members tell us about placements), but over time, they find out that the library is more than a full time job for one person. Cataloging, tagging, uploading, pitching, paperwork, tracking income, writing checks, PRO registrations, etc. for dozens, hundreds, maybe even thousands of composers becomes FAR more time consuming than what they were doing when it was just their music.

Eventually, they either hire other people, quit, or sell. Some library owners find that they are better suited at making music rather than being business people on a larger scale. Selling their catalog is probably a good option for them. They sell at a multiple of what the average annual gross income or net earnings were, and the new owner takes over pitching the catalog to monetize the investment, and hopefully make more money than they spent on buying it.

I think Casey's suggestion that TAXI might be able to contact Brian and get him to release anybody from the deal is extremely unlikely. Getting Brian to return my calls has been difficult, and he simply doesn't own the catalog any more. It's likely not his place to make that kind of decision or take that kind of action. My GUESS is that any music in that catalog will end up being owned by Universal or one of the major publishers, and the people in the catalog will have their music exposed to a much larger end user base and probably distributed internationally.

If it were my music, I'd be happy about it, and just keep cranking out more.

best,
Michael

[Casey H]

Apologies... What I meant to say in my post was maybe contact Taxi to see if they knew more about the overall situation with the library, not for Taxi to work on your behalf to get songs removed. I misspoke (Actually, mis-typed ).

But Michael covered it all. Thanks!

PS Peter... Just sit back and wait. So many times I've signed tracks with libraries, forgot all about the deal, and 5 years later suddenly started getting placements. You just never know. It's such a slow moving business.

Casey

[mladendomic]

I also have the same situation with the same catalog.
Some time ago I read that the library that purchased exclusive catalog from "TV Film Trax" is https://www.5alarmmusic.com/
I tried to search for my song on their web page but couldn't find it under the original title.
Is it possible that they changed the original title of the song without notice or amendment of the contract?