Abel Tesfaye, known as The Weeknd, and his team have established a new business partnership with Lyric Capital Group.
The agreement involves Lyric Capital investing in The Weeknd’s music catalog, spanning from the start of his career up to 2025. Crucially, the deal ensures that The Weeknd and his team will retain creative control, along with their status as shareholders and owners of the company.
According to Variety, the representative noted that the joint venture is not a conventional catalog sale: “From the beginning of the meeting, it was clear to all at Lyric that Abel would not sell his catalog. He wanted to be more innovative and creative in the way we established a partnership. To that end, through this venture, we constructed and launched a new business model with Abel and his iconic catalog whereby Abel and his team have the freedom to execute their creative vision with the entirety of his rights, both publishing and masters. This unique catalog deal sets a new standard for artist equity and control.”
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The Weeknd’s new $1 billion catalog deal covers his music masters and publishing up to 2025, specifically excluding any future releases. He is retaining his existing collaboration with XO/Republic/Universal Music Group, and Universal Music Publishing Group will continue to handle the administration of his publishing catalog.
Although the representative said this was not a normal catalog buy, so a usual royalty calculation wasn’t possible, news reports from Variety, Billboard, and Bloomberg earlier in the year estimated the assets were worth at least $1 billion.
This value was based on around $55 million in net money for the label and publisher, which suggests the price was 18.2 times that amount.
Representatives for The Weeknd and Lyric would, however, not verify the figures with Variety. But if the reported $1 billion valuation is accurate, the deal stands as one of the most significant single-artist catalog acquisitions ever, and certainly for a contemporary artist.
The only publicly confirmed single-artist catalog deal to exceed it was Sony Music’s acquisition of the Queen catalog last year, which was valued at $1.27 billion.
“There is no ABS or securitization deal here,” the rep added. “Lyric created a first-of-its-kind structure with direct input from Abel and his team, which includes a first-of-its-kind ‘Royalty Backed Note—produced by Lyric, ft. Partners Group—that drastically enhances the artist-friendly theme that underpins this partnership.”
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Ross Cameron, Lyric founding/co-managing partner, said, “I couldn’t be more excited about what Lyric, Abel and team have created together. From our first meeting, it was clear to me that we were sitting around the table with individuals that were going to change the way an artist thinks about his assets, music and legacy. The collaboration resulted in a first-of-its-kind partnership between an artist and Lyric, and we are beyond thrilled about this new venture.”
Rich Garzia, Lyric co-managing partner, stated, “Lyric strives to create artist-friendly structures and we believe this partnership demonstrates that at the highest level with the top artist in the world. I want to thank Abel and his team for putting their trust in Lyric.”
The Weeknd is among the world’s most listened-to recording artists, boasting over 120 million monthly listeners on Spotify. Furthermore, his current “After Hours ‘Til Dawn” tour has reached a milestone, generating more than $1 billion and setting a new record for a solo male artist.
Chord Music Partners, with support from Universal Music Group and Dundee Partners, previously held a 50% stake in The Weeknd’s publishing rights.
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