Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast.
Speaker 1: My guest today is Jay Cooper. Jay, you called me
Speaker 1: about your old client, Rod Temperton, right, I was writing
Speaker 1: about Quincy Jones. Can you tell me more about Rod?
Speaker 2: Yes. Rod was originally a member of heat Wave that
Speaker 2: I represented, who had a number of major hits and
Speaker 2: most of them were written by Rod Temperton. And I
Speaker 2: was representing heat Wave, and then Rod, when he left
Speaker 2: heat Wave, retained me to continue his representation of him
Speaker 2: as a songwriter. Well, it was a heat Wave. He
Speaker 2: wrote Boogie Knights and Always in Forever a number of
Speaker 2: other hits. And then evidently Quincy Jones had heard of
Speaker 2: these records and he was doing an album with Michael Jackson,
Speaker 2: and he called. I got a hold of Rod. Rod
Speaker 2: told me about it, came over here into Los Angeles,
Speaker 2: and Quincy hired him to come here and to do
Speaker 2: an album with Michael Jackson. And that album turned out
Speaker 2: to be the songs that Rod wrote for it.
Speaker 1: So like back in the day with heat Wave, how'd
Speaker 1: you get clients? Were you actively searching or once you
Speaker 1: made your name they came to you.
Speaker 2: I never actively searched, exactly but they came to be.
Speaker 2: They were recommended to be by producer in London whose
Speaker 2: name at the moment I don't remember.
Speaker 1: Let's go back to the beginning. Did you always plan
Speaker 1: to be an entertainment attorney.
Speaker 2: No, I planned to be a musician from the time
Speaker 2: I was a little kid. I wanted to be a musician,
Speaker 2: That's all I wanted. I studied music from the time
Speaker 2: I was three years old. My father was a musician,
Speaker 2: and I was ready when I finished high school to
Speaker 2: go off and to get on the road with a band.
Speaker 2: And my parents said, no, no, you My parents were Jewish.
Speaker 2: Of course, that means you have no choice. You have
Speaker 2: to go to law school or medical school. So they
Speaker 2: introduced me to a lawyer and they said, okay, I'll
Speaker 2: go to law school, but I got to find a
Speaker 2: music school too, So I founded DePaul University in Chicago,
Speaker 2: where I grew up, and I had a music school
Speaker 2: of law school, and it turned out they were in
Speaker 2: the same building, so it was perfect. I did my
Speaker 2: law classes in the morning and my music classes in
Speaker 2: the afternoon, and I worked my way through school playing music,
Speaker 2: playing with various bands and things like that. The Chicago
Speaker 2: area and I finished law school, took the bar exam.
Speaker 2: It was three days and day four I left with
Speaker 2: the band and ultimately came to California. And I was
Speaker 2: working here in California as a musician for a number
Speaker 2: of years, and eventually that's the story I've told a
Speaker 2: long time. How I got into law was through drugs.
Speaker 2: What this was My music friends were getting busted for
Speaker 2: possession and I was the only one they knew who
Speaker 2: had a law degree, and so they asked me to
Speaker 2: see if I could help them out. So I took
Speaker 2: the bar exam and started doing helping them with their
Speaker 2: drug cases. And while I was doing drug cases, they said,
Speaker 2: can you read this record contract? Can you read this
Speaker 2: television contract? Can you read this movie contract? So I
Speaker 2: opened a little office in Beverly Hills, and that's where
Speaker 2: I started.
Speaker 1: Okay, so what were this what were you know, marijuana?
Speaker 1: I won't say it's exactly legal, but close to it
Speaker 1: in California. What was it like in the fifties.
Speaker 2: Well, it was, it was It was not bad. It
Speaker 2: was nothing particularly wrong. Musicians many were on marijuana, some
Speaker 2: were on hard drugs. Bands used to have like four
Speaker 2: different kinds of musicians and they would have the hard
Speaker 2: drug musicians, the marijuana musicians, the drinker musicians, and the
Speaker 2: straits who did nothing. And so when you lost the
Speaker 2: trombone player, you had to find somebody. You had to
Speaker 2: find somebody who fit in that category with the tron
Speaker 2: buempare also a druggie or was he also a drinker
Speaker 2: or was he something else? So musicians were not at
Speaker 2: that time, and I don't and I guess since they
Speaker 2: were not. They didn't carry guns, they didn't carry knives,
Speaker 2: they weren't violent. They they were more i would say,
Speaker 2: more mellow and interested in their in their careers and
Speaker 2: their their horns than they were in anything else.
Speaker 1: Now, you said your father was a musician. Was he
Speaker 1: a full time musician at one time? Yes, he was,
Speaker 1: And tell me more about his career.
Speaker 2: He was. He was a marvelous musician. He was in
Speaker 2: a very famous band called the Wayne King Orchestra. They
Speaker 2: were from the They used to play the Aragon Ballroom
Speaker 2: in Chicago. They had a weekly broadcast from there, and
Speaker 2: he was the lead saxophone player and the singer in
Speaker 2: that and he did that for many years.
Speaker 1: Okay. And you started taking music lessons as young.
Speaker 2: Age, Yes, they're three years old.
Speaker 1: Three years old?
Speaker 2: Three years old?
Speaker 1: What the piano at three?
Speaker 2: No, My father gave me a little soprano saxophone, a
Speaker 2: very small little sopran which I still have to this day.
Speaker 2: And I played it for a year or two till
Speaker 2: my teeth fell out. And while I was waiting for
Speaker 2: my teeth to grow in, I went to piano, and
Speaker 2: then eventually to clarinet, and then back to saxophone, and
Speaker 2: then added flute over the years.
Speaker 1: And what instrument did he play?
Speaker 2: He played saxophone, he played saxophone, and he played trumpet,
Speaker 2: and he played clarinet.
Speaker 1: And do you have any siblings?
Speaker 2: I had a sister, yes, And was she older younger?
Speaker 2: She was younger, seven years or five years younger, But
Speaker 2: she never was a performer.
Speaker 1: Okay, So in this era, in the thirties and forties,
Speaker 1: you're playing your instrument at home? Are you playing out
Speaker 1: with school bands, bands and halls? What's it like?
Speaker 2: Well, of course I was in high school. I was
Speaker 2: in the school band, I was in the school orchestra,
Speaker 2: I was in the pep band, I was in the
Speaker 2: marching band. I was doing all of that, doing my studies. Uh,
Speaker 2: and then uh, forming bands outside. We would play the
Speaker 2: local the local park houses and all that. The parks
Speaker 2: all had a building where you could have dances and
Speaker 2: things like that. And that's what I was doing, and
Speaker 2: that I was playing weddings and playing dances and playing
Speaker 2: various things of that nature. Yeah, enough to make a
Speaker 2: living to pay my way through school.
Speaker 1: And what kind of music were you playing?
Speaker 2: Big band type music or big band a lot or
Speaker 2: play small bands and weddings? I played Polish weddings, Jewish weddings,
Speaker 2: Greek weddings, Italian weddings, played them all. We played the
Speaker 2: polkas at the at the the Polish weddings, we played
Speaker 2: seven eight time music. In Greek weddings, we played all
Speaker 2: the Jewish music, the Klasberg type of music. Played anything.
Speaker 1: And were you playing in multiple acts multiple bands?
Speaker 2: Was there one multiple multiple? I was a free lance musician.
Speaker 2: I'll take any call.
Speaker 1: Was the union involved at all at that time?
Speaker 2: Yes? I joined. I would remember the union by fifteen.
Speaker 1: Yes, now the union is almost irrelevant. But was the
Speaker 1: union in control? Everybody worked were a member of the union.
Speaker 2: Back then, everybody worked through the union because they paid
Speaker 2: you had minimum minimum per minimum salaries per gig that
Speaker 2: you played, and that's where you got all your jobs.
Speaker 2: You went down to the union like on Saturday afternoon
Speaker 2: and you hung around and somebody say, hey, we're looking
Speaker 2: for a saxophone player for Saturday night. I'm looking for
Speaker 2: this for Sunday night. I'm looking for this. And that's
Speaker 2: how you got your jobs.
Speaker 1: So you said you graduated from law school, you took
Speaker 1: the bar, and then you immediately went on the road.
Speaker 1: Tell me about that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I got it. The first thing was I got
Speaker 2: a call from a band called Larry Fhoteen. He was
Speaker 2: an originally he had his own band. He was an
Speaker 2: original arranger, I should say, for the Sammy Kay Orchestra.
Speaker 2: And we went to New York, worked around, worked the
Speaker 2: East coast. We were drove in cars, three or four
Speaker 2: separate cars a group of us, and we were working
Speaker 2: the west East coast. And then I got a call
Speaker 2: from the band called Henry Bussey band that was a
Speaker 2: big band in the days. Henry Bussy was originally a
Speaker 2: first trumpet player for the Paul Whitebolt Orchestra, and then
Speaker 2: he had an orchestra. He was based out of Los Angeles,
Speaker 2: and I got a call they lost their elite outdo
Speaker 2: player the Midwest. So I was doing a record date
Speaker 2: in Cincinnati at that time with the Larry Foteen band,
Speaker 2: and so I called around to see if I get
Speaker 2: a sub for me, and I found a sub, and
Speaker 2: I called my parents. They drove the sub down to
Speaker 2: Cincinnati where I was, and they drove me to where
Speaker 2: I had to meet the band with Henry Bussey band.
Speaker 2: And two weeks later that same year, I was in
Speaker 2: California and I said, this is for me.
Speaker 1: So how did this band know of you?
Speaker 2: Well, I was recommended by another saxophone player. I guess
Speaker 2: he got the call and he didn't want to go out,
Speaker 2: and so he recommended me somebody I hadn't met at
Speaker 2: Depault at music school.
Speaker 1: So, okay, you're in Los Angeles, then what goes on?
Speaker 2: I'm in Los Angeles and now, of course I'm looking
Speaker 2: for work and I did so many people except the band.
Speaker 2: I arrived and I used to go down with my
Speaker 2: horn to the Musicians Union, which was at eight seventeen
Speaker 2: Vine Street in those days. I go there every day
Speaker 2: with mount horns to practice because I was living in
Speaker 2: a little apartment in Hollywood and you couldn't practice your
Speaker 2: instruments there, so I would walk a mile to a
Speaker 2: local forty seven on Vine Street. I practiced my horns,
Speaker 2: and then they also had rehearsal rooms there. And then
Speaker 2: one of the bands heard me playing practicing and they said, hey,
Speaker 2: we need an alto player. So I joined that band.
Speaker 2: It was a rehearsal band, and you met a lot
Speaker 2: of musicians, with a lot of great musicians there through
Speaker 2: the rehearsal band. Because we used to we used to
Speaker 2: play charts for all the arrangers used to bring in
Speaker 2: their charts try them out, and so we got to
Speaker 2: know all the arrangers. I got to know all these musicians,
Speaker 2: and I started getting calls for work and I would
Speaker 2: go out with I'd go out with Nat Cole, I'd
Speaker 2: go out with Bobby Darren. I was out with Frank
Speaker 2: Sinatra for quite a while. I was out with I
Speaker 2: went out with the Less Brown Band. I went out
Speaker 2: with the Charlie Charlie Barnett band. I was part of
Speaker 2: Baited Ferguson's band, and I did a lot of Latin bands.
Speaker 2: I was playing Latin bands and used to Sunday night
Speaker 2: on I had the Palladium Bowroom in La used to
Speaker 2: have five six bands doing Latin Night. On Sunday, you'd
Speaker 2: have two thousand of latinos dancing. It was incredible and
Speaker 2: sometimes I'd play with four of the five bands. It
Speaker 2: was just a great time. There was lots of opportunity.
Speaker 2: There was ballrooms everywhere in La. There was jazz clubs,
Speaker 2: there was every studio had full symphony orchestras. So you
Speaker 2: had seven full time symphony orchestras in the studios. You
Speaker 2: had three networks, they all had full time orchestras. And
Speaker 2: there was clubs everywhere, so there were opportunities to play.
Speaker 2: Was enormous. I was became the I was the benefactor
Speaker 2: of that, and so the beneficiary I should say.
Speaker 1: Once you were in La, did you go on the
Speaker 1: road again or did you stay?
Speaker 2: Yes? Yes, I would go out and go out and
Speaker 2: come back. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So what was it like being on the road in
Speaker 1: the fifties as opposted today?
Speaker 2: Well, I can't tell you about the road today, but
Speaker 2: I can tell you about it then. It was. It
Speaker 2: was fine, It was there was rarely any problems of
Speaker 2: any sort. You would go out for three weeks, four weeks,
Speaker 2: five weeks and then come back. You know, Uh, you
Speaker 2: worked in the big ballrooms. There were ballrooms. Every every
Speaker 2: city had ballrooms right either inside the city or on
Speaker 2: the outskirts of the city, or and you had theaters
Speaker 2: where they you would play between the movies. You would
Speaker 2: you would be on the stage and the movie theater
Speaker 2: played between that. Or the big dance halls. Every every
Speaker 2: city had a big dance hall somewhere. And it was
Speaker 2: wonderful to keep running into run into other bands. And
Speaker 2: one of the great things was one time I was
Speaker 2: with the Less Brown Band and we were in I
Speaker 2: think it was may have been Salt Lake, I'm not
Speaker 2: positive at the moment, but we were in the hotel.
Speaker 2: And of course, when you're on the bus and all that,
Speaker 2: you're dressing your jeans, your shirt, you're kind of ragged
Speaker 2: and all that, particularly when you're driving three miles four
Speaker 2: hundred miles a day. And we were a bunch of
Speaker 2: us were standing outside when we're at this hotel, and
Speaker 2: here comes the Count Basie band pulling up the stay
Speaker 2: of the same hotel. They all got off the bus
Speaker 2: in suits and times they looked like they just they
Speaker 2: just were dressed for the case. It was just wonderful
Speaker 2: to see. It was a great time. It was a
Speaker 2: great time, Okay.
Speaker 1: The rock and roll musicians wanted to go on the
Speaker 1: road to meet the girls, to do drugs. Was it
Speaker 1: the same in your era?
Speaker 2: No, No, it was, it was I suppose there will
Speaker 2: always be some of those. There were certainly a number
Speaker 2: of people on hard drugs and things like that. But no,
Speaker 2: we were all there for the music. We were there
Speaker 2: for the music, not for the girls. Uh. We were
Speaker 2: there for the music, definitely, okay.
Speaker 1: And what was it like being Jewish on the road.
Speaker 2: Nothing, You didn't know you were Jewish or anything else.
Speaker 1: And what about when you had toured with black musicians?
Speaker 2: What was that like? Oh, well, you had to be
Speaker 2: you had to be very careful where you would stay.
Speaker 2: But there was no there was no no particular, no
Speaker 2: particular problem. The problem with when black musicians at that
Speaker 2: time was they had to live with what they called
Speaker 2: the Green Book, which I'm sure you know about, which
Speaker 2: was the list of places where they could stay, where
Speaker 2: they could eat. Uh. And so that was always difficult.
Speaker 2: But uh, that was always difficult, probably still difficult to
Speaker 2: this day. Other than that, it was generally generally fine.
Speaker 2: We you know, you knew what hotels to stay at
Speaker 2: you knew where they were where. It was acceptable to
Speaker 2: have musicians and things like that, but generally that time
Speaker 2: there was not a lot of them. There was a
Speaker 2: crazy craziness going on with in the bands. It was
Speaker 2: there was pretty pretty normal. People were pretty serious about
Speaker 2: what they were doing.
Speaker 1: So what would you and the other band members do
Speaker 1: when you were not on stage, when you were on
Speaker 1: the bus or in the hotel room? How would you
Speaker 1: pass the time?
Speaker 2: Uh? Well, I always sat in the back of the bus.
Speaker 2: The leader always had in the front of the bush.
Speaker 2: The girl singer always had in the front of the bus.
Speaker 2: Uh So everybody had their place where they use They said,
Speaker 2: I like to sit in the back. You read, you read,
Speaker 2: you're looking to see, you talk to you, talk to
Speaker 2: your friends. Nothing dramatic, nothing dramatic.
Speaker 1: Okay. So from the time that you came to Los
Speaker 1: Angeles till you opened your office, how long a period
Speaker 1: of time was that?
Speaker 2: About three or four years, I guess.
Speaker 1: Okay. So in that three or four years, excuse me,
Speaker 1: you were practicing.
Speaker 2: No law, no, not at all whatsoever.
Speaker 1: Okay. So you have these friends, they get into varying
Speaker 1: scraps with drugs. You're a newbie lawyer, So how do
Speaker 1: you figure out how to defend them?
Speaker 2: You do a lot of quick reading. It was it
Speaker 2: was fairly simple. Let me take an example. There was
Speaker 2: a lot of clubs on Sunset Boulevard, amongst other places.
Speaker 2: So I be playing that. There was the Macambo, there
Speaker 2: was Ciro's, there was the Crescendo, there was the Interlude.
Speaker 2: There was a number of clubs there, amongst other places,
Speaker 2: of course, all around the city. So let's say we
Speaker 2: were working at the Macombo, all the clubs, everything closed
Speaker 2: to two in the morning. At two in the morning,
Speaker 2: we will be packing up. The cops would be backstage
Speaker 2: and they say to the to the guy, open up
Speaker 2: your case. Okay. They opened the cases, so there'd be
Speaker 2: some drugs in it. Musicians didn't. It was easy for
Speaker 2: the cops because musicians didn't carry knives, they didn't carry guns,
Speaker 2: they didn't resist the rest. They weren't violent. So they
Speaker 2: were giving it a rest document and saying you got
Speaker 2: the peer in court at such and such a time.
Speaker 2: It was clearly illegal search and seizure. There was a
Speaker 2: motion we used to make at that time called nine
Speaker 2: nine to five. I don't know what it's called today,
Speaker 2: and we may go down to the court and make
Speaker 2: a motion of illegal search and season probable cause to
Speaker 2: accost them, and we walk out the door. And usually
Speaker 2: I'd walk out the door with a contract or motion
Speaker 2: picture contract or a television contract or some kind of
Speaker 2: contract to review. And so I studied a lot.
Speaker 1: Okay, how long after you started practicing law did you
Speaker 1: stop playing music professionally?
Speaker 2: Probably another seven eight years something like that.
Speaker 1: Well, really, so, did you think that you were living
Speaker 1: the dream in your music career or was there a
Speaker 1: rung above that you were trying to reach.
Speaker 2: Well, my rung was to be a studio musician, to play,
Speaker 2: to play record and all that. And I was starting
Speaker 2: to get a lot of very good work in town.
Speaker 2: I was achieving it. And then I was trying to
Speaker 2: to do both. I was trying to do the loan,
Speaker 2: I was trying to do music. So one day, when
Speaker 2: I was driving home, I fell asleep at the wheel.
Speaker 2: Fortunately I was not in a bad accident, and I realized,
Speaker 2: I have to make a choice. I can't continue to
Speaker 2: do both.
Speaker 1: And how hard was it to give up the music? Emotionally?
Speaker 2: Very difficult?
Speaker 1: And when you stopped, did you continue to play your
Speaker 1: horn or did you put it down because it was
Speaker 1: too painful to play?
Speaker 2: No. I continued to play my horn. I continued to
Speaker 2: do things not quite as much, and I would join
Speaker 2: some local My training was, my training was my teachers
Speaker 2: were in Chicago Siphony, so my training, my training was
Speaker 2: classical music. So I started to do with local community
Speaker 2: orchestras and things like that, which I continued to do
Speaker 2: for a long time.
Speaker 1: Okay, so you're in Beverly Hills, you have your office.
Speaker 1: What's the legal landscape like that? Are you a party
Speaker 1: of one? Are there ten people like you? The big
Speaker 1: law firms predate this. What's it like?
Speaker 2: Well, I couldn't get a job because I was not
Speaker 2: ready to give up my music. I was looking around
Speaker 2: for a place. So I was trying to figure out
Speaker 2: what to do. And so I got a little space.
Speaker 2: It was an ad in the trades, and I got
Speaker 2: a space for services. So I said, okay, I went
Speaker 2: to this place on South Beverly Drive in Beverly Hills,
Speaker 2: and I got a little office. I would have to
Speaker 2: render certain services, like going to court for the attorney
Speaker 2: there that I worked for a name with Lou Most
Speaker 2: and he would pay me twenty five dollars a court appearance,
Speaker 2: but I would have a little office I can work
Speaker 2: out of. He never paid me the twenty five dollars,
Speaker 2: so I lasted for a couple of years and then
Speaker 2: left and got another office on my own. In the meantime,
Speaker 2: I was continued to work and I started to work
Speaker 2: with the La Philharmonic and I did that for six years.
Speaker 2: Along with this, I was doing there playing their saxophone
Speaker 2: work and for instance, like pictures that an exhibition with
Speaker 2: the symphony, the balo, revels, bleo and things like that
Speaker 2: with a saxophone with them. And then for Pop Knights,
Speaker 2: I would play saxophone and clarinet for them with them
Speaker 2: with the La Philharmonic, I was doing that and that
Speaker 2: was terrific. Alongside while I was while I started by
Speaker 2: practice of law, and I was doing some record dates
Speaker 2: here and there and things of that nature. So I
Speaker 2: was doing both until it became impossible.
Speaker 1: And was there enough work because you were constantly in
Speaker 1: contact with people.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there was enough work. That was enough work.
Speaker 1: So now you put down your horn profession and you're
Speaker 1: one hundred percent of lawyer. What goes on?
Speaker 2: Then? Well, okay, so I I had another, a second
Speaker 2: little office on my own while I was going along,
Speaker 2: and then I had moved to another one. I practiced,
Speaker 2: started to get busy, and then I decided I only
Speaker 2: wanted to do entertainment law and I didn't want to
Speaker 2: do I was doing what they call door law. The
Speaker 2: door law is whatever comes in the door. I did divorces,
Speaker 2: I did adoptions, I did taxes, I did personal injury cases.
Speaker 2: I did a zoning case. I did a murder case.
Speaker 2: I did a robbery case, and I did I was
Speaker 2: doing contract television contracts, mostly picture contracts. So one day
Speaker 2: I said, I'm just want to do the entertainment stuff.
Speaker 2: So I hired my first lawyer and I said, you're
Speaker 2: going to do everything I don't want to do. And
Speaker 2: that was Chuck Hurwitz. Eventually became Cooper and Hurwitz, and
Speaker 2: after that it became Cooper Epstein at Hurwitz. Epstein was
Speaker 2: somebody who had his own firm across the hall from
Speaker 2: us in Beverly Hills, and he was looking to change
Speaker 2: his situation and he came over with us with a
Speaker 2: couple of attorneys and we started our little firm a
Speaker 2: Cooper Epstein. Herwits the seven lawyers, we eventually grew to
Speaker 2: about fifty.
Speaker 1: Jumping way ahead, how do you transfer from Cooper Epstein
Speaker 1: and Hurwitz to Greenberg Towing where you are?
Speaker 2: Now? Sure? Our firm was about fifty Cooper Epstein at
Speaker 2: Hurwitz and we were kind of in the middle. The
Speaker 2: firms that I thought were great were much bigger or
Speaker 2: much smaller, and so I went looking for a merger
Speaker 2: or partner for us, and I found a firm ment
Speaker 2: at Phelps and Phillips that they were interested in us.
Speaker 2: Not everybody wanted to go, so we closed down. I
Speaker 2: went there with about fifteen lawyers. It was not for me.
Speaker 2: I discovered it as soon as I got there. This
Speaker 2: wasn't for me for a lot of personal reasons which
Speaker 2: I won't go into. It's a good firm with very
Speaker 2: good lawyers, but it just didn't fit. It didn't fit me,
Speaker 2: all right. I didn't fit it one or the other.
Speaker 2: And out of the blue, Out of the blue, I
Speaker 2: get a call from Larry Hoffman, who was one of
Speaker 2: the founders of the firm ris. The fir was Greenberg
Speaker 2: Troway Hoffman. I called me and said, we just opened
Speaker 2: in California, which they did. That year, and we're looking
Speaker 2: for somebody to start to our entertainment practice. You want
Speaker 2: to come. Since I had only moved one time and
Speaker 2: the idea of moving it was a bore to me,
Speaker 2: I said, I don't think so. So he talked to
Speaker 2: me as a company taking a trip, which they wanted
Speaker 2: to send me at first class to the New York
Speaker 2: office or Miami office and bring a friend of yours
Speaker 2: and come and take a look at us. So I did.
Speaker 2: I was impressed. I was impressed with a firm. I
Speaker 2: was impressed with what they were doing. I had the lawyer,
Speaker 2: the quality of lawyers. I came back, and the idea
Speaker 2: of moving again was somewhat a boring to me, so
Speaker 2: I said no. I said, well, think about it. So
Speaker 2: I did. And as my life at the men at
Speaker 2: Phelps was not great as far as I've concerned, what
Speaker 2: I felt over there, and I was feeling really bad,
Speaker 2: I said, I don't know if I could stay here.
Speaker 2: I finally called Larry back after about six months, and
Speaker 2: I said, Larry, you're still interested. He says, yes, come over,
Speaker 2: he says, and bring and get whoever you want. So
Speaker 2: I came, and I started calling the people who had
Speaker 2: worked with me and for me my previous life, and
Speaker 2: they started coming one by one and including my including
Speaker 2: my partner, I Rapstein, and a whole bunch of them
Speaker 2: came and I've been with the firm ever since. It's
Speaker 2: an incredible firm. The broad knowledge and experience and quality
Speaker 2: of lawyer here is phenomenal. It's a big firm, but
Speaker 2: doesn't function like a big firm as far as we're concerned,
Speaker 2: and I treat our department as a boutique that sits
Speaker 2: in a big firm. They have made the experience quite well,
Speaker 2: quite excellent. You feel like they're giving you the reins
Speaker 2: and saying you run with it. It's yours. And that's
Speaker 2: how it's been.
Speaker 1: So how many years at Manat and how many years
Speaker 1: at Greenberg DrAk.
Speaker 2: I was a man at about six to seven, I
Speaker 2: can't remember exactly. And here I've been here about twenty
Speaker 2: years a little over.
Speaker 1: Okay. So when you had fifty with Cooper, Epstein and Horoitz,
Speaker 1: fifty attorneys, and you said you either had to be
Speaker 1: smaller or larger, what are the advantages of now being
Speaker 1: with a larger firm?
Speaker 2: The advantage of being larger firm than I found here
Speaker 2: is the expertise that you can find. There's an x.
Speaker 2: They have an expert on everything. I don't care what
Speaker 2: it is. You can send out emails I need an
Speaker 2: expert on horse maneur in Colorado, and you'll get fifty
Speaker 2: year responses. I'm exaggerating slightly, obviously, but there's an expert
Speaker 2: on everything here. The quality of lawyer is phenomenal. The
Speaker 2: willingness to share and help is phenomenal. They give you
Speaker 2: the reins and they say it's yours. You do what
Speaker 2: you want to do. They're not telling you how to practice,
Speaker 2: they're not limiting your abilities to practice. Be straight, but
Speaker 2: follow the law, do what to do, it's right, be honest,
Speaker 2: and they give you the tools. And that's all anybody
Speaker 2: can ask.
Speaker 1: And what's it like working for somebody else? Is supposed
Speaker 1: to working for yourself.
Speaker 2: I feel like I'm working for myself. I don't feel
Speaker 2: like I'm working for somebody else. If you want to
Speaker 2: know the truth.
Speaker 1: Okay, so what year did you merge with Epstein and Herwitz?
Speaker 1: When when did that happen?
Speaker 2: Ha? Well, I didn't merge with it. I mean I
Speaker 2: chuck Herwitz. I hired I told you he works for me,
Speaker 2: and I made him that. I made him a partner.
Speaker 2: We merged with he had about three lawyers. What year
Speaker 2: would that be It would take me a while to
Speaker 2: compute that. I can't remember. But let's say I've been
Speaker 2: here twenty some odd years. I was in mentat about
Speaker 2: six to seven years and see ten years there. Probably
Speaker 2: we were together previously twenty twenty five years.
Speaker 1: I would say, okay, so now you're practicing law. Music
Speaker 1: is unfortunately just a hobby. And you say, you hire
Speaker 1: Chuck Herwitz to do the stuff walks in. It's not entertainment.
Speaker 1: How broad is your entertainment practice? How much is television
Speaker 1: movies music?
Speaker 2: Fifty percent is music and fifty percent would be television
Speaker 2: and motion picture.
Speaker 1: And has it continued like that?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 1: And for the uninitiated, what is the difference in those
Speaker 1: two areas. What's the difference in terms of how do
Speaker 1: you see it in terms of the music business in
Speaker 1: the movie business.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I can tell you. I could tell you that
Speaker 2: straightforward way, which is, in order to be an entertainment
Speaker 2: lawyer in these fields, you have to know the business
Speaker 2: of what you're in. You have to know the business
Speaker 2: of the motion picture business. The business of television, the
Speaker 2: business of music. In other words, you have to know
Speaker 2: in record business, how records are made, how they're distributed,
Speaker 2: what the wholesale is, what retail is, where the money
Speaker 2: is flowing from? What a licensing of the music rights?
Speaker 2: What is it costs for all of that? Uh is
Speaker 2: a What does a record company earn when they sell
Speaker 2: a record or today when they're licensing streaming services? What
Speaker 2: do they get? What are the deals? Same thing in
Speaker 2: motion pictures and television you have to know what does
Speaker 2: the director get. What are the fees for directors? What
Speaker 2: are the fees for producers? What are the fees for writers?
Speaker 2: What does it cost to get an actor? What are
Speaker 2: the residuals? What are net profits? What are adjusted gross profits?
Speaker 2: What are the deductions can what are the various definitions
Speaker 2: what can be deducted from all You have to know
Speaker 2: the business, not only the law that affects it, not
Speaker 2: only copy. Remember, you have to know copyright because that's
Speaker 2: the very foundation of our businesses. Copyright. Copyright is the
Speaker 2: reason there is a motion picture business, or a music business,
Speaker 2: or television business, because it gives you a copyright, which
Speaker 2: gives you ownership, protection of intellectual property rights. So you
Speaker 2: have to understand in you have to understand copyright and
Speaker 2: copyright law. An example of copyright is the copyright. The
Speaker 2: Copyright Act is probably, I don't know, one hundred pages,
Speaker 2: two hundred pages Nimber on copyright, which is the major
Speaker 2: authority on copyright. It is twelve volumes interpreting the copyright law. Okay,
Speaker 2: twelve very thick volumes interpreting that that small little copyright law,
Speaker 2: if you will. Then, as I say, you have to
Speaker 2: understand the business of the motion pictures and television and music,
Speaker 2: how the product is distributed, how it's sold, how you
Speaker 2: earn your money, who are the recipients of the money.
Speaker 2: So you are not just a lawyer, You're a You're
Speaker 2: a business person because you have to understand the entire
Speaker 2: business of what you are in. And each of them
Speaker 2: are different. There's a different different music and television and
Speaker 2: motion pictures because the product is different, the creation of
Speaker 2: the product is different, the distribution of the product is different,
Speaker 2: and the moneies that you received from them is different.
Speaker 1: So did you just learn through experience or do you
Speaker 1: read trade papers? How do you keep up?
Speaker 2: You have experience, but you read everything, reading every day.
Speaker 2: You read the trades, you read the latest publications, you
Speaker 2: read the latest litigation lawsuits, you read the decisions. You
Speaker 2: read as much as you can about the latest deal making.
Speaker 2: You attend seminars, you review, you go to you go
Speaker 2: to various conferences. There's no ent toy. There's no end
Speaker 2: to learning in this business. There's no time in which
Speaker 2: you say I know it. There's no time in which
Speaker 2: you know it at all. There will always be.
Speaker 1: Now, this is your profession for a long time. Yes,
Speaker 1: do you like it? Do you enjoy it?
Speaker 2: I love it, and I enjoy it. I love it.
Speaker 2: It's why I'm still doing it.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you this. Let's just assume you were
Speaker 1: working solely and I came in and I said, oh,
Speaker 1: I have a recording contract or I'm an actor in
Speaker 1: a movie. Do you still draft the contracts or do
Speaker 1: you just make the deal and then subsidiary attorneys would
Speaker 1: get it on paper, so to speak.
Speaker 2: Well, at this point I have great associates for me
Speaker 2: that are doing drafting and things of that nature. We
Speaker 2: have our forms that we accumulated over the years. They're constant,
Speaker 2: they're always out of date the day you draw them.
Speaker 2: They're out of date. So we're constantly reviewing it. Fortunately
Speaker 2: I'm not doing a whole lot of drafting, but I
Speaker 2: have great associates that are doing the drafting. But at
Speaker 2: one point I did the drafting, I did the reviewing
Speaker 2: and all that. When I first entered the business record,
Speaker 2: contracts are three pages. They're now seventy eighty pages. Law
Speaker 2: motion picture contracts used to be very simple, very very
Speaker 2: straight ahead. Now there are hundreds of pages along When
Speaker 2: you do it, when you do a deal, and sometimes
Speaker 2: first I have some clients that do producing, directing, acting, producing, directing,
Speaker 2: ake writing, Well, it's it's you now fill about several
Speaker 2: volumes of what those contracts are.
Speaker 1: Okay, you're practicing law. As I say, you create your
Speaker 1: own forms. To a great degree, the attorney is seeing
Speaker 1: possibilities down the road, and on both sides of the fence,
Speaker 1: both the companies and the talent have not foreseen certain things.
Speaker 1: So to what creed do you try to dot every I,
Speaker 1: cross every T How do you stop? And if you
Speaker 1: ever had regrets that you haven't included or four seen.
Speaker 2: Something, well, you're always trying to anticipate, and of course
Speaker 2: that's what the industry is now going through with AI, right.
Speaker 2: I don't think that was much anticipated some time ago,
Speaker 2: and people have been thinking about it in the last
Speaker 2: couple of years a little bit. It's being addressed. You're
Speaker 2: always learning, and you're always playing catch up, and you're
Speaker 2: always going back and look at your contracts and see,
Speaker 2: you think we have covered this if we go back
Speaker 2: and take a look all the time. I can't say
Speaker 2: that were anybody is or we are flawless in that regard,
Speaker 2: but we certainly attempt to cover the bases and try
Speaker 2: and anticipate what is coming. That's why we go to seminars,
Speaker 2: That's why we talk to people, That's why we review
Speaker 2: all of the latest articles on all of this thing
Speaker 2: and see what's happening, and then delve into our contracts
Speaker 2: and see whether we've covered the basis.
Speaker 1: Now, in music, there are many attorneys who charge a percentage,
Speaker 1: usually five percent. How do people go by hourly? How
Speaker 1: do you do it?
Speaker 2: I've done it both ways, and.
Speaker 1: What are the advantages disadvantages to both?
Speaker 2: Okay, the advantage and disadvantage to percentage is I've talked
Speaker 2: to a number of clients, a number of attorneys on
Speaker 2: this twenty percent of your clients pay for pay for
Speaker 2: the other eighty percent. Okay, Usually when you take percentages,
Speaker 2: if you're taking only percentages, it's twenty percent of the
Speaker 2: clients who pay for the pay the bill. Hourly is
Speaker 2: straight straight ahead. You're either getting paid or say goodbye.
Speaker 2: They're either paid the hours. So some clients we have
Speaker 2: on percentage. Some clients we have an hourly. There are
Speaker 2: a number of particularly the boutique the smaller firms almost
Speaker 2: exclusively do five percenters are five percenters, they do very well.
Speaker 2: They do very well, but are they winning all the time. No,
Speaker 2: they're winning, but twenty percent better pay the bills for
Speaker 2: the eighty Because we are a full service firm, in
Speaker 2: which boutiques are not. So we do litigation right. Boutiques
Speaker 2: do not do litigation. That's hourly. There rarely is that percentage.
Speaker 2: Rarely is that percentage. Mostly that is our corporate work.
Speaker 2: We do corporate work. Boutiques don't do corporork's that's our
Speaker 2: that's hourly type of work. Trademark is hourly type of work.
Speaker 2: So it all depends on what it is. The advantage
Speaker 2: of a big firmish you can do both. You can
Speaker 2: do some clients on hourly, and some clients on percentage.
Speaker 1: Okay, this is a business entertainment in general that is
Speaker 1: shady when it comes to payment. So let's say you're
Speaker 1: on a five percent how do you know that you're
Speaker 1: actually getting five percent of the total.
Speaker 2: Well, hopefully, if you're representing a client, you are representing
Speaker 2: a client that you can trust. I recommend that very much.
Speaker 2: I wrote. By the way, I wrote an article many
Speaker 2: years ago for the Hollywood Reporter. It said. The article
Speaker 2: was this, I can tell by meeting somebody a client,
Speaker 2: let's say somebody who is a client of somebody, who
Speaker 2: the lawyer is, because clients choose lawyers would like personalities.
Speaker 2: By and large, Okay, I wrote that article. It was
Speaker 2: a long time ago. And in other way, somebody who's dishonest,
Speaker 2: do they want an honest lawyer who is going to
Speaker 2: tell them that they're dishonest? They don't. They wanted somebody
Speaker 2: to see what they see. If they're a paranoid personality,
Speaker 2: they want to find a lawyer who sees the same
Speaker 2: things that they say. And well, it's not absolutely true
Speaker 2: at all. And the thing was a humorous article. By
Speaker 2: and large, there's a lot of truth to that fact.
Speaker 2: They both choose lawyers that are few things the way
Speaker 2: they do thinks, and I think we all generally wanted
Speaker 2: to represent somebody that we feel are good people and
Speaker 2: pay attention to their to their profession and their honest people.
Speaker 1: Okay, so you come into the business. Recording is going
Speaker 1: on pretty much the beginnings, the beginning of the century, movies,
Speaker 1: television that time, there's some major changes. Let's just focus
Speaker 1: on the music business for a change. The Beatles come along,
Speaker 1: and they sell more product than anybody previously. Rock comes along,
Speaker 1: Rock starts in the early fifties, sort of fades around
Speaker 1: the decade of the City seem it is a huge resurgence.
Speaker 1: How does this ultimately affect the contracts in the practice
Speaker 1: of law.
Speaker 2: Well, Uh, a selling of a record is the selling
Speaker 2: of a record. I don't care whether it's a Beatles
Speaker 2: record or an Elvis Presley record or Frank Sorata record.
Speaker 2: The selling of a record is still the same the business,
Speaker 2: the business aspect is still the same. Uh. The some
Speaker 2: of the players are different. Some of the players are different.
Speaker 2: Some of the people who handle U tip top are
Speaker 2: different than the people who are who are handling classical music.
Speaker 2: It's an example. Okay, there are different players with different
Speaker 2: philosophies and different and different business models. So again you
Speaker 2: have to understand the business that you're in, which bit
Speaker 2: it is. So the music business has many, many fascets.
Speaker 2: It has a there's a classical music business, and I
Speaker 2: represent several major classical artists. There's a classical music business.
Speaker 2: There's a pop music business. There's a jazz musical business. Uh,
Speaker 2: there's a really been blues business. They're different, the numbers
Speaker 2: are different, the deals are different, Uh, the payments are different.
Speaker 2: So you have to So you have to learn all
Speaker 2: these different fields. Simply because it's music doesn't mean there's
Speaker 2: one standard fits all. It doesn't, and one contract doesn't
Speaker 2: fit all. It doesn't. The contracts are different, the style
Speaker 2: of making business is different. The people on the other
Speaker 2: side are different. The classical music people are different people
Speaker 2: than the pop music people. They don't think alike. They
Speaker 2: think differently, They think in different numbers and in different
Speaker 2: ways of doing business. So the music business much like
Speaker 2: the motion picture but the telephon, they're it's segregated in
Speaker 2: it in and of itself. So you could talk to
Speaker 2: the three executives and the music business from different genres.
Speaker 2: They're thinking differently and their deals are different.
Speaker 1: Okay, So, but the Rocket Hero starts to flourish in
Speaker 1: the mid sixties and ultimately contracts change. Okay, there's so
Speaker 1: many issues. A. Did the record company want the publishing, B,
Speaker 1: cross collateralization, C free goods, D the raw royalty percentage,
Speaker 1: accounting windows. Was that evolving generally and you evolved with it?
Speaker 1: Or did you have certain acts you made a stand
Speaker 1: such that you were moving the ball for artistry further
Speaker 1: down the playing field.
Speaker 2: Well, the deals became when the when the record companies
Speaker 2: went to what they called the three sixty deal, that's
Speaker 2: probably what you're talking about, in which they not only
Speaker 2: had wanted the record, they wanted the publishing, they wanted
Speaker 2: the touring, they wanted their acting moneies, they wanted everything
Speaker 2: else like that. A number of us was out alone,
Speaker 2: A number of us set up and said hold it,
Speaker 2: hold it, holdly. This is this is an overreach. Okay,
Speaker 2: this is a major overreach. There was a lot of
Speaker 2: fights about that. Uh at the beginning, we thought there
Speaker 2: was a grab by the companies at that particular time.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: They they viewed it as they were creating an actor
Speaker 2: or had an opportunity to earn all this money, et cetera.
Speaker 2: And so they see there were they were a partner
Speaker 2: in that or participant in that. They wanted to share
Speaker 2: that we are the talent side represented. The talent said, well,
Speaker 2: wait a minute, you didn't. There's nothing about this. What
Speaker 2: you've done is contributed that. Yes, your business is the
Speaker 2: record business. Your business is not touring, Your business is
Speaker 2: not movies, your business is not publishing. It's not fair.
Speaker 2: That battle goes on, that goes onto this, that goes
Speaker 2: on to this day as to how far you could go.
Speaker 2: Do remember that in the motion picture industry they used
Speaker 2: to have they used to have contracts seven year contracts
Speaker 2: are more with actors, and they would hire them and
Speaker 2: they would become they would become the employees, if you will,
Speaker 2: literally of the studio. And there became a revolution amongst
Speaker 2: the actor talent that no, that wasn't that wasn't very good,
Speaker 2: and they used what was called then the seven year
Speaker 2: statue to get out of these contracts. And the studios
Speaker 2: that eventually said, well, why are we keeping all these
Speaker 2: people on salary? And that was so it had a
Speaker 2: dual response, which was some people said gee, i'd like this,
Speaker 2: I like the weekly salary, and others say no, I'm
Speaker 2: free now to work for any studio I want. Not simple,
Speaker 2: but actors. Actors, when they finally got rid of the
Speaker 2: seven year contracts, they started making moneies which they're getting
Speaker 2: up to the twenty million plus salaries and making deals
Speaker 2: because they weren't tied.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's stay with the movie business. Be in ultimately
Speaker 1: visual entertainment. So in the late sixties and into the seventies,
Speaker 1: the game flips where the talent gains an amazing amount
Speaker 1: of control. So tell us what it was like then
Speaker 1: and what it's really like today.
Speaker 2: Well, when the talent found they got in control, would
Speaker 2: you have the Tom Cruises, et cetera. Who will become
Speaker 2: necessary to open a film? Right, it all became. It
Speaker 2: all became about opening a film. Previous to that period
Speaker 2: of time, they would put out a film. It would stay,
Speaker 2: it would stay on the boards or stay at as
Speaker 2: theaters for a long time. Now you got to make
Speaker 2: your money over the first few weekends to see if
Speaker 2: it's really sustained the film. When they found that it
Speaker 2: was certain actors like a Tom Cruise as an example,
Speaker 2: they that they could open a film and all of
Speaker 2: a sudden make millions on a weekend, multi millions on
Speaker 2: a weekend. The actors then all of a sudden gained power.
Speaker 2: They said, you want me for your film, this is
Speaker 2: what they're going to have to pay. And the salaries
Speaker 2: rose the ten million a picture to fifteen million a picture,
Speaker 2: the twenty million of picture and had more because the
Speaker 2: film's companies finally decided they really needed this actor to
Speaker 2: open the film. And so whether it was Julia Roberts
Speaker 2: or whoever, these were the people that the studio started
Speaker 2: to look for and realized that the and the actors
Speaker 2: started to realize that they need us. And so the
Speaker 2: attorneys who representative took advantage on their behalf to maximize
Speaker 2: the income that they were receiving, including the back end payments,
Speaker 2: which is now under challenge. The back end payments is
Speaker 2: a big subject right now and probably is the big
Speaker 2: subject of the strikes right now, the back end payments,
Speaker 2: because when you get it to certain certain production companies
Speaker 2: today who won't pay a back end. Back end, of course,
Speaker 2: is the money you get for future distribution, future exploitation
Speaker 2: of the film, and so if you have a percentage
Speaker 2: of the film you're going to get paid on that.
Speaker 2: Some people are making more money from the back what
Speaker 2: they call the back end, than they are from their
Speaker 2: front up front fees. And that's the current battle that
Speaker 2: goes out to this day.
Speaker 1: Okay, if you read the trades the business public, they
Speaker 1: say that talent prices have gone down in the theatrical
Speaker 1: business because certain name talent is not opened films, and
Speaker 1: some of these films, especially the Marvel movies, et cetera,
Speaker 1: it's less important who the talent is. Have you experienced this.
Speaker 2: I haven't personally experienced it, but I understand it. Some
Speaker 2: of those are Yeah, some of the films of Marble films,
Speaker 2: I understand. Whether they say people going to go see
Speaker 2: whether no matter who's in there. I don't know if
Speaker 2: they're completely if that's completely true or not. I haven't
Speaker 2: been able to I haven't examined any figures to that
Speaker 2: aspect of it. But I don't underestimate the power of
Speaker 2: the draw of certain talent in this business.
Speaker 1: Okay, so let you know where the talent is on
Speaker 1: strike right now. By time this year is who knows.
Speaker 1: Theoretically a deal could be made, but let's just talk theore.
Speaker 1: In the old days, the back end was such that
Speaker 1: you went to varying platforms. Maybe you were on network,
Speaker 1: then you went into syndication, then you went into physical
Speaker 1: with DVDs, vhs. Whereas with Netflix, let's say they might
Speaker 1: buy out the product and only have it on their platform,
Speaker 1: so you could have a contract with externalities if they
Speaker 1: distributed elsewhere. But if the product is paid for by
Speaker 1: Netflix and sits on Netflix, how would we construct the
Speaker 1: back end?
Speaker 2: Netflix, to my knowledge, does not pay it back end.
Speaker 1: Right, But as a representative of talent and the talent
Speaker 1: is looking for more money, do you see any way
Speaker 1: to do that?
Speaker 2: No? Back Netflix is a great company, but they have
Speaker 2: their own business model, and their business model does not
Speaker 2: call for a back end at all. And they have
Speaker 2: an unusual book they call it back in in which
Speaker 2: they pay you negotiate a deal with them for a number,
Speaker 2: and they take twenty percent of that number, and hey,
Speaker 2: that's your back end, and we'll pay that out within
Speaker 2: two for over the two years after the film has
Speaker 2: been distributed. That's been my experience with them.
Speaker 1: And is that twenty performance based No? Okay, let's talk
Speaker 1: about theatrical in general. You're a student of the game.
Speaker 1: What is the future of theatrical We obviously had the pandemic.
Speaker 1: Business is not completely recovered. The stocks of the theaters
Speaker 1: have gone up and down. The major studios are making
Speaker 1: less product. By the same token, there's more indepredent product
Speaker 1: than ever, although a lot of it does not get
Speaker 1: theatrical distribution. What's going to happen here in the future.
Speaker 2: Well, I can't predict the future. It's right now very uncertain. Uh.
Speaker 2: The I like to go to I like to go
Speaker 2: to the movies. Will the public continue to like to
Speaker 2: go into the movies? I don't know. We had a
Speaker 2: great I think you know, we had a great theater
Speaker 2: complex in Hollywood, the arc Line Theaters in Hollywood, and
Speaker 2: that a lot of us used to like to go to.
Speaker 2: Very much gone. I don't know if it's ever going
Speaker 2: to come back, but it's gone. The enthusiasm of going
Speaker 2: to theaters seems to be less. With the exception of
Speaker 2: Barbie Oppenheimer. So those are so those are two I've
Speaker 2: only I've seen Oppenheimer. I've not seen Barbie yet, but
Speaker 2: some of the some of the the people that work
Speaker 2: here have seen Barbie multiple times. They adore the film,
Speaker 2: and with good reason. I've heard nothing but great things
Speaker 2: at every in every corner, and Oppenheimer was an incredible film.
Speaker 2: But I don't know how many Oppenheimer's or Barbies there's
Speaker 2: going to be. It's going to draw people to the theaters,
Speaker 2: So I don't know. It's a hard one. I like
Speaker 2: to go to the theaters. A lot of people have
Speaker 2: got used to sitting at home and watching the thing
Speaker 2: at home on their couch. What they'll like in the future,
Speaker 2: I don't know. I think we're in between now and
Speaker 2: I don't know where it's going to come out.
Speaker 1: Okay, Now, the agencies, let's leave music aside, where the
Speaker 1: agent really just books live dates. But the agents in
Speaker 1: the visual entertainment field, needless to say, Mike Ovitz comes
Speaker 1: in and has a lot of control packaging, etc. But
Speaker 1: in terms of deals, not everybody has an agent. How
Speaker 1: do you interact with the agencies?
Speaker 2: Oh, well, A good portion of my clients are represented
Speaker 2: by agencies, and the agencies have been very good. They're
Speaker 2: out there. We don't go out there looking for jobs
Speaker 2: for these people. Okay, we don't know, at least I
Speaker 2: could speak for myself. I don't know what films are
Speaker 2: on the boards that they're looking for talent, and at
Speaker 2: which companies are looking for talent. That's that's what the
Speaker 2: good agents know. They know what Paramount has got on
Speaker 2: the boards. They know what Disney's got on the boards,
Speaker 2: they know what Universal, they know what's coming up, and
Speaker 2: they know where to call there and put up their
Speaker 2: clients for the opportunities at those places. We don't know that.
Speaker 2: The agents know that the ages are very good at that,
Speaker 2: and so we work with the agents is far with
Speaker 2: our clients because they know what's coming up and all that,
Speaker 2: and they've made multiple deals, so their input all the time.
Speaker 2: We may have our ideas what the deal is worth,
Speaker 2: the agents also have their ideas and it's valuable input.
Speaker 2: I have nothing but respect for the good agencies because
Speaker 2: they're on the front lines where we are not.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's flip it over to the music business. For
Speaker 1: a long time there, the last decades of the twentieth century,
Speaker 1: it was all about the major labels and major label
Speaker 1: recording contracts. A to what degree is out of percentage
Speaker 1: of your business today.
Speaker 2: That would be less than fifty percent, Maybe it's around
Speaker 2: fifty percent, maybe a little less.
Speaker 1: And we talked about the three sixty. How have those
Speaker 1: contracts change? I mean there are a lot of ways.
Speaker 1: I mean, in the days of physical products, certainly the CD,
Speaker 1: you have these huge advances and all sorts of other things.
Speaker 1: So what's a recording contract like today?
Speaker 2: It's pretty much pretty much the same question is are
Speaker 2: they willing to put out as a company willing to
Speaker 2: put out as much money today as they were? And
Speaker 2: that'll vary, that'll vary with the talent. There's I don't
Speaker 2: I don't know of a measure on that one. If somebody,
Speaker 2: if there's three record companies or four record companies want
Speaker 2: you're artists, it is one one type of thing. If
Speaker 2: there's one record company that wants are artist, it's a
Speaker 2: different deal. I don't think that has changed that much.
Speaker 1: Okay, So let's assume I'm making a deal with a
Speaker 1: major label. What kind of streaming rate can I get?
Speaker 2: Streaming rate? Okay? That's a that's a that's a that's
Speaker 2: a daily question around here. The maximum anybody is paid,
Speaker 2: and there some of them are paying it, it's at
Speaker 2: fifty percent of what proceeeds Okay, domestically for forty foreign Okay,
Speaker 2: at source as source. Not everybody's going to get that.
Speaker 2: That's that's a relatively few we'll get that, but it's
Speaker 2: it's possible to get a number of the companies. A
Speaker 2: number of the companies are paying at thirty five and
Speaker 2: forty and those forty forty domestic thirty five for some
Speaker 2: are paying less than that. The big problem we all have.
Speaker 2: The big problem is not the new deals, but the
Speaker 2: existing deals that were that were sitting there, in which
Speaker 2: the record companies are paying streaming rate and the same
Speaker 2: as they were paying for the CD rate. So if
Speaker 2: the CD rate was twenty percent or twenty five percent,
Speaker 2: that's what they're paying. So we're fighting with the labels
Speaker 2: to say, hey, wait a minute, it's unfair this time
Speaker 2: and this business and what you're making on it. You
Speaker 2: got to rethink it. You got to come to the
Speaker 2: table and renegotiate this thing. Every company has their own
Speaker 2: philosophy on it. But that's the type of discussion that
Speaker 2: should be had. Okay, even though somebody is there is
Speaker 2: getting a streaming rate of twenty or twenty five percent,
Speaker 2: they should be having a conversation with the label, Hey
Speaker 2: that's not fair, because it isn't because they don't have
Speaker 2: many factory, they don't have storage, shipping, they don't have storage,
Speaker 2: they don't have any of the things that they used
Speaker 2: to have with with a CD. They it. Basically, My
Speaker 2: position is it's a license. It's all it is. They
Speaker 2: exercise the license. Yes, they do some promotion, and no
Speaker 2: question they do promotion. But the rate, in my personal
Speaker 2: opinion is anything lower than forty or fifty percent is wrong.
Speaker 2: And we make calls and everybody else is doing the
Speaker 2: same thing, main calls. Hey, it's time to rethink this
Speaker 2: with the with the labels. But I think for any
Speaker 2: decent act, forty to fifty percent domesticated and throughound thirty
Speaker 2: to thirty five or forty percent four and is what
Speaker 2: is the goal? Everybody's not going to get it?
Speaker 1: So are these there are no deductions on the fifty Okay,
Speaker 1: So let's say I have an historic contract and they're
Speaker 1: paying me a low rate. Many people don't have any leverage.
Speaker 1: So how do you get these labels to cough up more.
Speaker 2: Go out and buy an AK forty seven?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 2: You you try your best. I you know, you try
Speaker 2: your best. If they really love the artists and they're
Speaker 2: really interested in the artists. They want to keep a
Speaker 2: happy artist, and most labels want to keep a happy artist.
Speaker 2: You go in on that basis you don't have any leverage,
Speaker 2: but you're going to say, look, it's not fair. Well,
Speaker 2: they're not fair. Work always work. It won't always work,
Speaker 2: but it will work. Sometimes it will work. Sometimes. I've
Speaker 2: seen one label very positively when you have legendary, legendary
Speaker 2: artists on the label come to the table and say, yeah,
Speaker 2: we gotta make it right.
Speaker 1: Okay. There have been all these issues in the music
Speaker 1: business of contracts that have not foreseen the future. To
Speaker 1: what degree do you have artists who have contracts there
Speaker 1: are now revenue streams that were not foreseen in the contract,
Speaker 1: which raise questions in bargaining power. How often does that happen?
Speaker 2: It happens. I mean, look at all the contracts that
Speaker 2: were done before there were streaming, lots of them. And
Speaker 2: I'm doing battle right now. These are contracts I inherited
Speaker 2: with a couple labels and say, we got up these
Speaker 2: streaming rays. It's not fair to be paying twenty percent
Speaker 2: royalty for streaming. It's just not right. And while right
Speaker 2: now I'm in these conversations, I haven't received the know
Speaker 2: what I'm receiving is we're reviewing it. I keep hearing
Speaker 2: we're reviewing it. Well, I think the review time is over.
Speaker 2: Let's get to something. But it's worth the conversation, and
Speaker 2: everybody should have that conversation.
Speaker 1: Okay, there are issues. We have a lot of acts
Speaker 1: that have they had to re re record it, like Aerosmith, whatever,
Speaker 1: ye haven't you? You get to write a reversion after
Speaker 1: twenty five years on the original albums because they didn't
Speaker 1: foresee any economic value after twenty five years. So when
Speaker 1: you make a deal today, okay, is there any reversion
Speaker 1: of the copyright? Can that be negotiated? What are the
Speaker 1: terms there?
Speaker 2: Negotiating the reversion is very tough. You have to have
Speaker 2: a superstar to do that, to get an ownership. But
Speaker 2: absent that, under the Copyright Act, there's a thirty five
Speaker 2: year termination for any recordings that are done after nineteen
Speaker 2: seventy eight. Okay, released after nineteen seventy eight under the
Speaker 2: Copyright Act, so you can get it back. Now, here's
Speaker 2: what's going on with that. Copyright Act of nineteen seventy
Speaker 2: nineteen seventy eight provides for this or in nineteen seventy six,
Speaker 2: commencing in nineteen seventy eight. The Copyright Act prize for
Speaker 2: a thirty five termination right under the old Act, the
Speaker 2: previous Act, it was a fifty six year termination. Fifty
Speaker 2: six year termination. So you said, now you're coming up,
Speaker 2: you got two You got two years before the thirty
Speaker 2: five years to send your notice. You got to give
Speaker 2: a two year notice and it's a five year period
Speaker 2: of which you have to send it. But the termination
Speaker 2: would be between thirty five to forty years. So you
Speaker 2: send your notice. The first thing happens is the record
Speaker 2: companies say, no, you're not in time too, because it's
Speaker 2: a work for hire, work for hire, work for higher
Speaker 2: provision in the Copyright Act says that they own it
Speaker 2: and they own it in perpetuity, but nothing. There's no
Speaker 2: termination right for work for hire. However, here's the situation.
Speaker 2: It's long and a complicated reason. Under the Copyright Act,
Speaker 2: there are nine categories that work for hire, nine categories.
Speaker 2: Sound recordings are not one of the nine categories. Audio
Speaker 2: visual works are one of the nine categories. As an example,
Speaker 2: the collective works are a category but doesn't say sound recordings.
Speaker 2: In the year to nineteen ninety nine, the RIAA Record
Speaker 2: Industry Association of America got Congress to add a tenth
Speaker 2: category sound recordings to the list of to the list
Speaker 2: of nine categories which made sound recordings that work for hire,
Speaker 2: which means you could terminate number of us. It was
Speaker 2: Cheryl Crow, Don Henley Irving Azoff and I got involved
Speaker 2: myself on behalf of Cheryl, and we protested the Congress
Speaker 2: that they shouldn't have passed this law. Okay, it was
Speaker 2: included in a one thousand page stock television amendment. Okay,
Speaker 2: that's where it was included. I contacted Howard Berman and
Speaker 2: then Howard Kobel. They were the Howard Cobel was the
Speaker 2: chairman of the Appropriate Committee and Howard Berman was the
Speaker 2: ranking member. They decided to hold hearings on this thing.
Speaker 2: I got Cheryl Crow to go back and testify. I
Speaker 2: went and testified, and this is the year two thousand.
Speaker 2: The year two thousand, we had dueling professors. Helen Rosen
Speaker 2: was the head of the RAA at that time. She testified.
Speaker 2: We had a professor. They had a professor carry grat
Speaker 2: carry grad. Kerry Sherman was the general consul for the
Speaker 2: ra He testified on the other side and it became
Speaker 2: very clear to Coward Coble and Howard Berman that they
Speaker 2: made a mistake. They shouldn't have They shouldn't have passed
Speaker 2: this without a hearing, with no hearing when they passed that.
Speaker 2: So they called Kerry Sherman to myself into a room
Speaker 2: and they said, they said, come up with language to
Speaker 2: remove this language. And we came up with language. It
Speaker 2: took her quite a while. The two of us came
Speaker 2: up with the language. They finally passed it, and so
Speaker 2: sound recordings was removed as a tenth category. Notwithstanding that fact,
Speaker 2: the the record companies to this day claim when you
Speaker 2: send your termination notice that it's worked for hire and
Speaker 2: therefore there's no right to terminate. There's litigation pending on
Speaker 2: this which has not been There is no resulve, and
Speaker 2: the record companies refuse to acknowledge that there's a right
Speaker 2: of termination. You're saying the is a collective work and
Speaker 2: therefore it falls within the falls within the ten nine categories.
Speaker 2: As I say, there's no result in litigation. So what
Speaker 2: happens on when you send your termination notice? They say
Speaker 2: you have no right to terminate, but let's talk, and
Speaker 2: then they generally will negotiate and the advance and negotiate
Speaker 2: higher royalties and things of that nature. And there's no
Speaker 2: consistent way it's done, and they're all Every record company
Speaker 2: is different, Every record company attrius it differently. That's the
Speaker 2: state of the art. There's no answer to that question
Speaker 2: except the record companies maintained it is a work for
Speaker 2: hire and there's no right to termine it.
Speaker 1: Okay, do you anticipate one of these cases going to trial.
Speaker 2: There's two pending out there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, let's go back to the recording contract. Used
Speaker 1: to be that lawyers would shop deals. Is that still
Speaker 1: a factor at all? Or how many people come in
Speaker 1: and say the label's interest in me, I need a lawyer.
Speaker 2: Well, if the label is interested, they're not shopping. No,
Speaker 2: I won't. I won't shop I don't know how many
Speaker 2: attorneys are doing it shopping at this point. I won't
Speaker 2: do it. The reason why we don't, I'll tell you why.
Speaker 2: The reason we don't do it myself and everybody else
Speaker 2: probably similar, which is the one thing we have is access.
Speaker 2: I can call over and get somebody on the phone.
Speaker 2: But if I'm calling up to find out if they
Speaker 2: if they're interested in my latest deal. They're not going
Speaker 2: to be answering the phone. We need, we need access
Speaker 2: and shopping is the worst thing you can do because
Speaker 2: now they don't want to take their call because they
Speaker 2: don't they don't like to say a lot of people
Speaker 2: they don't like to say no. They don't like to
Speaker 2: tell you no. So I stay away. I'm sure a
Speaker 2: lot of people are that stay away from shopping. It's bad.
Speaker 2: I don't want to do it. But if the label
Speaker 2: says I'm interested, I said, then I'll call them and say, okay,
Speaker 2: I'll talk to you now now.
Speaker 1: But there are fewer major labels who are putting out
Speaker 1: less product. Yeah, so basically everybody walks through the door
Speaker 1: has a deal or do you have other acts who
Speaker 1: say I'm doing incredible on the road. I don't want
Speaker 1: to make a major label deal, but I need representation.
Speaker 2: Well I can give representation. Well, I'm not going to shop,
Speaker 2: but maybe I can get them to a manager or
Speaker 2: to somebody who will do that. A good manager. There
Speaker 2: are good there are good managers who will do will
Speaker 2: do that with with talent, they will do that, and
Speaker 2: that's fine. I don't want to have my name attached
Speaker 2: to it. I'm sure there's a lot of otheritorians feel
Speaker 2: the same way. Don't want to shop.
Speaker 1: How about the other thing in California where we've had
Speaker 1: this issue for sixty years now, where if someone who's
Speaker 1: not an attorney or licensed talent agent gets work, the
Speaker 1: contract can be voided and no money is owed. What's
Speaker 1: the status of that and what's your experience.
Speaker 2: That hasn't That hasn't changed. Uh, that hasn't changed at all.
Speaker 2: An agent has licensed to to solicit work, okay, and
Speaker 2: if you don't, if you don't have that, your you're
Speaker 2: at risk. There have been cases on that subject. I
Speaker 2: haven't had that discussion for quite some time, but there
Speaker 2: was who's named Matthew kates H exactly right? Oh god,
Speaker 2: the name came out on where that name came out.
Speaker 2: But yeah, that's it. Uh, there has I haven't had much.
Speaker 2: I haven't seen much of that lately because I guess
Speaker 2: talent or I actually have anybody who will go try
Speaker 2: and shop shop for them, and they will. I feel
Speaker 2: sorry for talent because it's hard for them to get
Speaker 2: doors open to them, and it's hard to get into
Speaker 2: the agencies because the agencies are busy, they they're responsible
Speaker 2: for the any talent that they have, and so some
Speaker 2: of them are. It's hard to get into the agency,
Speaker 2: hard to get an agent, and they're not easy, so
Speaker 2: the attorneys are not doing it. It's difficult to get
Speaker 2: an agent. So when you find someone who's willing to
Speaker 2: put their put themselves out there, nobody's trying to nobody's
Speaker 2: right now trying to kill those people who are trying
Speaker 2: to say no, don't do that, because the talent has
Speaker 2: nowhere else to go. The only thing the talent can
Speaker 2: do is keep performing showcases right and hopefully somebody shows
Speaker 2: up that that might be interested in them. But it's
Speaker 2: not easy. But so what we can do is sometimes
Speaker 2: refer them to a manager, who is if we think
Speaker 2: something is really good, we'll refer to a manager, and
Speaker 2: the managers go ahead and notwithstanding the law, because nobody's
Speaker 2: really interested and going after managers for trying to shop.
Speaker 2: There's nobody interested in that because there's nowhere else the
Speaker 2: talent has to look.
Speaker 1: Okay, Now, there are certain managers who have handshake agreements,
Speaker 1: others have contracts. What do you advise the talent and
Speaker 1: what has been your experience in terms of what whether
Speaker 1: people want a contract or not?
Speaker 2: Well, what type of person wants to contract?
Speaker 1: Let's say you're representing talent. Talent now has a manager, right,
Speaker 1: some managers want paper, other managers don't. Do you advise
Speaker 1: the act one way or another? And if there is paper,
Speaker 1: what are the key points you're negotiating?
Speaker 2: Well, I think there probably should be a paper the
Speaker 2: keyboard are the royalties? Are the bed's a commission? I
Speaker 2: should say, what's the commission? How long is the contract?
Speaker 2: The big things are, yeah, what's the commission? And how long?
Speaker 2: And how long is the contract? And is there a
Speaker 2: sunset clause? Right?
Speaker 1: Okay, So just going back to the record companies. You know,
Speaker 1: sixty years ago you had two albums a year. The
Speaker 1: total might be of the contract seven years might be
Speaker 1: fourteen albums. What is what are the deliverables today? And
Speaker 1: what are the terms today?
Speaker 2: Well, lucky if you get one album a year now,
Speaker 2: and usually the contracts are the contracts are usually a
Speaker 2: lens of about how many albums? There's the four albums
Speaker 2: are the five albums and six albums and the seven albums?
Speaker 2: There were contracts years ago. We all remember contracts of
Speaker 2: twenty albums and twenty two albums and twenty four albums
Speaker 2: and things like that. Today it's usually somewhere between five
Speaker 2: to five to six to seven albums, sometimes four, a
Speaker 2: lot less than what it a lot less to what
Speaker 2: it used to be. That's probably more typical somewhere there
Speaker 2: usually five somewhere between five to seven albums, which is
Speaker 2: still a lot on behalf of talent. I'd like to
Speaker 2: see less. I'd like to see the more than four
Speaker 2: quite frankly.
Speaker 1: Okay. Then we have the seven year clause, and the
Speaker 1: issue is whether it's it's been seven years the label
Speaker 1: argue haven't delivered all the product. But we did have
Speaker 1: one act of then sevenfold who left Warner and went
Speaker 1: to Capital. What are your thoughts on that now?
Speaker 2: Okay, I've got definite thoughts on that. Okay. California, we
Speaker 2: have a seven year statue. Seven years statute applies to
Speaker 2: everybody in the state of California. Seven years. And there
Speaker 2: was a famous case on there is oliviited to Havel
Speaker 2: then get Warner Brothers. And although she was put on
Speaker 2: suspension because she didn't perform in certain things, the court
Speaker 2: said in California, seven years mean seven years. Okay, seven
Speaker 2: years mean seven years. Seven years. She's out, whether she
Speaker 2: performed or not. Now here's another battle we had with
Speaker 2: the recording artist coalition, which I helped form. We had
Speaker 2: the battle of the one in the Congress I told
Speaker 2: you about, and then this was the second battle. So
Speaker 2: Ora comes into California and says, uha, seven years should
Speaker 2: not apply to the record industry, and if they don't,
Speaker 2: it should be. They first came in and said it
Speaker 2: should be ten years for record people. Ten years eventually
Speaker 2: what And I went up there on behalf of a
Speaker 2: number of artists to oppose that legend. Uh. The uh
Speaker 2: it passed and it passed anyway. Uh. And their argument was, well,
Speaker 2: the artist is not delivering all the stuff we should
Speaker 2: we should they should not be allowed out of their contract. Uh.
Speaker 2: But seven years applies to everybody else in California. Why
Speaker 2: shouldn't have applied the recording artists that placed the actors
Speaker 2: applies to everybody else. Their arguments said, well, they committed
Speaker 2: to the seven years that should be it should be. Uh.
Speaker 2: And we we we made an investment in the artists,
Speaker 2: so as they start in the film studio and make
Speaker 2: an investment that their there are actors. And they won
Speaker 2: the day, which basically said, if you don't deliver all
Speaker 2: the products, even if it's on option, even if the
Speaker 2: option was not exercised, Uh, you have to you have
Speaker 2: to deliver the album and if you have and if
Speaker 2: you haven't done that, you're liable for damages. You're liable
Speaker 2: for damages were undelivered damages for what? What are the damages?
Speaker 2: So what album sold ten million albums? Next album could
Speaker 2: sell nothing? We don't know what are the damages. Are
Speaker 2: the damages the basis of what you would have made
Speaker 2: on ten million albums? Uncertain? There's no answer. There's no
Speaker 2: answer to that at all. But they got they got
Speaker 2: the legislature in California to agree that artists could be
Speaker 2: sued for damage for damages for undelivered product even though
Speaker 2: they weren't optioned in the state of California. And that's
Speaker 2: the state of the law. Now. It's preposterous. In my
Speaker 2: personal opinion, it should never have happened. As I say,
Speaker 2: I opposed it on behalf of the artists. I went
Speaker 2: up there to testifying along with Don Henley and others.
Speaker 2: Don Henley was not my client, but we were part
Speaker 2: of the same artist coalition. Recording Artists Coalition and we
Speaker 2: opposed the legislation. Unfortunately, we didn't win that, or we
Speaker 2: lost that, however you want to describe it. It's not right,
Speaker 2: but that is the state of the law in the
Speaker 2: state of California. So even if they haven't delivered all
Speaker 2: the products in the seven year period, they can't get out.
Speaker 2: They can't get out.
Speaker 1: Okay. Let's shift to publishing for a second. So it
Speaker 1: has been your experience with termination rights in publishing.
Speaker 2: Been more positive, much more positive. So far. We've had
Speaker 2: no issue with getting people out of the contract. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I stopped out of the country. I'm sorry. We have
Speaker 2: no problem not terminating and not getting the rights back. Correct.
Speaker 1: Okay. So let's say you have what they call a
Speaker 1: heritage artist, someone whose heyday of recordings is in the past,
Speaker 1: and they walk in and they say, okay, I have
Speaker 1: the right of termination. A lot of them will immediately
Speaker 1: make a deal with the person who had it before.
Speaker 1: What would you advise someone who now has an asset
Speaker 1: which they've regained, Well, it all.
Speaker 2: Depends on their relationship. If you're with a good publisher,
Speaker 2: you're with a good publisher, you probably want to stay
Speaker 2: with a good publisher. So you make it. You make
Speaker 2: a new deal, make yourself a better deal, maybe get
Speaker 2: some advances, better royalties, what have you. If you've got
Speaker 2: a good publisher, why not stay with them? Don't You
Speaker 2: don't give them the ownership necessarily, you will make a
Speaker 2: deal for what we call an administration deal, and you
Speaker 2: get more favorable rates instead. Instead of the publisher getting
Speaker 2: fifty percent or twenty five percent, maybe you get them
Speaker 2: down to ten percent, maybe even five percent. But if
Speaker 2: you've got a good publisher, a good publisher, are you
Speaker 2: really want a good publisher, and good publishers are very effective,
Speaker 2: why not make a deal with them. Unless you're very
Speaker 2: unhappy with that particular publisher, and then okay, take your
Speaker 2: stuff back and run somewhere else. But you're still going
Speaker 2: to have to make a deal with somebody. You can't
Speaker 2: do it yourself. You can't do it by advise it.
Speaker 2: I guess doing it yourself. There's too much to administrate,
Speaker 2: there's too many licenses to do, there's too much knowledge
Speaker 2: you need about what the latest deals are, et cetera.
Speaker 2: So do your termination right and make a deal. If
Speaker 2: you like the publisher, make a deal with the publisher
Speaker 2: the same one.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the beginning of a contract. Sure, you
Speaker 1: make a deal with a major label doesn't include publishing rights,
Speaker 1: and different publishers will come and say I'll buy the
Speaker 1: publishing or a license it. They're different deals. Do you
Speaker 1: advise taking the money? What do you advise an act
Speaker 1: at the beginning of their career relative to publishing.
Speaker 2: My general advice, without anything else is, never give up
Speaker 2: ownership of your publisher. Never give up ownership. Make an
Speaker 2: administration deal for them to administrate for a limited period
Speaker 2: of time, and then it gives you. If they do
Speaker 2: a good job, you'll do another one with them. If
Speaker 2: they're not doing any job, you'll go with somebody else.
Speaker 2: But never ever, ever give up ownership of your copyrights.
Speaker 1: Which brings the next question. We are now an era
Speaker 1: where people are selling their copyrights out right Hypnosis, Primary Wave.
Speaker 1: There are a number of these companies round hill. What's
Speaker 1: your advice to clients on that.
Speaker 2: That's a person, it's a personal thing. If they the
Speaker 2: mondies are very big. Some of these copyrights have gone
Speaker 2: for as much as the thirty times multiple s are
Speaker 2: twenty five times multiple summer, twenty sixth summer, or twenty
Speaker 2: or less This is a personal question. It's not that
Speaker 2: we could have advice on them, because it's a person.
Speaker 2: It has to do with their personal finances and their
Speaker 2: personal future. If they if they feel that they don't
Speaker 2: mind losing control of their copyrights and they want to
Speaker 2: pocket a lot of money, then you do the deal.
Speaker 2: But if you want to control of your copyrights, really
Speaker 2: control your cover, then you don't sell because once you sell,
Speaker 2: although you can retain limited controls, limited but limited approval rights,
Speaker 2: I should not control limited approval rights. Again, you got
Speaker 2: down to I've heard a songwriters say, these are my babies,
Speaker 2: these are benter creation. Well, do you want to sell
Speaker 2: your baby? Do you want to sell your creation? I
Speaker 2: never advised them to sell. Unless the money is so
Speaker 2: big that they say, wow, I can make a score
Speaker 2: now and I don't have to worry for the rest
Speaker 2: of my life. That's a different choice.
Speaker 1: Okay, what we have seen in the digital era is
Speaker 1: they said the sky was falling, you know, twenty years ago,
Speaker 1: and now there are endless new avenues of remuteration. And
Speaker 1: everybody I know has sold before this previous run up
Speaker 1: it has always regretted it. So thirty X, if you're
Speaker 1: seventy looks like a really good number. Not that many
Speaker 1: people live to one hundred. But assuming I didn't need
Speaker 1: the cash, what would you tell me.
Speaker 2: Well, what's the reason for selling it? I don't see
Speaker 2: the reason why killing it if somebody can make a
Speaker 2: big score, and some of you see if people have
Speaker 2: made a big score. But if you don't need the cash,
Speaker 2: and you don't have something to do with that cash
Speaker 2: right now, you have there's certain investments you'd like to do.
Speaker 2: You'd like to buy this building or or buy a
Speaker 2: yacht or whatever you have in mind, there could be
Speaker 2: a reason to do it. But absent that, unless you
Speaker 2: have a specific reason what you want to do with
Speaker 2: the money, or you're fearful about the future and you
Speaker 2: want to put this money away, those are reasons to
Speaker 2: not to sell. But when you yours, when you sell,
Speaker 2: you giving up a certain amount of control. It's your
Speaker 2: I've heard songwriter say these are my babies. Well, do
Speaker 2: you want to sell your baby? Uh? You want to
Speaker 2: sell your You want to sell the control of this copyright?
Speaker 2: What can be done with it? What can how it
Speaker 2: can be used? Who who can license it or where
Speaker 2: where it can be used? Tough questions.
Speaker 1: And in terms of overall revenues from recordings, do you
Speaker 1: see what do you see coming down the pike?
Speaker 2: Revenues revenues are are very good right now and increasing
Speaker 2: because of because of streaming. Uh. The streaming has uh
Speaker 2: recovery has recovered the or it has caused the music
Speaker 2: industry to recover from the adultgens that went through after
Speaker 2: the nineties. Uh, it went really really down. Uh, and
Speaker 2: streaming has been a savior for it. And there's uh
Speaker 2: the royalties seemed to increase. Uh. The so it's been
Speaker 2: a boon. It's been a boon for the for the
Speaker 2: record industry, for the artists UH that participated. Uh. Very
Speaker 2: it's very very good, very good to see.
Speaker 1: Okay, there are many artists and artists are not always
Speaker 1: informed on the economics who decry streaming payouts and and
Speaker 1: we know that if you stream in quantity, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of money there. What is your viewpoint overall on
Speaker 1: streaming payouts.
Speaker 2: Well, there's two aspects of the streaming aspect. One is
Speaker 2: the recordings stream backs for the recording that are the streaming,
Speaker 2: and then there's one for the songwriters. The difficulty for
Speaker 2: the songwriters is in particular, their royalties are regulated by
Speaker 2: the government. There are hearings that have to be held
Speaker 2: as to what the streaming rates are for songwriters. Now,
Speaker 2: don't I don't think that the executives of companies would
Speaker 2: like their rates set by the government. Uh, And I
Speaker 2: don't think and songwriters certainly don't. And it's it's they
Speaker 2: really feel wronged that their future and their livelihood and
Speaker 2: their income is determined by the government in the sense
Speaker 2: that you have to has to be hearings on what
Speaker 2: the royalty rates are for that. Now, in other words,
Speaker 2: there's a mechanical rate which they're limited as it's been
Speaker 2: raised a little bit recently. There's the mechanical rate. There
Speaker 2: is the streaming rates which are regulated, has going up
Speaker 2: a little bit for them, but it's not the same
Speaker 2: regular regulation that the artists have. Part of their money,
Speaker 2: the artist's monies are regulated, but a good portion or
Speaker 2: not a good portion with the record companies where they
Speaker 2: can make a lot of money amount of money depending
Speaker 2: upon their deal. So the songwriters had the biggest complaint
Speaker 2: to make it this particular point because of all the
Speaker 2: regulations that their income is regulated by the government or
Speaker 2: our government decree. I should say.
Speaker 1: Prior to the digital era royalties, the record companies never
Speaker 1: paid one hundred percent on the royalties, and if you
Speaker 1: did audit it cost you a fortune. There was a window.
Speaker 1: If they found money, they settled. What's the status of
Speaker 1: the honesty of payments these days?
Speaker 2: Okay, let me answer it this way. I've never taken
Speaker 2: an audit. I'm not going to respond to the word honesty.
Speaker 2: I've never taken an audit of any company where we
Speaker 2: haven't found money. Okay? Is it mistakes? Is misallocation? What
Speaker 2: is it we always find bundy? Okay. I've never claimed
Speaker 2: that they're dishonest. Okay. There are so many ways that
Speaker 2: money can be calculated in a recording contract, and so
Speaker 2: many It comes in from so many sources, in so
Speaker 2: many ways, through so many departments of the record company.
Speaker 2: It's not so simple. And mistakes are made. Are they
Speaker 2: pretty good to correct the mistakes when you order and
Speaker 2: find them? Yes? Are they fighting you on these things?
Speaker 2: They'll fight because are the interpretation of the language. But generally,
Speaker 2: I have ever taken it long where we didn't find
Speaker 2: money and then we didn't settle. I've never had a
Speaker 2: suit one of these companies, never have had the sue
Speaker 2: one of these companies. We always resolve it. Are there
Speaker 2: things in there that we challenged that we never resolved? Yeah,
Speaker 2: there are some items like interest you really can get
Speaker 2: interest from them. Or foreign taxes is another thing. You
Speaker 2: always fight about whether they could have deducted from taxes
Speaker 2: paid in the United States, et cetera. But I can't
Speaker 2: say they've been dishonest. But let's say, if there's a question,
Speaker 2: of course, they're going to take a favorable interpretation. And
Speaker 2: a lot of these things are our questions as to
Speaker 2: where it belongs or what it is, or have they
Speaker 2: allocated it right. But I've settled every audit. I've never
Speaker 2: had to sue them. Did we get one hundred percent
Speaker 2: of what our claims in? No, we've never gotten one
Speaker 2: hundred percent of our claim claims in, but sufficient to
Speaker 2: satisfy the client.
Speaker 1: Okay, just switching to the live business for one second.
Speaker 1: Lawyers are heavily involved in negotiating tour deals. At this point,
Speaker 1: to what degree are you involved in that and what
Speaker 1: is the state of the business.
Speaker 2: Yes, we are true to a large degree the agent's
Speaker 2: run point on the tour deals. The agents are very
Speaker 2: They're all very good. All the agencies are very good
Speaker 2: at that. They've got a lot of experience. But we
Speaker 2: were there going over the scene, questioning. I'm monitoring it,
Speaker 2: putting our opinion on whether they it's certain items and
Speaker 2: the things that but we work alongside managers and agents
Speaker 2: and those things, not alone.
Speaker 1: And what's the status of insurance for cancelation of gigs
Speaker 1: for whatever reason?
Speaker 2: Today there's insurance that we try and maintain. I have
Speaker 2: not had a problem, not with not getting insured. We've
Speaker 2: always had insurance.
Speaker 1: Okay. To what degree has your practice of law been
Speaker 1: all consuming and to what degree it has affected your
Speaker 1: family life?
Speaker 2: Huh? I hadn't had a negative because I have. I've
Speaker 2: been married a long time. She was a musician, he
Speaker 2: is a musician herself. She's very, very understanding. So it's
Speaker 2: never been a problem with my wife. We've been married
Speaker 2: fifty some other year, fifty three years. That's not been
Speaker 2: a problem. But the business is all If you're going
Speaker 2: to do this business and do it right, whether you're
Speaker 2: a lawyer or an agent or a manager, it is
Speaker 2: all consuming. It takes a lot of time. It's not
Speaker 2: a nine to five job. It's weekends, not all weekends,
Speaker 2: but it's weekends, it's nights, it's during your vacation, etc.
Speaker 2: It goes with the territory. We don't think about it
Speaker 2: because we don't. It's just our job. It's just our
Speaker 2: job to do it, and we find a way to
Speaker 2: do it.
Speaker 1: And how did you meet your wife?
Speaker 2: I met her backstage at the Greek Theater. I was
Speaker 2: representing a featured act at that time, and she was
Speaker 2: joining the opening act.
Speaker 1: Okay, now you are in your nineties. I don't know
Speaker 1: whether you're comfortable saying your exact age. How much long
Speaker 1: are you going.
Speaker 2: To do this? I'm as long as I can. I
Speaker 2: love my job. I love the people I work with.
Speaker 2: I love my partners, I love my clients. Uh. As
Speaker 2: long as I'm healthy and UH can deal with it,
Speaker 2: I want to do it. I enjoy my I enjoy
Speaker 2: my work. I look forward to it. I get up
Speaker 2: every day looking forward to the day, looking forward to
Speaker 2: the interesting. I'm learning something every day. Why why wouldn't
Speaker 2: I What what we're gonna do is sit at home?
Speaker 2: Uh Uh. I enjoyed. I enjoy the clients I work with.
Speaker 2: I've got doc on wood, terrific clients. Uh uh. Interesting
Speaker 2: interesting issues. I'm learning something new every day. Uh. I
Speaker 2: never know enough. There's no way to know enough about
Speaker 2: this business. There's always something to learn every single day.
Speaker 2: Uh Uh. It keeps you going. I think it keeps
Speaker 2: you going.
Speaker 1: Okay, this is a business that a lot of people
Speaker 1: and this is a thing in general today they talk
Speaker 1: about in sports where people don't understand the history. What
Speaker 1: the young people not know about the entertainment business that
Speaker 1: they should know?
Speaker 2: No? No, well, okay, what the what it's It's a business. Okay,
Speaker 2: it's a serious business. It's not fun and games. It's
Speaker 2: a serious business. I guess learn your business. Learn learn
Speaker 2: what learn what you're in here was just not just law. Uh,
Speaker 2: it's not just accounting. It's it's a business. Learn the business. Uh,
Speaker 2: learned everything about it. There's no end to it, and
Speaker 2: it changes on every changes on a daily basis. Who
Speaker 2: knew that not that long ago? About streaming? Who know
Speaker 2: anything about streaming and what it is and where it's
Speaker 2: going and what is developed? Who knew was going to
Speaker 2: take over the took over the business? When I first
Speaker 2: got into this business, there was the contract I think
Speaker 2: I mentioned earlier. It was three pages. It was three
Speaker 2: pages long, get a Capitol Records contract. The first way
Speaker 2: I looked at that was three pages. It dealt with
Speaker 2: forty fives and thirty three and seventy eight's. We're a
Speaker 2: little ways from that, and it's been exciting. It's an
Speaker 2: exciting venture to go along to learn these things and
Speaker 2: see what people come up with and new and now
Speaker 2: we're going into AI and what do we deal with that?
Speaker 2: How are we dealing with that? So we're lucky we're
Speaker 2: studying that, trying to learn AI, trying to learn what
Speaker 2: it means, and how to prevent rip off of our
Speaker 2: client's voices and things of that nature. And we don't
Speaker 2: want licensing. We have to be careful with life. We
Speaker 2: don't want our product license into AI without our permission,
Speaker 2: without knowing exactly what it is. And we've got to
Speaker 2: learn all about that. You're constantly learning. Learning is what
Speaker 2: keeps you going, not sitting on your rear end at
Speaker 2: home reading a book.
Speaker 1: Okay, Jay, you're you know, you're amazing, as sharp as ever.
Speaker 1: You've seen it all and I want to thank you
Speaker 1: for taking this time to share your wisdom and your
Speaker 1: story with my audience.
Speaker 2: Well, well, thank you. Uh it's been It's been a
Speaker 2: real pleasure. I just wanted to finish with one thing.
Speaker 2: We started off with Rod Temperton. Then, Uh, as I
Speaker 2: told you on the phone. I think we told you
Speaker 2: on the phone. The most amazing thing about Rod is
Speaker 2: when Quincy heard the When Quincy heard the the recording
Speaker 2: is by heat Wave. Uh, and he called Rod Temperton,
Speaker 2: and Rod Temperton came into came in here. First song
Speaker 2: Rod wrote was off the Wall. Uh, it's extraordinary. And
Speaker 2: then the next thing he wrote that was the next thing,
Speaker 2: or a couple of songs later he wrote was for
Speaker 2: the next album, Thriller. He wrote, thriller. Uh, it's extraordinary.
Speaker 2: It's this little guy from from the north of England
Speaker 2: who came out of nowhere.
Speaker 1: Well, okay, so when someone walks in your office, do
Speaker 1: you know who's gonna make it? And now how big
Speaker 1: they're gonna be?
Speaker 2: No, you don't know. You don't know. You can guess.
Speaker 2: You can guess as to who's not gonna make it.
Speaker 2: You can guess who's not gonna make it. But when
Speaker 2: somebody comes in with songs like he wrote with heat
Speaker 2: Wave as an example as an example, you you know,
Speaker 2: you know it's only a matter of time, and I've
Speaker 2: had that experience with a number of artists and songwriters.
Speaker 2: You come in and you hear some of that stuff,
Speaker 2: you say, there's no problem here.
Speaker 1: Okay Jay, Thanks again, many more years of practice for you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Thank you doctor.
Speaker 1: Until next time, This is Bob left sex