In 2014 three highly regarded FAC artist executives Crispin Hunt ,Mark Kelly and Martyn Ware ( Human League/Heaven 17) resigned reportedly due to a lack of artist autonomy and concerns over the Google and Spotify funding. And now we have reports that MMF are trying to neutralize Hunt and Kelly by having MMF chief executive Jon Webster challenge them for a board seat at the PPL Director Elections. PPL is the UK organization that collects and distributes public performance royalties to performers and labels. Crispin and Mark currently occupy a board seat reserved for artists representatives.
So the managers are standing against the artists for a hard fought artists position? MMF want to remove an artist from the board and replace them with a pro Spotify manager/former record executive? How is that even allowed? In what capacity is he a performer or possibly represent performers? Manager? Give me a break. The history of pop music shows managers rarely have the long term interests of artists at heart. Why don’t we just go ahead and let the foxes guard the henhouse also?
Great heads up.
I generally don’t vote in these things, but saw this post and voted online immediately. I hope other PPL members read Trichordist.