Paul McCartney Get The Rights To His Beatles Songs Back?
Aside from the Lennon and McCartney songs being such a valuable asset for Sony/ATV, the latter Beatle has another association with the publisher, of course, thanks to that popular music publishing story that it was McCartney who advised a then young Michael Jackson to invest his growing wealth in song rights. Only to see the king of pop take control of the famous Beatles songs by buying up ATV, which had in turn outbid Lennon and McCartney when they tried to buy the fab four’s original publisher Northern Songs. This soured McCartney’s friendship with Jackson, with the one time Beatle, on occasion, complaining about having to pay the popstar to perform his own songs, though Macca insists he got over that frustration long ago. That’s possibly because McCartney’s reversion right dates started to appear on the horizon. Because, thanks to a change to American copyright law in the 1970s, songwriters who assigned their rights to publishers get a one-off chance to claim their copyrights back.
The reversion right usually kicks in at 35 years after assignment, though for songs published before 1978 it is 56 years after the original deal was done. Which means old man McCartney’s reversion rights are still to kick in, but the dates are now looming pretty close. To exercise this right, a songwriter must file paperwork with the US Copyright Office no later than two years before the reversion right date. And, according to Billboard, McCartney – who has talked about exercising his reversion rights with the media in the past – has now filed the paperwork for 32 of his Sony/ATV published songs.
Many of the songs listed in that paperwork won’t actually revert until 2025, though given the works will have another 70 years of protection after McCartney’s death, it’s certainly worth taking the copyrights back. Once the rights have reverted, McCartney could negotiate a new deal with Sony/ATV, or with another publisher, or keep the copyrights for himself and hire a rights administrator.
The reversion only applies to the US, and only covers McCartney’s share in the songs he co-wrote with John Lennon. Yoko Ono seemingly reached a new deal with Sony/ATV years back over Lennon’s share in the songs, which means the reversion right at 56 years no longer applies.
As for the impact McCartney exercising his reversion rights has on the publishing company Sony just spent $750 million to wholly own, well, the firm has known for decades that this is coming, and it won’t affect their existing rights in the famous Beatles songs outside the US. Plus the company could still try to negotiate a new deal with McCartney, perhaps offering better terms on the rest of the world to continue repping the works in America.
Source: Global Music Update
