Thrash metal titans Metallica are backing a new initiative, the Heavy Music Collective, designed to help heavy music artists reclaim potentially millions of dollars in unclaimed streaming royalties. In a new video explaining the organization’s mission, co-founder Ben Koller of Converge detailed the urgent problem: if musicians don’t claim their mechanical royalties from streaming services within three years, the money is legally given back to major music publishers.
The new organization, launched by Koller and royalty expert Dan Hegarty, is a division of the global publishing administrator Word Collections, in which Metallica is the lead investor. The collective aims to navigate the complex, country-by-country system of royalty collection on behalf of artists.
In a video announcement, Koller broke down the critical issue facing independent artists in the streaming era.
He said (as transcribed by theprp):
“If you have music on the streaming services like Apple Music and Spotify, you probably want to hear about this. In 2018 the Music Modernization Act was passed. This law created an agency called the MLC, the Mechanical Licensing Collective. When you put your song on Spotify, it has two royalty halves. One is the sound recording, one is the musical composition.”
“The musical composition generates a mechanical royalty. Spotify and Apple Music, and everybody else has to pay that money to the mechanical licensing collective. Once it’s there, it’s your job to go and find it and fill out all the paperwork and claim the money that’s rightfully yours. But guess what? If you don’t claim that money in three years, they are legally allowed to take it all back and give it to the major music publishers. So, with the Heavy Music Collective, it’s our job to find all that money that’s rightfully yours and get it before they do.”
“But hey guess what? That’s only in the United States. If your music streams in England, France, Australia, Japan — you get mechanical royalties there too. But guess what? All those countries have different organizations you have to get your money from, and if you don’t get it, it goes to the major music publishers. Noticing a trend here?”
In their official launch post, the Heavy Music Collective defined their mission.
Their full post reads:
“Introducing…the Heavy Music Collective! The Heavy Music Collective is a community of musicians and royalties professionals that are committed to getting money back to the bands. We are a division of Word Collections, a global publishing administrator that has Metallica as its lead investor. Heavy Music Collective co-founder @benjaminkoller (Converge, Killer Be Killed, Mutoid Man) explains why heavy music songwriters aren’t getting all of their royalties.”
The Heavy Music Collective has already amassed an impressive initial roster of clients, including Metallica, Baroness, Converge, The Offspring, Greta Van Fleet, and Yngwie Malmsteen. The launch of the initiative is a significant and much-needed development for independent artists, ensuring that the money earned by their music ends up in their own hands.
You can visit their website for more info.
