https://spoti.fi/42l6cXf

This is why you never sell your publishing.

I knew Luke Combs covered Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car.” I made a mental note to catch it at some point, but it wasn’t front of mind, not something I had to do right away, until I saw this:

https://bit.ly/44PNXuH

That’s a TikTok clip. You should watch it. This shows the power of the platform. Because of Combs’s authenticity. Combs breaks all the rules. He’s not movie star beautiful, he’s not wearing spandex, but jeans. And you can’t even see any tattoos on his arms. And he’s telling a story almost anyone can connect with, about his dad, about growing up.

Meanwhile, since Combs is a country singer, you’d think his father is a yahoo from down south. But he’s from Akron, Ohio. And Combs says he listened to all kinds of music. That his dad’s first concert was Pink Floyd and the James Gang the night we landed on the moon. Whew!

And the story goes on…

And ends before Combs plays the song!

By conventional music business wisdom this is a missed opportunity. The audience is right there, hooked, it’s so hard to gain attention in today’s economy. But that is not what Combs is selling here. He’s not selling at all! He’s giving a view into his identity, and when an artist does it right, you can relate. I ask you, how much of the Spotify Top 50 can you relate to?

Now “Fast Car” was a hit in 1988. That’s thirty five years ago. Almost two generations. What are the odds Combs’s audience is familiar with it? Low. It’s brand new to them! And when a song is great, it’s ever green.

And if you hear this story, you’ve got to play the record, and I immediately went to Spotify and did.

It’s not that different from the original. Oh, a few words are changed to fit Combs’ modern, male identity, but that riff… You listen to it and think about how hard it is to play, about Combs practicing it long before he broke through. And it resonates just as much as it did back when, it’s got the same dark feel… Turns out “Fast Car” is forever. Like Toto’s “Africa,” an afterthought on the album that has 1,423,651,528 Spotify streams in its original iteration, never mind the 75+ million of the Weezer cover and the multiple versions on YouTube. There’s money there… A LOT of money.

Now this could not be predicted. These are not Beatles records that never went away. Meanwhile, Paul McCartney knows the value of publishing, that’s why he bought all those companies. But some of his contemporaries are blowing out their songs, even their royalty streams for their records, convinced that this is a once in a lifetime period, that they’re pulling the wool over the acquiring companies’ eyes.

Now they don’t account for a cover of “Fast Car” decades after its initial release when they value a catalog, they look at the past, not the future, no one can predict the future. These companies look at what you’ve earned, oftentimes decreasing over years, and then they pay you a multiple. Maybe you’re even a superstar and you get north of 20x, but probably not if you’re someone with one hit, that’s been lying somewhat dormant. This is a banking transaction, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise, where do you think all that money comes from?

And you get that chunk of change…

Your manager takes a cut. And the government takes a huge piece. And then what do you do with the money? Anybody who tells you you can get a guaranteed 10% a year, never mind more, is lying. There are no guarantees. And the people making more than 10% know they’re taking a risk, which is why they diversify, they don’t have all their cash in high risk ventures. And everybody in the market took a 30% haircut a year ago. And it hasn’t come fully back. So not only is your asset worth less, you’ve given up that yearly income, so you have to drain money from the asset in order to put food on the table. Because you’re never going to get paid again. Sure, you can go on the road, but maybe you can’t. There’s not a demand for every act out there. And the economics might not work, not every musician can play solo, the audience might expect a full band, never mind the travel expenses, never mind the fact that it’s hard work, not so much the ninety minutes you’re on stage, but the other twenty two and a half hours in the day, away from home.

But the above screed won’t make a difference. Because if you’re a great musician, you’re almost always bad with money. And vice versa, those great with money are not great artists. So you see that pile of cash. And your team is telling you to take it, after all they get a commission, and everybody else is selling, and then…

You hear one of your old hits on the radio. But instead of smiling, you’re wincing. Because as the track runs up the chart you’re not being paid, the publisher/bank is. You feel ripped-off, all that hard work you put in to making it, the experience of writing the song, whatever fame you still have, it’s completely irrelevant, when it comes to money you’re gonna get none. And I ask you punk, how is that gonna feel? LOUSY!

P.S. When you click on that TikTok link you’ll be asked to log in, just close that window, it’s unnecessary, you can watch the clip without registering.

P.P.S. As of this writing Luke Combs’s version of “Fast Car” has 52+ million streams on Spotify, it’s already reached #2 on the country chart and it’s not over yet.