Warner Music to ditch legacy artists’ unrecouped debt

Effective from 1 July 2022, the new initiative will disregard unrecouped advances taken by musicians who joined the label before 2000 and have not taken any further advances since 2000.

“For our artists and songwriters who signed to us before 2000 and didn’t receive an advance during or after 2000, we won’t apply their unrecouped advances to royalty statements for any period beginning 1 July 2022 or after,” WMG said, adding that “the programme will also benefit other artist royalty participants such as producers, engineers, mixers and remixers.”

The move could help eligible musicians to start earning royalties. Unrecouped advances were a big talking point at a UK inquiry into the economics of music streaming last year, with industry stakeholders debating whether companies should wipe out debt from the pre-streaming era to give artists more money for the streams generated from their work.

Shortly after the debate at the UK inquiry, Sony introduced a similar policy in June called the Legacy Unrecouped Balance Programme, which pays out royalties to legacy musicians who signed to the label before 2000 and are yet to recover their advances. In July, the music company extended the policy to its publishing arm. Universal Music, meanwhile, is expected to introduce a similar policy in the coming weeks that will effectively wipe unrecouped balances for its heritage artists, MBW reported.

WMG confirmed the unrecouped advances programme in its first Environment Social Governance (ESG) report, which was published today. The document was helmed by ESG vice-president Samantha Sims and the ESG executive oversight committee, with input from more than 70 employees.

Warner says the document is used as a “vehicle to communicate to key stakeholders and a baseline for WMG to measure its ESG progress in areas including employee well-being, diversity, equity, inclusion, social impact and climate change”. It also delves into other issues including mental health programmes for employees.