Catalogs and Cash:

Tag: IP rights

  • What the De La Soul catalog story teaches us about uncleared samples and digital distribution

    For years, De La Soul’s pioneering catalog was effectively invisible to an entire generation of listeners — absent from every streaming platform because of uncleared samples buried in the music. Golnar Khosrowshahi, founder and CEO of Reservoir Media, shares what it took to finally bring it online in her appearance on Billboard’s On the Record.

    1. Uncleared samples can lock an entire catalog off streaming platforms

    When Reservoir acquired the Tommy Boy Records catalog in June 2021, one of the most urgent priorities was De La Soul’s music, which had never been available on digital streaming platforms due to uncleared samples embedded throughout their recordings. The group were pioneers of hip-hop’s golden era and among the most critically lauded artists in the genre’s history — yet an entire generation of listeners had no easy way to access their music. Every uncleared sample was a legal liability that had to be resolved before a single track could go live.

    “We purchased Tommy Boy in June of 2021. The first call was to them — and then we spent 18 months clearing the samples.”

    2. Sample clearance is one of the most labor-intensive processes in the business

    The 18-month clearance process for the De La Soul catalog was run on Excel spreadsheets, weekly phone calls, and extensive human coordination — tracking down rights holders, negotiating terms, and documenting every cleared sample one by one. For a catalog as sample-dense as De La Soul’s, this was an enormous undertaking. It required Reservoir to trace the ownership of dozens of interpolated recordings, often across multiple rights holders, label mergers, and estate arrangements. The complexity is a window into why so many catalogs with uncleared samples simply sit in limbo rather than getting resolved.

    “It was run on an Excel spreadsheet with weekly phone calls and a lot of human interaction and recall — an 18-month exercise to get the music ready for the first time on digital platforms.”

    3. Clearing samples can unlock enormous additional value

    Getting De La Soul’s music onto streaming platforms was not just a logistical achievement — it was a commercial one. Once the catalog was live, it was eligible for sync licensing opportunities that had previously been off the table. One of the first to materialize: “3 Is the Magic Number” appearing in the credits of Spider-Man in November, just weeks before Reservoir released the first De La Soul single in January 2023 and the full catalog on March 3rd. A song that had been stuck in legal limbo suddenly had one of the biggest possible promotional platforms in the world.

    “That opened up licensing for ‘3 Is the Magic Number’ in the credits of Spider-Man — which happened the November before we released the music.”

    4. The human cost was devastating — and the timing made it worse

    The clearance work and the eventual streaming release were meant to be a triumphant moment for De La Soul — a long overdue recognition of their legacy and a chance for the three members to finally see their music reach the audience it deserved. Instead, founding member Dave Jolicoeur passed away just weeks before the catalog went live, leaving the group and the Reservoir team to navigate the release in the shadow of grief. For Khosrowshahi, the loss was not primarily a business setback — it was a deeply personal one.

    “What made me the most sad was that they wouldn’t enjoy this moment together, the three of them — with their families. It was going to be such an important moment for them.”

    5. AI could transform sample clearance — and the implications are significant

    Khosrowshahi reflects that the same 18-month clearance process, if undertaken today with AI-assisted tools, could potentially be compressed to a fraction of the time. Sample identification, rights chain research, and clearance tracking are exactly the kinds of repetitive, data-intensive tasks that AI tools are rapidly improving at. For catalog owners sitting on music with uncleared samples, this is potentially transformative: value that has been locked away for legal reasons may become accessible far more quickly and cheaply than it would have been just a few years ago.

    “I wonder if 18 months would be one month — because we would be able to use AI tools to help us clear the samples.”

    Based on Golnar Khosrowshahi’s appearance on On the Record, Billboard’s music industry podcast.

  • Taylor Swift, Big Machine, and Shamrock: what the catalog sale taught the industry

    No catalog sale in history generated more public attention than when Big Machine Records sold Taylor Swift’s master recordings to Shamrock Holdings. Golnar Khosrowshahi, founder and CEO of Reservoir Media, reflects on what the saga actually taught the music business in her conversation on Billboard’s On the Record.

    1. It exposed the gap between financial investors and music companies

    The sale drew a sharp public line between two very different kinds of buyers operating in the catalog market. On one side: financial investors like Shamrock whose primary interest is cash flow acquisition and return on investment. On the other: music companies and labels with active platforms, artist relationships, and a long-term stake in how a catalog is managed. Most catalog deals happen quietly between industry insiders. This one played out in public, and it forced a mainstream audience to reckon with the fact that music rights can change hands without an artist’s involvement or consent.

    “It started to shed light on this bifurcation — those with platforms who are in the business of preserving legacies, and those in the business of cash flow acquisition.”

    2. The deal structure Swift signed was standard at the time — and that’s the point

    Swift was a teenager when she signed with Big Machine. Under the terms of her deal, as was typical for record contracts of that era, the label retained ownership of her master recordings. There was nothing unusual or predatory about the arrangement by the standards of the time — which is precisely what made it such a powerful moment for public education. Millions of people who had never thought about music rights suddenly understood that an artist could pour years of creative work into recordings they don’t own.

    “It was within Big Machine’s right to do with the catalog what they wanted to. That situation put a spotlight on the fact that Taylor Swift did not own her own masters.”

    3. Re-recording only worked because of who she is

    Swift’s decision to re-record her entire back catalog as “Taylor’s Version” was audacious — and it worked. Fans switched en masse to the new recordings, effectively diminishing the commercial value of the originals. But Khosrowshahi is clear-eyed about why: Swift had spent years building one of the most devoted fan bases in music history, and she had the direct relationship with those fans to make her case and be believed. Almost no other artist could pull off the same move. The lesson isn’t that re-recording is now a viable weapon for any artist — it’s that it was viable for her specifically.

    “That artist has completely changed the structure of how you connect with your fan base. She’s already talking to an existing group of people who are just out there supporting her.”

    4. It accelerated the shift to more artist-friendly deal structures

    In the wake of the Swift situation, major labels began adding re-recording restriction clauses to new contracts — but they also began offering more favorable ownership terms to attract and retain artists. Today it is increasingly common for artists to receive deals where ownership reverts to them after a set period, or where they retain a meaningful equity stake from the outset. The next generation of catalog sellers will be artists who actually own or co-own their masters — a very different market dynamic from the one that existed when Reservoir started.

    “Nowadays we’re seeing much more artist-friendly deals — artists getting record deals where ownership reverts to them, or they get to own 50% of it.”

    5. The broader catalog market barely felt a ripple

    For all the public drama, Khosrowshahi says Reservoir felt no direct impact from the Swift situation on its own deal flow or valuations. The catalog market was already heating up for structural reasons — streaming growth, institutional capital, and a finite supply of premium assets. The Swift saga added mainstream visibility and public education, but the underlying market dynamics were already well in motion. If anything, the attention it brought helped normalize catalog investing as a concept for a wider pool of potential buyers and sellers.

    “We didn’t feel any impact. It was a perfect storm of who was involved and the impact on someone with such a huge fan base.”

    Based on Golnar Khosrowshahi’s appearance on On the Record, Billboard’s music industry podcast.