On Monday, Apple Music agreed to pay royalties to rights holders during the three-month free trial period offered to users of their service. This came after days of uncertainty and disagreements that came to a head with Taylor Swift penning an open letter criticising Apple’s initial decision not to pay. Now label group PIAS have issued a statement that concludes “despite what one might read, this was not entirely down to Taylor Swift.”
The statement has been issued after PIAS last night concluded their negotiations with Apple over terms. Adrian Pope, Managing Director of PIAS, says: “
Over the last three weeks or so we and others have worked hard to secured a range of significant benefits, protections and improvements on the originally proposed terms.
“A key point of improvement is that we will now receive a per stream payment from day 1 of any free trial period. Other controls and protections have been added such that we feel this is a genuinely good deal for the labels and artists we represent. It should be noted that [PIAS] made it contingent that in us approving this agreement the same terms would be made available to all 4000+ independent labels, thus providing a fair playing field for all.” Having agreed these terms, Pope says that PIAS endorsed and signed the agreement with Apple Music. “Our recommendation to labels is that we now embrace the service. We are in the process of getting all relevant repertoire ready to go live on 30th June. We are also working closely with Apple on other aspects of the service, more detail on that to follow.” Apple Music launches on June 30.
