Jason Aldean performing live.Back in October of 2021, Spirit Music Group owner Lyric Capital launched a $500 million catalog fund with Northleaf Capital Partners. Now, Spirit Music has acquired the song rights of country artist Jason Aldean in an estimated $100 million deal.
27-year-old Spirit Music Group announced its music-IP agreement with 44-year-old Jason Aldean today. The transaction encompasses 90 percent of the five-time Grammy nominee’s recorded catalog as well as “neighbouring rights and SoundExchange royalties,” according to New York City-headquartered Spirit.
Aldean remains signed to BMG’s Broken Bow, and the Bertelsmann subsidiaries “still retain their portion of the catalog rights” in the work, emphasized Spirit, which owns and/or manages north of 100,000 songs. (BMG signed Rita Ora to a record deal earlier this month.)
Having arrived on the scene with a self-titled album in 2005, Macon, Georgia-born Jason Aldean has released nine complete studio albums to date – seven of which are certified Platinum or multi-Platinum. (Macon, the first half of a double album entitled Macon, Georgia, debuted in November of 2021; the second half is expected to drop in late April.)
The aforementioned Broken Bow has released each of these projects, including well-known tracks such as 2008’s “She’s Country,” 2011’s “Dirt Road Anthem,” and 2018’s “You Make It Easy,” which was co-written by Florida Georgia Line and Morgan Wallen. Additionally, Aldean, who 10 days back announced a 34-city tour that’s set to kick off in July, boasts 7.70 million monthly listeners on Spotify.
Weighing in on the sale in a brief statement, Jason Aldean said: “It’s cool that a company like Spirit, that’s been around so long, has taken on my music catalog. It’s something really important to me, so I’m glad it’ll be looked after.”
Spirit Music’s pact with Jason Aldean is the latest in a long line of catalog acquisitions, which began to ramp up in quantity – and in price – around the beginning of 2020. Legacy acts like Def Leppard, America, Paul Simon, and Mötley Crüe have sold off their catalogs, as have the estates of David Bowie, James Brown, and Larry Smith, to name some.
Nearly two months into 2022, however, catalog sales look to have shifted towards younger creators and towards country artists. On the former front, Warner Music Group just recently dropped millions of dollars to acquire “modern evergreen” song rights.
In terms of genre, few of the catalog deals from 2020 and 2021 involved country, but 2022 has already delivered sales from Travis Tritt, Kenny Chesney, and, of course, Jason Aldean.
