How Paul McCartney Accidentally Became the Publisher for ‘Annie’
In 1969, Paul McCartney started MPL Communications, the umbrella company that handled his multitude of business interests. The company owns the publishing rights to decades-worth of music from many classic artists. Paul McCartney isn’t too involved with the company and was surprised to discover that MPL was the publisher for the musical Annie.
MPL Communications is one of the world’s largest music publishers
MPL (McCartney Productions Ltd.) Communications is a music publishing company founded by McCartney. The company handled McCartney’s post-Beatles work but would later own the copyrights of 100–years’ worth of music. MPL owns the distribution rights for many songs from artists like Buddy Holly, Frank Sinatra, The Beatles, Carl Perkins, and John Lennon.
The company has also bought the rights to a few films, including a film adaptation of Rupert Bear. Many TV shows and movies that want to use copyrighted music must go through MPL Communications. Their website shows dozens of recent projects that have used music owned by the company.
Paul McCartney had no idea MPL was the publisher for ‘Annie’
In an interview with Billboard, Paul McCartney discussed his involvement with MPL. He said the idea to form the company came after his accountants told him to invest his money in something. He decided to go for it and has earned a pretty fortune from the company over time. However, he isn’t fully involved in what gets funding and he said he was surprised to find out the company was publishing the music for Annie.
Someone said, ‘You’re the publisher for this new show that’s trying out in Boston, and we’re paying them to keep it going — do you want to continue paying?’ The company had signed the writers, and we were helping fund the show. And I said, ‘Let’s just keep going.’ Well, that turned out to be Annie.”
This turned out to be fortunate, especially since Jay-Z later used “It’s a Hard Knock Life” as a sample for “Hard Knock Life (Ghetto Anthem)”. McCartney considered it luck that this happened and also shared that luck had been a common trend throughout his career.
“So how pleased was I when Jay-Z used it! It’s luck,” McCartney admitted. “But The Beatles was luck! How did these four guys in Liverpool get to meet each other? We weren’t at the same school.”
McCartney doesn’t have a lot of involvement with MPL
While Paul McCartney could technically be considered the publisher of Annie, he doesn’t have a lot of involvement with MPL. The former Beatle told Billboard that he remains committed to making music and only allows “10%” of himself to be attached to the company. He aims to focus more on his artistic endeavors.
“When we first did this, I said, ‘I could be on tour for a year — don’t expect me to come in.’ Then, having said that, it was like, ‘Well, I’m in London next week, I’ll pop in.’ And that’s still how it still happens,” McCartney explained. “I’ve got so much brain, and 90% of it has to be free for songs and art. If I block that out with finance, I’m sunk. So 10% of me can think about where we’re going, but I keep the rest open to do various artistic things.”
