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Allen Klein
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Allen Klein (born December 18, 1931) is an American businessman and record label executive. He is best known (and somewhat notorious) for his tenacious management of rock and roll performers in the 1960s, and the acquisition and control of their works.
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Allen Klein was born the son of Jewish immigrants from Budapest. His father was a butcher, and his mother died before he reached the age of one. As a teenager, he worked several jobs while attending evening classes. He excelled at mental arithmetic, and graduated from Upsala College, East Orange, New Jersey, in 1956. He did bookkeeping for several show-business people, and audited record companies. In 1957 he began his own business, a partnership with his wife Betty. A couple of years later, while attending a wedding, he met singer Bobby Darin. He asked Darin "How would you like to make $100,000?" A stunned Darin asked what he had to do. "Nothing," was Klein's reply. He then pursued Darin's record company for what he regarded as monies owed to the singer. Darin let Klein audit his accounts and received the cheque, exactly as promised. This 'no win, no fee' approach became his trademark. Record industry insiders began to fear his blunt-speaking tenacity, and celebrities began to recommend him.
Following the death of his son in 1963, Sam Cooke started to take control of all aspects of his career. He demanded his own record company. Allen Klein became his business manager (a role which never previously existed), someone who would take the artist's side in negotiations with the recording industry. He secured an unprecedented agreement, with Cooke starting a new label (Tracey Records) that would own the rights to all of his future recordings (it would be distributed, at first, by RCA), site fees, gate revenues for concerts, 10% of all records sold, and back royalties. Allen Klein forever changed the relationship between record company and artist.
When Cooke died in 1964, Cooke's wife Barbara became the owner of Tracey Records. She later sold these rights to Allen Klein.
Cameo Records was formed in 1956 and Parkway, a subsidiary, was formed in 1958. They were based in Philadelphia and specialised in pop music for the teen market. They had run out of hits by 1964, but struggled on until 1967, when Klein bought them, together with rights to music by The Animals, Herman's Hermits, Bobby Rydell, Chubby Checker and recordings produced by Mickie Most. The music of Cameo Parkway was made available to the public in 2005.
Andrew Loog Oldham was losing his battle with drugs in 1965. Allen Klein then took over from him, as business manager of The Rolling Stones. Mick Jagger had studied at the London School of Economics and was initially impressed enough with Klein's business skills to recommend him to Paul McCartney. Not long after, Jagger started to doubt Klein's trustworthiness. By the late 1960s the Stones decided to fire Klein, and set up their own business structure in 1970 - however this also meant giving Klein the rights to most of their songs recorded before 1971.
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Since the death of Brian Epstein, The Beatles had been without a manager per se, although NEMS, headed by Epstein's brother Clive, had been taking care of day-to-day business, with Peter Brown playing the Brian role, and Paul McCartney steering the band artistically[citation needed].
By 1969, The Beatles' company Apple Corps was financially in a mess, and it was becoming apparent that a business brain was needed to attempt to sort things out, although not as a manager in the sense that Epstein had been manager. Several names were considered, including Lord Beeching. Paul McCartney favoured Lee Eastman (father of McCartney's wife, Linda) as the man for the job, a suggestion that did not sit well with the other three Beatles, as they felt that Eastman would be batting for McCartney's interests ahead of those of the rest of the group.
After a meeting at the Dorchester Hotel in London's Hyde Park, where Allen Klein impressed John Lennon with both his in-depth knowledge of Lennon's work and his tough 'streetwise' attitude and language, Lennon convinced George Harrison and Ringo Starr that Klein should take over instead. Paul McCartney agreed to pose for photographs with Klein as a show of unity, pretending to sign a new contract, but he never put his signature on the paper. This fundamental disagreement about who should manage them, fuelled by a decade-long build up of resentments and insecurity about other matters such as power and influence within the group, was one of the key factors in the eventual break-up of The Beatles.
The Apple label was struggling, and Klein offered to work for a percentage of their increased business only. In 1969, he re-negotiated their contract with EMI, granting them the highest royalties ever paid to an artist at that time; 69 cents per $6-7 album. He oversaw the issuing of the single "Something"/"Come Together". His contacts enabled him to recruit Phil Spector for the album and film Let It Be.
On the other hand, Klein also managed to alienate many of the people who had previously been part of The Beatles' business and personal circle, with his abrasive style of management and negotiation. His cost-cutting measures at Apple Corps included what was considered by some as 'cold-blooded' firing of many of the employees that had flocked to The Beatles' experiment in commune-business, including the erratic Magic Alex and old Epstein minion and friend Alistair Taylor. He also closed the Zapple Records imprint.
At press conferences Klein was notorious for his profanities. He was parodied by John Belushi as "Ron Decline" in the TV film All You Need Is Cash.
In spite of Klein's financial successes for The Beatles, McCartney continued to distrust Klein and eventually sued the other three Beatles for what he called 'a divorce', and the Beatles came to an end.
Klein helped John Lennon and Yoko Ono with their film Imagine, and helped George Harrison to organise the Concert for Bangladesh. It was here that his reputation started to unravel. Rather than prearrange matters with UNICEF, Klein waited until after the concert to approach them, leading to questions about the proceeds, and finally a US tax investigation. While a check was cut at the time, additional proceeds meant for UNICEF were frozen in an escrow account until the 1980s. Also, Klein had sided with Harrison in believing Yoko Ono should not perform at the concert, wanting Lennon to appear without her, causing Lennon to cool on Klein. (He later took out his feelings toward Klein in "Steel And Glass", which appeared on his 1974 album Walls and Bridges.) After several suits and countersuits, Klein made his final financial settlement with The Beatles in 1977.
Klein acquired the rights to all of The Rolling Stones' recordings from the 1960s and two from the 1970s. Klein's ABKCO label released the rarest of all Stones albums, Songs Of The Rolling Stones (1975). By the late 1990s, some of the 1960s albums were becoming hard to acquire on CD. Finally, in 2002, Allen's son Jody Klein oversaw a re-mastering of the 1960s albums, to much acclaim.
Klein bought the rights to music produced by Phil Spector, such as the Philles Records and Phil Spector International catalogues, in the 1980s.
In 2005, Chilean cult film director Alejandro Jodorowsky was still unable to derive profits from two of his early movies, El Topo and The Holy Mountain, because Allen Klein continued to retain the legal rights, which he allegedly refused to sell or otherwise license for distribution. Reportedly, Klein originally acquired them on the advice of John Lennon, who was said to be a big fan of the movies. Jodorowsky has called the situation 'cultural murder', and there is no record of any comment by Klein's office. Jodorowsky claims he needs the income from these movies (which are available on the bootleg market) to finance future projects. Jodorowsky and Klein have since made peace, and the films are being prepared for HD-DVD release. (See http://abkcofilms.com for more information on the HD-DVD release.)
On their song "Bittersweet Symphony", the British outfit The Verve sampled an orchestration from The Rolling Stones' "The Last Time", the rights to which are owned by Allen Klein's ABKCO Industries. Before the release of the album, The Verve negotiated a licensing agreement with Klein, who administers the Stones catalogue, to use the sample - at least the composition rights to the sample. In 1997, The Verve's album Urban Hymns peaked at No. 23 on the Billboard charts. A bitter legal battle ensued, resulting in The Verve turning over 100% of the royalties to ABKCO. Klein argued that The Verve had violated the previous licensing agreement by using too much of the sample in their song. The Verve argued that Klein got greedy when the song became successful. Capitalizing off the success of the song, Klein licensed The Verve's "Bittersweet Symphony" to Nike, who proceeded to run a multi-million dollar television campaign using The Verve's song over shots of its sneakers. Klein also allowed the song to be used in advertisements for Vauxhall automobiles. (Additionally, though the song was authored by The Rolling Stones, the Andrew Loog Oldham Orchestra performed the sampled recording, and also filed suit upon the success of the song. When "Bittersweet Symphony" was nominated for a Grammy Award, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were named as the nominees, and not The Verve). The stress of the situation was found to be too much for The Verve, and they split up.
| The Rolling Stones |
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| Mick Jagger • Keith Richards • Charlie Watts • Ron Wood
Brian Jones • Bill Wyman • Mick Taylor • Ian Stewart See also
Chuck Leavell • Darryl Jones • Andrew Loog Oldham • Allen Klein • Nicky Hopkins • Bobby Keys • Jim Price • Billy Preston Related articles
Discography • The Glimmer Twins • Jagger/Richards • Nanker Phelge • Rolling Stones Records • Rock and Roll Circus Categories
The Rolling Stones • Members • Albums • Singles • Songs • Tours |
Categories: Articles lacking sources from July 2006 | All articles lacking sources | Articles to be expanded since January 2007 | All articles to be expanded | Articles with unsourced statements since January 2007 | All articles with unsourced statements | 1931 births | Living people | Apple Corps | Apple Records | American businesspeople | Elvis Presley | The Beatles | The Rolling Stones