Information AboutAllen Klein |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT ALLEN KLEIN | |
| 1931 births | |
| living people | |
| apple corps | |
| apple records | |
| american businesspeople | |
| elvis presley | |
| the beatles | |
| the rolling stones | |
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THE ACCOUNTANT Allen Klein was born on 18th December 1931, the son of Budapest butchers. 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 book-keeping 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 made a bold suggestion - that he could bring in $100,000 from Darin's record company. 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. SAM COOKE Following the death of his son in 1962 , 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 artists side in negotiations with the recording industry. He secured an unprecedented agreement, with Cooke receiving all his master tapes, site fees, gate revenues for concerts and 10 percent of all records sold and back Royalties . Allen Klein forever changed the relationship between record company & artist. When Cooke died in 1964 , Klein became the owner of his catalogue. CAMEO PARKWAY 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 , and recordings produced by Mickie Most . The music of Cameo Parkway was made available to the public in 2005. THE ROLLING STONES 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 was an accountant by training and initially praised the quality of Klein's work to Paul McCartney , though he soon had second thoughts about Klein's trustworthiness. THE BEATLES Since the death of Brian Epstein , The Beatles had been without a manager per se, although NEMS headed by Brian Epstein 's brother Clive Epstein had been taking care of day to day business, with Peter Brown playing the Brian role, and McCartney steering the band artistically. By 1969, Apple Corps was in a mess financially, 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 a manager. Several names were considered, including Lord Beeching . Paul favoured Lee Eastman (father of Linda ) as the man for the job, a suggestion that didn't sit well with the other three Beatles, as they felt that Eastman would be batting for Paul's interests ahead of the group's. After a meeting at the Dorchester Hotel on London 's Hyde Park where Allen Klein impressed John with both his in-depth knowledge of John's work, and his tough, "streetwise" attitude and language, Lennon convinced George and Ringo 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, he 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 man-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 Alastair 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 Klien's financial successes for the Beatles, Paul continued to distrust Klein and he eventually sued the other three Beatles for what he called , "a divorce", and the Beatles were no more. Klein began to "cash in" on the breakup immediately. SOLO BEATLES Klein helped George Harrison organise the " Concert For Bangladesh ". It was here that his reputation started to unravel because the charity money became tied up in Escrow and did not reach UNICEF for years. Ironically, Klein agreed with George that Yoko Ono should not be in the concert and this started to create friction with Yoko. He helped John organise his 1973 film '' Imagine ''. After several suits and countersuits Klein made his final financial settlement with the Beatles in 1977 . John Lennon's song "Steel and Glass," from his 1974 album Walls And Bridges , is reputedly about Klein. THE STONES AGAIN Klein acquired the rights to all of the Rolling Stones recordings of the 60s and a couple of recordings of the 70s. Klein's ABKCO (Allen and Betty Klein and Company) label released the rarest of all Stones album "Songs of the Rolling Stones" (1975). By the late 1990s some of the 60's albums were becoming hard to acquire on CD. Finally in 2002 , Allen's son, Jody Klein oversaw a re-mastering of the 60's albums, to much acclaim. Klein bought the rights to music produced by Phil Spector in the 1980s , such as the Philles Records and Phil Spector International catalogues. ALEJANDRO JODOROWSKY FILMS In 2005 Chilean cult-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's 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 & Klein have made peace and the films are being prepared for DVD release. THE VERVE On their song " Bittersweet Symphony " the British outfit The Verve sampled an orchestration from The Rolling Stone's "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 number 23 on the Billboard Charts. What ensued was a bitter (and not sweet) legal battle 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 used the song to hawk 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. To add even more insult to injury, when "Bittersweet Symphony" was nominated for a Grammy, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were named the nominees and not The Verve. What could be more "Bittersweet"?) |
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