The Man Who Bailed Out the Beatles, Made the Stones, and Transformed Rock & Roll
May 25, 2015
Allen Klein revolutionized the rock and roll business, spinning money out of record sales, song publishing rights, and forceful readjustments of contracts that were wildly unfair to artists. "Pugnacious and foul mouthed," Klein and his ABKCO Records became one of the first independent record labels and music publishers, persuading artists that he "can get you a million dollars." It wasn't purely altruistic, as his many enemies noted. "He robbed from the rich and kept it," an approach that contributed to his lasting negative reputation. His hard-nosed negotiations with Andrew Loog Oldham, the first manager of the Rolling Stones, both ensured the band's financial fortunes and eventually gave him a huge percentage of their early royalties as well as control over their early back catalog. Klein's greatest fame came in the four years he served as manager of the Beatles, bringing some financial order to the chaos of their hippie business umbrella, Apple Corps. Goodman (Fortune's Fool), an accomplished journalist, goes over these triumphs in exhaustive detail, painting a portrait of a man with horrific impulse control and a combative personality who got embroiled in ruinously expensive litigation with his most famous clients. While the ins and outs of Klein's wheeling and dealing are well documented here, Goodman rarely provides adequate context for how his approach differed from the practices of the time, and it's tough to see an obvious audience for this book-length portrait of the accounting behind the music.