Abbey Road to be sold!!

[ant]

Hi Guys, Just read this! What a shame. With any luck someone with dosh will come along and keep it going.


http://www.classicrockmagazine.com/news ... -for-sale/


Cheers


ant

[The Tasmanian]

200 million in debt! Not a great business to purchase.

[Ben M]

I wonder if EMI would take Iced Vovo's for Abbey Road?
Mat how's your stock of vovo's? We might need a few for this one.

[ChrisW]

200 million in debt! Not a great business to purchase.

EMI is in debt, not Abbey Road I'm guessing.

I agree, a very big studio complex in a highly desirable residential area is probably not the greatest purchase, unless you are going to strip out the studio and sell the land to developers.
Sadly, I can see that happening.

[Kurt]

Maybe Tom or Uli will buy it ;)

[Ben M]

Hmmm.... I was in Abbey Road in 1999. What a great studio complex. So much history there. Fantastic staff.
McCartney was setup in studio 2 with a full band doing sessions and I was able to go in and have a good look around and tinkle the ivory's briefly before the band came into the studio that morning. A special memory for me.

I think before it gets to the stage of selling it to developers, the british gov. should butt in and list it as heritage (if it's not already) and turn it into a museum. Worst case scenario of course. Developers would have strong opposition from industry/musicians/public/etc - we could see a live aid for Abbey Road yet.
Too much history there to waste it on apartments me thinks. :)

[The Tasmanian]

EMI sold the business years ago - same as 301 in Sydney - they saw the writing on the wall - studios are for people who own them to lose money!

[ChrisW]

Well I assumed they'd sold it years ago.

'Abbey Road Studios, a business name of EMI Records Limited. Registered in England no. 68172.
Registered office: EMI House, 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5SW'
http://www.abbeyroad.com/services/

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/889e63f0-1a70 ... ab49a.html

[rick]

its been for sale for 20 years , on and off i hear mcartny bought it , tom misner bought it - garth brooks bought it etc

ballpark is 30 million property and goods
however the staff benifets are the stumbling block , they have about 40 staff and a lot of them have benifets that need to be paid out or maintained and that figure alone makes the studio buyout a huge stumbling block cash wise its just not going to be viable - never was

ie land value is less then what the studio is "worth " so if you buy it and you have to pay out the staff its not a viable development site

its not a viable business ( its reportably lost money since 1964) so its not a business worth buying , you cannot make enough on the real estate deal to be worth while
its book figure for emi is long since set but is dropping
i think the reason it is still there is emotional - maybe its time is finally up

hell my business has to move because the owner of the building went broke in the GFC

but i own my business and it makes money so i am just moving..

but i think emi are really actually broke this year so it interesting that they have made a public push to sell it again .
unless sir paul changes his mind and buys it , i think it might be a block of apartments waiting to happen

can you imagine the auction :)

[Ender]

I think before it gets to the stage of selling it to developers, the british gov. should butt in and list it as heritage (if it's not already) and turn it into a museum. Too much history there to waste it on apartments me thinks. :)

I totally agree.. it would be nice to think its not always 'just' about the business and the development opportunity and is acknowleged as a real piece of history.

[ChrisW]

Olympic Studios went down without much of a murmur.
Not quite as world famous as Abbey Road, but still important and a historic site for music lovers.

[Dallas]

Olympic Studios went down without much of a murmur.
Not quite as world famous as Abbey Road, but still important and a historic site for music lovers.

Reckon the whole Beatles connection would make the public take a bit more notice than Olympic (shame, many more of my fave albums made at Olympic!)

[Adam Dempsey]

Not sure if the greater debt lies with EMI or rather Terra Firma, but responses now from McCartney, The National Trust and some guy called Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber:
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wir ... id=9893324

[Ben M]

Not sure if the greater debt lies with EMI or rather Terra Firma, but responses now from McCartney, The National Trust and some guy called Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber:
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wir ... id=9893324

Thank you for keeping this up to date Adam.

Best news and best outcome for the moment.

As predicted the heritage and national trust are kicking in, plus a bunch of wealthy muso's/industry/etc. plus public opinion on the matter = "Business as usual" (copyright Men at Work 1981)

from the article
"Sir Paul McCartney has also spoken this week about the need to save the studio. Britain's National Trust charity, which owns the childhood homes of McCartney and John Lennon, has asked Britons for their views on whether it should step in and preserve the building for the public."

[jkhuri44]

just heard something about Abbey Rd on Ten News.

[Adam Dempsey]

the latest:
Abbey Road not being sold - Faster Louder and CNN.

[Ben M]

the latest:
Abbey Road not being sold - Faster Louder and CNN.

bewdy.

[13thbeach]

Spewin......I was thinking about buying it. oh well.

[Ben M]

Spewin......I was thinking about buying it. oh well.

Mat, I calculated Iced vovo's and it got ugly. IVV36,000,000,000,000,000

[13thbeach]

Spewin......I was thinking about buying it. oh well.

Mat, I calculated Iced vovo's and it got ugly. IVV36,000,000,000,000,000

Yeah, I'm just not prepard to part with that much VoVo.

[Ben M]

Spewin......I was thinking about buying it. oh well.

Mat, I calculated Iced vovo's and it got ugly. IVV36,000,000,000,000,000

Yeah, I'm just not prepard to part with that much VoVo.

What would we have a cuppa with? There'd be none left. :(

[mylesgm]

don't worry I'm the anonymous party they are in discussions with.

I'll let you drop in if you like and if you bring the vovos. I can supply the tea....

[Dallas]

don't worry I'm the anonymous party they are in discussions with.....

& here I was thinking it was gonna be Rick's new mastering suite....

[jkhuri44]

hahahah! ^


The Brit Gov declared Abbey Rd a Heritage Site this morning.

YAY :-)

[Mickstape]

well maybe there is some hope left in this world for blokes like me.

maybe in 25 years we will be a lot grayer in the hair dept and begging for the Aus government to save TurtleRock and turn it into a heritage listing, it won't happen with 301 because Tom needs more money, he always needs more money, he's kind of like god, can create a multitude of wonderful places and things, but is really bad with money.

[Chris H]

Been doing a bit of reading on the recent history of EMI and it seems it is a classic example of reaping what you sow and a fitting real world outworking of what went wrong with the music industry. A lot of the "blame" for the wreckage that EMI has become is going to Guy Hands, The Boss of Terra Firma a Private Equity Giant who purchased EMI. The whole situation is a very dirty corporate mess ........where money players play their game of corporate greed in their world absent of any real or effective measure of ethical standards.
Here a a few snipits, cut and pasted from another forum that may shed a bit of light on the whole seedy shitfight:

Say Goodbye To EMI
=================
by Moses Avalon

I know, I know. I’m usually the guy who’s very Bullish on the condition of the music business, but this is one story even I cannot spin upward.

To save the beleaguered major label, EMI, its owner, Guy Hands has about a month to come up with about $150 Million to satisfy payroll and debts. In real estate terms, Hands is upside down on his house. He now owes more than he can sell the company for and his bank, Citigroup, is forcing him to foreclose rather than give him the chance to save the label that controls such classic catalogs as the Beatles.

Knowing he can not find a buyer or come up with the money, Citigroup’s unofficial but rather obvious plan is to foreclose, at which point they get their hands on the super valuable catalogs for dimes on the dollar.

Normally, when companies this size are in trouble their creditors help out by restructuring the loans. But not here. In this case Citigroup, has bitch-slapped Hands and all but said, let it burn. When your own investors want you to fail, there is little hope of survival.

Historic music in the hands of bankers.

How did this happen? Could we have predicted it?

Answers, details and your insider comments:

http://www.mosesavalon.com/mosesblog/?p=570

[Chris H]

and a bit more..........

ood story Moses on EMI’s dilemma, and here’s some more back story, and some other goings on that might illuminate a bit more about EMI:

It’ true that begging Hand’s creditors and angry investors for more money to bail out the (business improving, but) beleaguered EMI is one obvious angle on viewing EMI’s demise or redemption, but it may not be the most critical one. There is the case of the “lawsuitâ€

[Chris H]

and just in case you thought Citycorp were just misguided nice respectable wealthy people here is a bit of history to shed light on em...no surprises really:

This lawsuit against Citigroup is bound to be interesting..





Bankipedia

Citigroup Inc. (branded Citi), is a major American financial services company based in New York, NY. Citigroup was formed from one of the world's largest mergers in history by combining the banking giant Citicorp and financial conglomerate Travelers Group on April 7, 1998.[2]

Citigroup Inc. has the world's largest financial services network, spanning 140 countries with approximately 16,000 offices worldwide. The company employs approximately 300,000 staff around the world, and holds over 200 million customer accounts in more than 140 countries. It is a primary dealer in US Treasury securities[3].


Criticism




[edit] Citigroup proprietary government bond trading scandal

Citigroup was criticized for disrupting the European bond market by rapidly selling €11 billion worth of bonds on August 2, 2004 on the MTS Group trading platform, driving down the price, and then buying it back at cheaper prices.[40]
[edit] Regulatory action

On March 23, 2005, the NASD announced total fines of $21.25 million against Citigroup Global Markets, Inc., American Express Financial Advisors and Chase Investment Services regarding suitability and supervisory violations relating to mutual fund sales practices between January 2002 and July 2003. The case against Citigroup involved recommendations and sales of Class B and Class C shares of mutual funds.[41]

On June 6, 2007, the NASD announced more than $15 million in fines and restitution against Citigroup Global Markets, Inc., to settle charges related to misleading documents and inadequate disclosure in retirement seminars and meetings for BellSouth Corp. employees in North Carolina and South Carolina. NASD found that Citigroup did not properly supervise a team of brokers located in Charlotte, N.C., who used misleading sales materials during dozens of seminars and meetings for hundreds of BellSouth employees.[42]


[edit] Terra Securities scandal

In November 2007 it became public that the Citigroup is heavily involved in the Terra Securities scandal, which involved investments by eight municipalities of Norway in various hedge funds in the United States bond market.[43] The funds were sold by Terra Securities ASA to the municipalities, while the products were delivered by Citigroup. Terra Securities ASA filed for bankruptcy November 28, 2007, the day after they received a letter[44] from The Financial Supervisory Authority of Norway announcing withdrawal of permissions to operate. The same letter also stated, "The Supervisory Authority contends that Citigroup's presentation, as well as the presentation from Terra Securities ASA, appears insufficient and misleading because central elements like information about potential extra payments and the size of these are omitted."


[edit] Theft from customer accounts

On August 26, 2008 it was announced that Citigroup agreed to pay nearly $18 million in refunds and fines to settle accusations by California Attorney General Jerry Brown that it wrongly took funds from the accounts of credit card customers. Citigroup would pay $14 million of restitution to roughly 53,000 customers nationwide. A three-year investigation found that Citigroup from 1992 to 2003 used an improper computerized "sweep" feature to move positive balances from card accounts into the bank's general fund, without telling cardholders.[45]

Brown said in a statement that Citigroup "knowingly stole from its customers, mostly poor people and the recently deceased, when it designed and implemented the sweeps...When a whistleblower uncovered the scam and brought it to his superiors, they buried the information and continued the illegal practice."[45]


[edit] Terra Firma Investments lawsuit

In Dec. 2009, Citigroup was sued by British equity firm Terra Firma Investments for fraud regarding Terra Firma Investment's purchase of music corporation EMI's label and music publishing interests.

[rick]

in case anybody is wondering i just deleted a bunch of off topic nasty posts , i have better things to do then edit the forum
and i am sure you guys have better things to do then to get nasty with each other on my dollar
peace and long live abbey road :)

[Howard Jones]

http://www.livinginternet.com/i/ia_nq.htm

Not that those who already make rude posts would probably read it...