Lawrence Mestel*
Founder/CEO, Primary Wave Music Publishing
Justin Shukat, 43
President, Primary Wave Music Publishing
In a $50 million deal with Island Records founder Chris Blackwell — a former partner and mentor to Mestel — Primary Wave acquired an 80 percent share in the catalogs of Blue Mountain Music and reggae legend Bob Marley. Although Marley’s songs have been streamed over 1.7 billion times in the United States alone, Mestel hopes to “reintroduce him to a new youth culture, and do it in a way that would make Bob Marley proud.” A cover of “Three Little Birds” by Maroon 5 reached No. 5 on Billboard’s Reggae Digital Songs in June, and an animated movie based on Marley’s music is in development from Fox Animation and PolyGram. While Primary Wave also recently acquired the publishing catalogs of David Rose, Brenda Russell, Alice Cooper and pianist Glenn Gould, Shukat is excited about newly signed clients like Carlie Hanson, whose second single, “Only One,” has collected 16.5 million on-demand streams.
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