PULSE RAISED
BY CONCORD

Pulse's Cutler and Abraham; Concord's Wisely and Salm

Months of speculation has ended, as hot L.A. indie pubco Pulse Music Group has formed a joint venture with Concord Music Publishing. The two companies jointly made the announcement early on Tuesday, 1/7.

The deal was triggered by Concord’s acquisition of Fujipacific Music’s global stake in Pulse, and Concord will administer the Pulse catalog and all future signings. The A&R-focused JV will capitalize Pulse’s continued expansion.

Pulse co-CEOs Scott Cutler and Josh Abraham will run the JV, along with their executive team including President Maria Egan and VP Ashley Calhoun.

“Scott and Josh are proven winners whose business built from scratch is both complementary to and strategic with Concord’s ambitions in music publishing,” said Concord Chief Publishing Executive Jake Wisely. “It was quickly apparent that Pulse would make a great partner for us, and Pulse recognized that Concord is the best fit for them. I’m also grateful to do business with longtime friend and colleague Ichi Asatsuma of Fujipacific.”

Concord Chief Business Development Officer Steve Salm also fashioned a statement. “While the broader market remains hyper-focused on deep publishing catalog and passive income-stream deals,” he began, “Concord has chosen to differentiate itself with partnerships that greatly expand its abilities to create frontline content across compositions, recordings and theater. Recognized as one of the leading frontline publishers in the world, Pulse is a company that Concord has always greatly admired, and this collaboration instantly makes Concord a leader in the frontline pop, hip-hop and R&B publishing world.”

“From Day 1, we built Pulse Music Group as a world-class incubator for culturally relevant songs,” reads Cutler and Abraham’s joint statement. “We wanted to create a haven built by songwriters for the modern songwriter culture. Through the hard work, A&R prowess, and passion of our entire team, combined with the global footprint, financial capacity and administration expertise of the team at Concord, we are now well on our way to achieving that. This joint venture with Jake, Steve, [Concord CFO/COO] Bob [Valentine], [Concord CEO] Scott [Pascucci] and the team at Concord enables us to continue providing world-class services to our writers who are at the forefront of every decision we make.”

Jeff Light of Myman Greenspan repped Pulse in the deal.

Pulse, the 2018 AIMP Music Publisher of the Year, boasts a catalog of more than 10,000 songs and has 175 active clients, including Starrah, Ty Dolla $ign, OZ, Tyler Johnson, YEBBA, Rich the Kid, James Blake, YBN Cordae, El-P and Bonnie McKee.

Fujipacific will continue to sub-publish the Pulse catalog and new works in Japan, India and Southeast Asia. Music Asset Management will continue to administer the Pulse catalog and new works until July.