Universal Music Wins Approval to Buy EMI Recorded Music

Vivendi SA (VIV)’s Universal Music Group won approval from the U.S. Federal Trade Commission for its purchase of the recorded-music business of EMI Group, best known as the record label of the Beatles.

The FTC closed its review of the transaction, which allows the merger to go forward, following approval earlier today from European competition authorities after Universal Music agreed to sell about one-third of EMI assets to cut the combined group’s market share.

“Based on its review of company documents, discussions with industry participants and empirical analysis, commission staff did not find sufficient evidence of head-to-head competition to conclude that the combination of Universal and EMI would substantially lessen competition,” Richard Feinstein, director of the FTC’s bureau of competition, said in a statement.

Antitrust approval for the transaction comes almost a year after Universal Music agreed to buy London-based EMI’s recorded unit from Citigroup Inc. (C) for 1.2 billion pounds ($1.95 billion), effectively ending more than 80 years of business at EMI.

Major Companies

The takeover cuts the number of major record companies to three, as the industry faces challenges including illegal downloading and fewer CD sales.

“We have been working behind the scenes for this moment for about nine months, and we are very happy,” Universal Music Chief Executive Officer Lucian Grainge said in a phone interview.

With control over labels such as Virgin Records and Capitol, the next steps will be “about how we integrate, our ambition for the future and our intention to invest and rebuild with entrepreneurs, creative talent and music professionals,” Grainge said. The company is planning a “significant increase in investment,” particularly in Capitol records, he said.

Grainge also said he’s committed to achieving savings of 100 million pounds ($163 million) by integrating the two companies.

Among divestments, Universal Music will sell the Parlophone music label, home to Coldplay and David Bowie, as well as Black Sabbath’s record company Sanctuary, and the Chrysalis label, home to Depeche Mode, the European Commission said in a statement today. Universal will also avoid favorable terms for any new digital music deals in Europe for 10 years.

“The very significant commitments proposed by Universal will ensure that competition in the music industry is preserved,” EU Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia said in a statement.

Opposition Voice

Public Knowledge, a Washington-based public interest group, opposed the transaction, calling on the FTC to block the merger entirely or demand stronger concessions appropriate for the U.S. market, such as ordering Universal Music to sell Capitol Records or the Island Def Jam Music Group.

“It is incredible that the FTC has not taken any action whatsoever to protect consumers and competition in the nascent digital music market,” said Jodie Griffin, staff attorney at Public Knowledge. “By failing to act to block this merger or even impose even one condition beyond that imposed by the European Commission, the FTC is allowing UMG to acquire unprecedented market power and amass a dominant collection of copyright holdings.”

Citigroup sold EMI’s publishing division in a separate transaction for $2.2 billion to a Sony Corp.-led group. That purchase was cleared by EU regulators in June.

Citigroup seized EMI from Guy Hands’s private equity firm, Terra Firma Partners Ltd., in February 2011 after it failed to meet loan terms. Hands bought EMI in 2007.

Joe South, Singer-Songwriter From 70s, Dies at 72

Singer-songwriter Joe South, who performed hits in the late 1960s and early 1970s such as "Games People Play" and "Walk A Mile In My Shoes" and also penned songs including "Down in the Boondocks" for other artists, died Wednesday, his music publisher said. South was 72.

South, whose real name was Joseph Souter, died at his home in Buford, Ga., northeast of Atlanta, according to Marion Merck of the Hall County Coroner's office. Merck said South died after having a heart attack.

"He's one of the greatest songwriters of all time," said Butch Lowery, president of the Lowery Group, which published South's music. "His songs have touched so many lives. He's such a wonderful guy and loved by many."

South worked as a session guitar player on recordings of some of the biggest names of the 1960s — Aretha Franklin, Bob Dylan and Simon & Garfunkel, among others. But he had a string of hits of his own starting in the late 1960s that made his booming voice a familiar one on radio stations, with a style that some described as a mix of country and soul.

He is perhaps best known for the song "Games People Play," which reached No. 12 on the Billboard charts in 1969 and won him two Grammys for Best Contemporary Song and Song of the Year. The opening lines evoked the message songs of the era: "Oh the games people play now, every night and every day now, never meaning what they say now, never saying what they mean."

The song, which was released on South's debut album "Introspect," spoke against hate, hypocrisy and inhumanity.

He also had hits with "Walk A Mile In My Shoes" and "Don't It Make You Want to Go Home," and wrote the Grammy-nominated "(I Never Promised You a) Rose Garden" for country singer Lynn Anderson.

Earlier, South's song "Down in the Boondocks" was a 1965 hit for singer Billy Joe Royal. He performed on Aretha Franklin's "Chain of Fools," as well as on Bob Dylan's 1966 classic "Blonde on Blonde," a triumphant mix of rock, blues and folk that Rolling Stone magazine ranked No. 9 on its greatest-ever albums list. The magazine credits "expert local sessionmen" with helping to create "an almost contradictory magnificence: a tightly wound tension around Dylan's quicksilver language and incisive singing."

According to billboard.com, South also backed up Eddy Arnold, Marty Robbins and Wilson Pickett.

But his music career was struck by tragedy when his brother, Tommy Souter, committed suicide in 1971. A biography of South on billboard.com says he moved to Maui and retired from recording for a time starting in the mid-'70s, and that his career was complicated by a rough-around-the-edges personality. South's last album was "Classic Masters" in 2002.

According to South's website, he was born in Atlanta on Feb. 28, 1940. As a child he was interested in technology and developed his own radio station with a one-mile transmission area.

In 1958, South recorded his debut single, a novelty song called, "The Purple People Eater Meets the Witch Doctor."

South was an inductee in the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Georgia Music Hall of Fame.