WordCollections Raises $5 Million from Metallica’s Black Squirrel Partners

Jeff Price

WordCollections, a New York-based startup building digital rights management systems, has raised $5 million from music group Metallica’s Black Squirrel Partners and others. Black Squirrel, founded by Metallica and Paul Donahue, led a $3.5 million round for the company in late 2021.

With $8.8 million raised from investors, WordCollections has made advances in the business — moving initially from protecting the rights of speaking artists such as comedian Jerry Seinfeld to serving music groups. It plans to use the funds for further technology development and to accelerate direct licensing.

Founded in 2020 by music industry veteran and serial entrepreneur Jeff Price, WordCollections has built a simpler global digital rights management system, cutting out intermediaries. Its customers include Metallica, Billy Crystal and Songwriters Guild of America.

Price’s first venture was spinART, an independent record label he started in 1990. In 2006, he started TuneCore, which helped artists directly distribute and sell or stream their music.

In 2013, he established Audiam, which helps musicians and other digital rights holders protect their copyrights by locating metadata for every recording and recovering due royalties. Price sold Audiam initially to Canadian collection society SOCAN in 2016, and then to US performing rights organization SESAC, after which he had a fallout with the new owner, leading to his firing.

Even decades after the advent of digital rights and streaming, the legacy global administration system is fundamentally broken, contends Price. WordCollection says royalties still travel through layers and layers of middlemen, each taking a cut, before the remaining unpaid billions in ‘black box’ royalties are paid to others. Consequently, billions of dollars earned by songwriters and authors still don’t make it into their pockets – sometimes due to inefficiencies but on many occasions by design.