Episode 254: Lior Tibon: How Duetti Helps Artists Unlock the Value of Their Catalogs
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Lior Tibon is the CEO and co-founder of Duetti, a revolutionary platform transforming how independent artists monetize their music. With a background in finance and a passion for empowering creators, Lior brings a fresh perspective to the music industry. By bridging the gap between artists and investors, Duetti provides a streamlined way for musicians to access catalog sales, helping them achieve financial freedom and creative independence.
In this episode, Michael Walker and Lior Tibon explore the dynamic intersection of music, finance, and technology. Learn how Duetti is redefining music financing, giving independent artists the tools to thrive in a competitive industry.
Key Takeaways:
Discover how Duetti empowers artists to leverage catalog sales for financial growth.
Understand why building a niche audience is critical for independent success.
Explore the balance between human artistry and AI in music creation and discovery.
free resources:
Tune into the live podcast & join the ModernMusician community
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Learn more about Lior Tibon and his work on Duetti:
Transcript:
Michael Walker: YEAAAH! All right. I'm excited to be here with my new friend, Lior Tibon. Lior is the CEO and co-founder of Duetti, a company founded in 2022 that empowers artists with quick access to catalog sales, offering up to $400,000 per track through a data-driven platform.
Formerly, he was the COO of Tidal, where he worked with Jay-Z to help launch the platform until its acquisition in 2021. He has a finance background, having worked at Deutsche Bank in London from 2009 to 2015. This unique experience merges the financial industry with the music industry.
I’m really excited to have him on the podcast today to discuss democratizing the music business. As an indie artist in today’s rapidly evolving landscape, how can you best monetize your existing catalog on your own terms?
Lior, thank you so much for taking the time to be here today.
Lior Tibon: Thank you, Michael. Thanks for having me.
Michael: Absolutely. To kick things off, for anyone connecting with you for the first time, could you share a quick introduction to your story? Also, what would you say is the core problem you’ve set out to solve with Duetti?
Lior: Sure. Well, you gave a great overview of the different stages of my career, but as a quick recap to answer your question:
I started 15 years ago in finance and happened to work on a number of music industry transactions, advising music industry companies. This was back in 2009 and 2010, so things were very different in music at the time.
Through that experience, I connected with people in the space and ultimately worked for seven years as the COO of Tidal, the music streaming company that Jay-Z launched. I stayed on after we scaled the platform and eventually sold it.
Then, I started Duetti. To answer your question, Duetti is a way to rethink how we finance music. It’s really about bringing together the entirety of my career experiences.
Before starting the company, I looked at industry data and trends, and it became clear that there was a growing need to rethink how financing is done. Traditionally, there was one dominant model: the record label. You’d get a label deal—if you could secure one—and they would finance your future by pre-buying albums while helping with marketing and other services.
However, many people have grown apprehensive about that model. It also doesn’t work for a wide spectrum of creators. What we’re doing with Duetti is addressing that gap by using catalogs as a financing avenue. This approach not only provides financial support but also offers marketing support for a much broader group of artists, beyond just the A-list label artists.
Michael: Cool. So it sounds like part of the purpose of the platform is to help address this large independent artist base that’s been left behind by the traditional record label industry.
I’d love to hear your perspective. A lot of people watching or listening to this podcast are independent musicians. The landscape of record labels versus indie artists is evolving quickly. From your perspective, where do you think things are at right now? For someone who wants to capture the next wave of the music industry, what are your thoughts?
Lior: Yes, I think we’re seeing different things. If I’m zooming out, I’ll say something that some people might find controversial, but I believe we’re seeing a really positive movement in terms of diversity and the ability of artists to create and put their names out there.
For example, Spotify announced a few months ago that, by their definition, there are around 200,000 artists on the recorded music side who are able to make some type of income from music. That’s a really good number from a historical perspective.
So, on that end, we’re seeing the music economy become more diverse. A lot of new artists are emerging who, in another context or in the past, would have found it much more difficult to break through and reach audiences.
At the same time, we’re also aware that many artists are finding it difficult to turn that presence and those audiences into sustainable careers. It takes not only finances but also expertise, teams, and other resources to really build a successful career in music.
That’s the tension we’re seeing—between these two forces happening in the industry today.
Michael: Got it. So, on one hand, it’s easier for independent artists to make music, create it, and distribute it, opening up the playing field. But on the other hand, it’s probably more challenging than ever for these artists to monetize and make sustainable income with their music at the same time.
I know this is one of the core reasons you’ve built this platform—to help address these challenges. Could you share, for artists who may not be familiar with the concept of selling their catalog, what this strategy could do for them?
Lior: Absolutely. Over the past few years, there’s been an investment boom in music catalogs. We’re seeing big, headline-grabbing deals—Justin Bieber, Bruce Springsteen, Rod Stewart—household names and estates of A-list artists selling music catalogs to financial firms and, in some cases, record labels.
The question we asked ourselves was: why is this happening? The reason is that financial firms see music catalogs as a very interesting investment area. From their perspective, it’s easier than ever to predict how much money will come in over the next few years for a specific piece of music.
Most of the money in music now comes from streaming, which is tied to recurring annual subscriptions. This makes it easier to predict how many people will listen to a given record, especially if it’s been out for a while. Financial firms can build models around that stability and predictability, which has attracted more Wall Street interest in music as an investment.
What we’re doing at Duetti is expanding this concept beyond a small number of A-listers to a much larger group of independent artists. We’re translating the same principles that have been working at the top of the market into opportunities for a broader range of artists.
To do that, we have to speak two languages. On one side, we need to understand what independent artists are looking for—where they are in their careers and how we can design deals that work for them. On the other side, we need to understand and speak the language of Wall Street investors—what they’re looking for and how we can align those interests.
We’re essentially matchmaking between these two groups. We identify opportunities in catalogs, which we define as music that’s been streaming for at least two years. This gives us enough data to understand its performance and predict future earnings. Based on that, we can determine how much money to offer to buy parts of the catalog in a way that benefits everyone involved.
Michael: That’s super interesting, and it’s clear how this ties into your experience in the financial markets leading up to this point.
For indie artists, from an investment standpoint, it seems similar to stocks—you buy something at a certain value with the expectation that it will go up. If you get a good deal on an emerging artist you believe in, the value could increase, making it an interesting investment vehicle.
When a catalog sale happens, I’m sure there are variations, but what does a typical deal look like? Does selling a catalog mean royalties from streaming, publishing, licensing, or something else? And while NFTs have had their peak, they still seem to have untapped potential. What do these catalog deals look like from an ownership standpoint?
Lior: Sure. So for us, we’re barely two years old as a company. When we started, we decided to focus on doing one thing really well before expanding into other types of deals and options. Since we began in the summer of 2022, we’ve been offering independent artists the opportunity to sell their masters outright.
There’s a lot of flexibility in the sense that you can choose what you want to sell, which is quite unusual. You can sell as little as one track or one album. We provide a menu of options based on the music you have that’s been released. You can also choose to retain a percentage of the income from the masters you sell. But the core of the deal is that the artist needs to be comfortable with selling the underlying master outright to Duetti.
That’s the model we’ve developed. The ability for artists to play around with different track or album selections has been very powerful in providing extra flexibility. Once you sell, you receive, hopefully, a significant amount of money upfront. Moving forward, unless you’ve retained a percentage of income, all revenue from the masters—including streaming, sync, physical sales, and other income streams—would go to us.
What makes our model particularly interesting is that we’re long-term owners of the music. We heavily invest our own money, not through marketing funds or similar arrangements. If we acquire a master, we put significant effort into promoting it—mainly on streaming platforms but also through sync agents and other avenues. Many artists we’ve worked with have seen the masters they sold to us actually increase in revenue after the sale. This can directly benefit them if they retained a percentage of the income, and in all cases, it significantly boosts their careers by introducing their music to new audiences.
Michael: That’s so cool. One thing I’m understanding now that I didn’t fully grasp before is that your model involves you directly purchasing the songs. You’re not just a bridge between buyers and sellers—you’re actively buying the catalogs from artists. And one of the benefits is that artists can sell on a track-by-track basis, allowing them to benefit from the additional promotion and resources you bring to amplify the value of the tracks they’ve sold.
I’d love to hear some examples of artists you’ve worked with. I’m sure you’re selective about the deals you pursue, so maybe a better question is: who do you think would be an ideal candidate for a partnership with Duetti?
Lior: Absolutely. While we’re still actively looking for new artists to work with, we have a few minimum criteria to start a conversation. First, the artist must own the master outright. Sometimes there’s confusion about whether the artist or their label owns it, but we can only move forward if the artist has full ownership.
Second, the track must have been available on streaming services for at least two years. This is important because we use historical data to determine the value of the catalog. Without at least two years of data, it’s not robust enough for us to evaluate the potential future earnings accurately.
Finally, there’s a minimum size requirement. Right now, we’re looking for tracks that generate at least 500,000 streams per year, which typically translates to $1,000 to $2,000 in annual income. This is the minimum threshold for us to explore a potential deal. Of course, the larger and older the catalog, the more we can typically offer.
If an artist meets these criteria, we review their catalog and provide several options to consider. This could range from selling one or two tracks to a larger buyout. Recently, we announced a new round of fundraising, raising over $235 million in two years. We now have the capacity to pay up to $3 million per artist for the right opportunities.
Michael: Cool. So, the key criteria you’re looking for are at least two years of data to analyze and a track earning $1,000 to $5,000 annually as the starting range for a deal.
Lior: That’s correct. That’s the minimum, but generally, the larger and older the catalog, the higher we can pay, for obvious reasons.
Michael: Got it. Do you have examples of artists you’ve worked with that you can share? Perhaps some notable ones that people can check out to see the kinds of deals you’ve been doing?
Lior: No, for sure. First of all, if anyone is interested, we have a bunch of examples of deals we’ve done with a really great list of artists on our website, duetti.co, or our Instagram page, Duetti Music. One example I can mention, which we highlighted as part of our latest fundraising announcement, is a rapper called FTO. He’s from Memphis and has been a great partner for us.
As part of the public announcement after doing a deal with us, he shared that some of his tracks saw a 3x increase in the number of streams on a monthly basis. The reason for this, as I mentioned earlier, is that beyond the financial consideration—which, of course, is really important—we focus on marketing and the ongoing support we provide.
We’re doing this in very cutting-edge ways. I come from a streaming background, as you mentioned at the very beginning. I ran big parts of TIDAL for many years, and we have team members from Spotify, Apple Music, and SoundCloud—really the full suite of streaming services.
For example, we have a playlist network on Spotify. That network has close to 2 million followers, and we operate and activate hundreds of playlists. What we do is look for specific audiences relevant to a particular piece of music we’re working with. We’ve found this type of marketing to be extremely effective in opening up new audiences to an artist’s music.
Michael: Awesome. That’s super smart. So in addition to a catalog sale, where you have a lot of investment and cash capital upfront, you also provide the benefit of promotion and marketing. This includes Spotify playlist promotion and boosting tracks.
I imagine that this benefit ripples out across an artist’s other tracks and their career overall. In some ways, it’s almost like an alternative path to a record label deal, which, in the past, would have been required for someone to access this type of resource.
Lior: No, absolutely, Michael. I think another consideration is that we like to think of ourselves as almost like catalog custodians. That’s what we do. We’re not focused on frontline or new music. All we do, all day long, is think about catalogs—how to present them and expand their reach even further.
There are a couple of things to consider. Number one: the world is becoming more competitive every single day. Right now, streaming services have over 100 million tracks available, and that number is increasing daily. With the addition of AI tools, we think this number will grow even faster in the coming years.
If you’re an artist and want to maintain your presence, let alone increase it, it’s going to become more competitive. That’s just the nature of the environment we’re in. We see ourselves as partners who can help with that. We can step in and assist with active promotion, metadata optimization, and leveraging our relationships with streaming companies to ensure your catalog is well-maintained and appropriately featured over time.
That’s the first element to keep in mind. The second is that, frankly, catalog marketing has been somewhat neglected by the industry. Historically, for decades, the main focus and excitement—understandably—has been on frontline music. That’s what everyone talks about. Someone releases a new record, it goes to the Grammys, and it’s the centerpiece of attention in other forums.
The byproduct of that, however, is that catalog music has often been left behind. If you look at the resources record labels allocate to frontline versus catalog music, the disparity is clear. That’s another area where we aim to help. It’s not just about putting some marketing spend behind catalogs; it’s about doing it in a smart, strategic way that gradually increases reach and builds audiences.
That’s the type of marketing service we offer, and it’s what makes what we do very unique.
Michael: That's fantastic. It almost seems like a great kind of financing vehicle for an artist. If they don't have a record label giving them an advance or fronting a lot of money, they can actually have this upfront investment to be able to invest in recording new songs and doing all the things that come with having a successful music career on their own.
It's like having a way to bring on investors in order to have access to capital. That's really cool.
Curious—at the time of recording this, we've had some big waves that have kind of gone up and been sort of bubble pops as it relates to blockchain and specifically with NFTs. From my perspective, it sort of makes sense. There were GIFs of hamsters selling for millions of dollars, and it's like, okay, that's probably not worth millions of dollars.
But I've always looked at it like this: the fact that you can buy the Mona Lisa for $800 million, but you've never been able to purchase Let It Be by the Beatles for more than $1 just seems like there's a huge mismatch there in terms of value.
So yeah, I'm curious how you reflect on the market of Web3 and blockchain. Do you think there's anything to that as an opportunity in the future, especially as it relates to these types of assets that you're working with? And is that kind of integrated when someone sells a master? Like, does that also include the Web3 part of it as well, or how do you imagine that working?
Lior: So, Michael, I agree with you. There was kind of this boom in ’21 and ’22 around some of these concepts and avenues. We keep following the market and monitoring new developments, but we kind of took a more boring approach, right?
When we started, instead of thinking about the technology, we focused on the substance of what we’re trying to do. And the substance is moving money from investors into the pockets of artists and creatives. If that’s the objective, maybe we can work with the existing financial system. We don’t necessarily need to take this big leap into the unknown of a new, emerging financial architecture.
We thought there was a place for that, and that’s what we’re doing. Essentially, there’s an opportunity—you just need to approach it in a very specific way. You need to do your due diligence, consider the legal standpoint, and so on, to make sure that everything we do can rely on the traditional financial infrastructure.
I think that’s really been one of the secrets to why we’ve been able to grow so quickly. I know there have been other attempts around Web3 and blockchain to effectively do the same thing—selling rights and monetizing them—but those haven’t been able to scale so far. We decided to stick with a more traditional, maybe more boring, approach, but it’s proven to be very effective at growing and putting money into artists’ pockets.
Look, I think going forward, for us, the technology is just a way to achieve an objective. We’re talking to people in the blockchain space, and we’re aware of what’s going on. If, at some point, we think that would be a more efficient way of delivering a substantive solution, we will definitely explore it.
But I don’t see that as something that could be of interest to us anytime soon. I think there are a lot of traditional investors—Wall Street investors, as I mentioned earlier—who are very interested in financing independent artists, as long as the guardrails are in place. And that’s really what we do.
Michael: Awesome. All of that makes sense. It sounds like what you’re saying is there are different vehicles you could try to achieve the result, which is really connecting investors with artists and helping them fund their creativity and own an asset.
The traditional route of streaming is really reliable. I mean, there’s so much fluctuation, even with things like Bitcoin. It seems like the value rises and falls—it’s just a lot of uncertainty. So the model has been to focus on what’s working, what’s tried and true, even if it’s “boring,” because as a financial model, that’s what people are willing to invest in.
That could change in the future if the vehicles evolve, but based on what’s happening now, it seems like you have a vehicle that’s working. So why pivot to something fluctuating that hasn’t really found its footing yet?
Lior: Yeah, that’s exactly right. As I said, we’re aware that this solution only covers part of the market. There’s definitely a lot more to do, and we’re going to look into expanding into different areas in the future.
This isn’t the be-all-end-all solution to address the significant challenge of financing the independent music community. But we thought this was the proper place to start, and we’re continuously monitoring and thinking about new ways to expand.
Michael: Got it. That absolutely makes sense. Even just from a standpoint of owning the masters to a catalog, you’re going to want to find ways to really exploit—though that word sometimes has a negative connotation, I think it’s actually a good term here—monetize and maximize the value of the assets you own.
It makes sense that you’re aligned with that.
Cool. Speaking of emerging technologies, this one is quite a bit trendier right now for obvious reasons, but AI is revolutionizing all sorts of creative endeavors. Music, in particular, has seen a few tools pop up that are remarkably good at generating tracks. I’m curious how you view that emerging technology in relation to what you’ve built—owning a catalog of masters—and where that might be headed.
Lior: Yeah, for sure. So, first of all, I should say that we use AI, and we use AI to help us with the statistical analysis and projections of how songs are going to perform. That helps us ultimately come up with pricing options, right? AI can be used in very different ways.
There's generative AI, AI for creatives, and also AI in finance and statistics. So, we're definitely using it as a way to model and analyze more sophisticated datasets when looking at catalogs.
Usually, when people talk about AI in the music industry, they're actually talking about it in the context of creating new music and how the music landscape is going to change. No doubt, there will be a lot of change.
In the short term, I think it's going to help more people create more interesting things, which is very exciting for us. This is exactly the type of innovation we get very excited about.
Then there's the longer-term question: Do we think AI is going to replace human artistry? At least from our perspective, the answer is no. Of course, things will evolve and be different—things are not static. But ultimately, human artistry and human creativity stand at the core of what we do.
For example, we don't buy masters that aren't created by humans. We're not doing any type of machine-generated or production music. While that could be a good business, it's just not what we do. We're set up to help human artists and human creators.
We’re big believers that, even with twists and turns over the coming years as AI manifests itself and impacts how music is consumed, the fundamental human desire to listen to other humans create and express themselves remains at the core of the longevity of the music we’re involved with.
Michael: Awesome. Yeah. So, in a nutshell, you think this type of technology can really unlock a lot of creativity and expression from humans. You don’t believe it’s going to replace humans entirely but rather augment and provide tools that allow us to express ourselves more effectively.
And that's really what you're focused on right now—helping the human creator use these technologies and tools to express themselves, as opposed to these tools replacing humans entirely.
Lior: Absolutely. And the other piece that I would add to that is that what we're already seeing is that the existing streaming companies and other platforms are injecting AI into the music discovery process. You may or may not agree with me, but for Spotify, YouTube, or other companies, the algorithms keep serving you new music.
I think they’re becoming better at doing that. Some data we have, for example, on Spotify, shows that the importance of editorial playlists—whether we like it or not—is actually declining. People listen to those less, and they are becoming more and more interested in algorithm-driven discovery of human music.
That’s another impact of this AI wave we’re going through right now: better discovery. If you listen to Artist X, the platform knows how to suggest Artist Y for you more effectively. This means you’re going to spend more time on an artist you might otherwise never have heard of.
So, we’re seeing more and more discovery of independent artists, which is, of course, very beneficial for diversity and aligns with everything we stand for.
Michael: Awesome. Yeah, it definitely seems like with the discovery mode that Spotify opened up recently, that’s a way to tap into some of those algorithmic benefits to get your music shown to the right people.
This also ties in with another question I have for you, related to artists who might be a bit earlier on. They’re just before the precipice of being a really good fit for what you offer—having a catalog they can sell.
I’m curious if you have any recommendations or tips for artists who are maybe just a bit earlier on, watching this, and thinking, “Man, I’m going to put that on my vision board. I want to sell a track to Duetti.”
But first, they need to get one of their songs to, say, a million streams a year. Any advice or recommendations for helping artists get things off the ground and reach the point where they have a track they can sell to the catalog?
Lior: First of all, I should say it's very, very difficult. We have to recognize that. I think there are well over 10 million artists in the world who have music out there on streaming platforms. Right? And so, if any one of us wants to get into the very top of that, there are millions of other creators out there at different levels who are trying to do the same thing. We have to recognize that it's a very, very big challenge.
The second thing I would say is: really focus on being very consistent, if you can, in building a very specific audience. It's better to make a name for yourself in a small community and grow from there, versus trying to go mass market and reach millions of people and have that as your objective.
What we're seeing from where we sit, as we're looking at consumption and what people are interested in, is that the world is going more and more niche, into smaller groups of audiences. I think there’s been some shift, right? If we were talking five years ago, maybe I would have said something different. But in this day and age, where everything is becoming so specific with all these algorithms on social media and streaming companies, it’s all about carving out and finding the right niche that is, of course, authentic and makes sense for you as a creator. It's about trying to grow from there, as opposed to trying to appeal to many people and go very, very big right at the outset. That’s very, very difficult.
Michael: Got it. Yeah, good stuff. Well, Lior, it’s been a really fun conversation. I think the platform you’ve created is super interesting. Hopefully, there are people watching this right now who didn’t even realize they were sitting on an asset they could actually use as a vehicle for investment like this.
So, thank you for the work you’ve done creating this tool for music artists. For anyone listening right now or watching this who’s interested in exploring it and thinks they meet the criteria to potentially enter into a deal, what would be the best place for them to go to connect more?
Lior: The best place is to send us an email through the website. We usually come back very quickly, and one of our team members will start a conversation to see if there’s a good fit. That’s the best place.
Also, Michael, I want to take this opportunity to thank you for having me here. I really appreciate it and thank you for everything you do in terms of the education you put out there and the different materials. It’s super, super important in this environment, so I really appreciate that.
Michael: Oh, thanks, man. That means a lot. I appreciate you being a part of it.
Lior: Thank you.
Michael: So, like always, all the links will be in the show notes for easy access. It’s duetti.co (D-U-E-T-T-I.co). Lior, thanks again for being on the podcast, and I look forward to talking again soon.
Lior: Likewise. Thank you, Michael.