Rick Springfield says he was 'preyed on' in early career

Aussie '80s rock legend Rick Springfield has opened up about the realities of the recording industry, in particular how "predatory" it is.

The Jessie's Girl singer opened up on a podcast with SiriusXM's Eddie Trunk about one of the biggest mistakes he made in his early career.

Watch the video above

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"The music business has always preyed on the young. Absolutely," he said, adding,
"And I got preyed on when I was like 20 and I signed away my publishing rights because I didn't know any better."

He said that as an Australian, he didn't have a good understanding of American recording contracts.

"I was in Australia and these big Americans sent over this contract and we didn't know about lawyers," he said.

"I didn't even have a lawyer look at it and I just said, 'OK, this must be fair.' And I signed it and realised a couple of years later that they owned all of my publishing."

He described the typical process, sharing, "The majority of [the labels] just would shove product down the pipeline as much as they could, until the pipeline choked. That was kind of their approach. So every artist has absolutely their due to take all their music back.

"[It] would always amaze me that I'd spend $100,000 on a frigging video in the '80s and the record company would own it," he continued.

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He went on to say he admires the efforts of young artists like Taylor Swift, who re-recorded her old music after her label Big Machine was sold to Scott Borchetta and Scooter Braun in 2019, and with it the rights to her back catalogue of songs.

Though Springfield says his own publishing rights debacle was "just the way of the world" at the time, he admires the push Swift is making to change the way creative control works for present and future artists.

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Springfield was one of the most famous rockers of the '80s, bursting onto the scene with Jessie's Girl in 1981, which won him the Grammy Award for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance, as well as number ones on the US and Australian charts.

He is also known for his hits I've Done Everything for You, Don't Talk to Strangers, Affair of the Heart and Love Somebody, all of which were top 10 hits in the US.

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