Sting doesn’t need to put on the red light: The Police frontman is the latest musician to sell his entire songwriting catalog. The New York Times reports that the singer and bassist has passed all music under his name to Universal Music Group, in a catalog deal estimated to be worth around a whopping $300 million.
This transaction covers the copyrights for the recordings to Sting’s songs, as well as his royalties as a songwriter. It includes both Sting’s solo material and his entire output with The Police, spanning from the band’s 1978 debut Outlandos d’Amour all the way to last year’s The Bridge. This means hits like “Roxanne,” “Message in a Bottle,” “Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic,” and “Every Breath You Take” are now entirely controlled by Universal.
Sting joins a growing list of artists who have struck multi-million dollar catalog deals in the past couple of years. Bruce Springsteen sold his masters and publishing to Sony Music for a reported total of $500 million in December. Last month, Neil Young sold half of his catalog rights to Hipgnosis for an undisclosed amount, and David Bowie’s entire publishing catalog sold for $250 million. UMG previously bought Bob Dylan’s songwriter catalog in 2020 for an estimated $300 million and his recordings were recently sold to Sony for $200 million.
