Martin Mills (born 12 May 1949) is the founder and chairman of the Beggars Group.

Early life

Mills grew up near Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire and comes from an "upper-middle-class English family".[1] His father worked as a civil servant and his mother was a teacher and headmistress. Mills attended Magdalen College School and Oriel College, Oxford University, where he studied Philosophy, politics and economics, graduating in 1970.[2]

After graduating from university, Mills worked for the Office of Population, Census and Surveys, writing reports on abortion law reformation and processing abortion statistics; however, the experience left him wanting "to do something completely different".[1] After leaving, he found a job at the Record and Tape Exchange, a secondhand record shop in Shepherd's Bush, where Mills realised his future was in the music industry.[2] Eventually, Mills opened a record shop of his own, based on the idea of creating a "new kind of record shop which sold new and second hand records side by side", and began promoting concerts.[3]

Beggars Group


The record store was opened initially to re-sell records that he and a friend, Nick Austin, had collected for a mobile disco.[4] The disco, and then the company, was named after the Rolling Stones' album Beggars Banquet.[5] Mills and Austin had seen an opportunity for a record shop that sold both new and second-hand records. Beggars Banquet soon became a six-shop chain in London, arriving shortly before punk broke through; “It turned what we did upside down. We all started being interested in a completely different style of music. The kind of concerts we had been promoting suddenly became completely irrelevant, so we started promoting punk gigs instead. It was an amazing, incredibly exciting sea change."[6]

In the radio show he was quoted as saying that The whole point [of independent music publishing] is not giving people what they want but what they are going to want.[5]

Having served on the BPI (British Phonographic Industry) Council, the governing body of the record industry, from 1987 to 2000, he quit to become the progenitor of the Association of Independent Music in the UK, and similar bodies in Europe (Impala)[7] and the US (A2IM), and the Worldwide Independent Network.[8]

He also led the establishment of Merlin in 2008,[9] the independents’ rights licensing body, which has distributed well over $2 billion to members since launch, and today counts 850 members from 63 countries.

He has remained active in other music industry organisations, through his participation in the government’s Music Industry Forum, the Music Business Forum, being on the board of UK Music, and both as a director of PPL and VPL, the industry’s rights licensing bodies. In addition, he was called by the US Senate to Washington in 2012 to be a witness in the hearing on the proposed purchase of EMI Records by Universal Music.[10]

He was awarded an MBE in the 2008 New Year Honours list, as well as outstanding contribution awards from Music Week, Billboard, the Radio Academy, the Featured Artists Coalition, IMPALA, Canadian Music Week, The Music Producers’ Guild, A2IM, Billboard, and the 'Pioneer Award' at the AIM Awards.[11]

He has a personal fortune of £230 million.[12] A Beggars Group sale of their stake in Spotify in 2019 earned Mills £8 million.[13]

As of 2023, the labels that comprise the Beggars Group are 4AD, Matador Records, Rough Trade Records, XL Recordings and Young.[14]

Awards and accolades

Commentary

In June 2013, Mills was described in a BBC Radio 4 portrait as looking "remarkably unremarkable" but being "like a wise old fisherman watching minnows waiting to catch a really big fish".[5]

References

  1. 1 2 Werde, Bill (24 January 2013). "Billboard to Honor Beggars Group Chairman Martin Mills at MIDEM". Billboard. Retrieved 11 December 2022.
  2. 1 2 Kelly, Liam. "Martin Mills, founder of Beggars Group: my greatest hits — from rock bottom to Gary Numan and Adele". ISSN 0140-0460. Archived from the original on 19 November 2021. Retrieved 11 December 2022.
  3. ↑ "Beggars Group". www.beggars.com. Retrieved 27 March 2023.
  4. ↑ Music Made Me Do It: The Label Founder – Beggar’s Banquet’s Martin Mills The story of the biggest independent record company in the world, 30 Nov 2019
  5. 1 2 3 Radio 4 'Zeitgeisters', 22 June 2013
  6. ↑ Center Of The Indie Label Universe, 14 March 2011
  7. ↑ Impala Music Website
  8. ↑ 2018 Impala Music Article on WIN appointing Martin Mills as their first Chair, 27 Feb 2018
  9. ↑ Music Business Worldwide: Merlin Is 5: A Timeline Of Achievement, 6 June 2013
  10. ↑ Billboard: Beggars Group’s Martin Mills On Testifying at Senate Universal-EMI Hearing, 20 June 2012
  11. ↑ NME: Martin Mills to receive Pioneer Award at AIM Independent Music Awards 12 June 2014
  12. ↑ Hall, James (15 October 2021). "Adele, Inc: why the music industry is banking on pop's $1.5 million-a-day woman". The Telegraph. ISSN 0307-1235. Retrieved 30 April 2023.
  13. ↑ Kelly, Liam. "Payday for Beggars Group music pioneer Martin Mills". ISSN 0140-0460. Retrieved 30 April 2023.
  14. ↑ "Beggars Group Homepage". Company Website.
  15. ↑ Music Week: History Of The Strat Award, 9 May 2019
  16. ↑ Scoop Independent News/UK Government Press Release: Queen's New Year Honours List 2008, 31 Dec 2007
  17. ↑ Record Of The Day: Martin Mills and Everybody's honoured at Artist and Manager Awards, 18 Aug 2011
  18. ↑ The Guardian: Music Power 100 list, 26 May 2011
  19. ↑ Impala Honours Martin Mills and Label Love With Outstanding Contribution Awards, 2 Feb 2012
  20. ↑ Billboard: Beggars Group’s Martin Mills To Be Honored At A2IM’s Inaugural Libera Awards, 30 May 2012
  21. ↑ Audio Media International: Martin Mills honoured by Music Producers Guild, 4 Jan 2012
  22. ↑ Martin Mills Receives Billboard’s Industry Icon Award, 27 Jan 2013
  23. ↑ Billboard: Power 100, 2 Feb 2013
  24. ↑ Beggars Group Founder Martin Mills to Receive Inaugural CMW Global Impact Award at Canadian Music Week 2014, 8 May 2014
  25. ↑ PRS For Music: Martin Mills to receive AIM Pioneer Award, 12 June 2014
  26. ↑ Billboard: International Power Players, 30 Jan 2014
  27. ↑ Billboard: Power 100, 12 Feb 2016
  28. ↑ Billboard: Power 100, 9 Feb 2017
  29. ↑ Billboard: Indie Power Players, 14 Aug 2017
  30. ↑ Billboard: Indie Power Players, 27 Aug 2018
  31. ↑ Variety: International Music Leaders, 4 June 2018
  32. ↑ Billboard: Indie Power Players, 7 Feb 2019
  33. ↑ Billboard: Indie Power Players, 17 June 2019
  34. ↑ Variety: International Music Leaders, 30 May 2019
  35. ↑ Billboard: Indie Power Players, 15 June 2020
  36. ↑ Billboard: Indie Power Players, 23 Jan 2020
  37. ↑ Billboard: Indie Power Players, 7 June 2021
  38. ↑ Billboard: Indie Power Players, 6 June 2022
  39. ↑ Billboard: Power list, 26 Jan 2022
  40. ↑ Variety: an index of the 500 most influential business leaders shaping the global media industry, 28 Dec 2022
  41. ↑ Billboard: Power 100 list Jan 2023

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