There are two takes on the propaganda war over music piracy. One is of a fearless protector fighting to save artists’ livelihoods from the grasp of criminals. The other is of an Orwellian capitalist machine bearing down on those who believe in freedom and sharing. Either way, the record industry’s campaigning function is painted as a large, powerful force.

 

“I allow myself a wry smile at being described as the industry’s lobbying juggernaut,” says Adam Liversage, director of communications at the BPI. “It’s just me, in an office. It’s not that we’re throwing massive resource at it. It’s the clarity of your argument. It benefits vested interests to turn a blind eye to illegal downloading or encourage it. But what is reasonable behaviour? Is it reasonable to allow the stealing of music? It’s fascinating, though. Everyone has a view on it.”

 

He admits to being evangelical about the BPI’s side of the debate. “Three quarters of content is consumed illegally. That has an impact on the industry’s ability to invest in new artists. We’re a country brimming with musical talent. We’re a net exporter of music. We should be nurturing and protecting that.”

 

Adam’s early years gave only slight indications that he’d become a campaigning force. Born in Stockport and raised in Birmingham, Adam’s youth was fuelled by a love of both music and current affairs. But he found he wasn’t content just to observe from the side lines.

 

“Around the age of 14 or 15, I developed a taste for writing letters to the local newspaper and the NME,” he says. “I was amused and enthralled by fact that I could make myself heard on subjects like the Poll Tax. If I’m being honest, I’ve always been fond of the sound of my own voice. It’s probably why I’m here now.”

 

His route into the comms profession was, he admits, “not traditional”. He left school at 16 and side-stepped university in favour of work, joining PowerGen in a general admin role.

 

After four years, he was made redundant but he’d been studying on day release and at night school so took it as a cue to apply to university. In 1992, he began the second year of a BA in public relations at Leeds Metropolitan University, having been exempted from the first year due to his work experience.

 

“The degree was a fascinating experience,” he says. “I was a little nervous about how academically challenging it would be. But, as it turned out, the work ethic I’d developed from four years of working in an office was pivotal. The degree was very vocational.”

 

Only as graduation loomed did Adam begin to wonder: what next? He hadn’t mapped out a career in advance. “There’s never been a plan. Everything has come from either serendipity or me acting on a hunch.”

 

In an idle conversation with his course secretary, he was told Leeds City Council was looking for a PR to focus on music. “Within 3 hours of getting my degree result I was sat at a desk working.”

 

His role was in the council’s Leisure & Tourism department and he was soon poached by the central communication department, with a brief that stretched from education and health to licensing.

 

As with many budding PR professionals, however, he had his eye on a move. “I acknowledged that, if I was going to make a go of a career, I needed to move to London. If you want to be engaging with the national media on a regular basis, you just have to do it.”

 

He joined a PR agency called Bastion, a specialist in video game PR, and realised rapidly he’d bitten off more than he could chew.

 

“I had nowhere to live, I didn’t know anyone, I’d taken the job entirely on spec and was learning a new industry and how an agency works. After a few months, it just wasn’t working out – for them or for me. So they let me go.”

 

Undeterred, Adam quickly landed a job as press officer at London Transport – a gig that was, in his words, “high profile”.

 

London Transport being what it is, a large chunk of his work was crisis management. “It was an incredible learning experience that really accelerated the development of my media relations skills. It was made clear from the start that if you were willing to put in the hours, you could go far.”

 

Each member of the team was given a tube line or two to look after, and Adam was also tasked with overseeing the early rumblings of what became Oyster cards – a full ten years before they saw the light of day.

 

His next move was prompted by curiosity more than anything. “I noticed an ad from something called the New Millennium Experience Company, which was looking for someone with a robust knowledge of transport and technical press.” He was a shoo-in and only then realised what an “enormous story” he’d become part of.

 

Adam would frequently have to don a hardhat, and take media tours for scrums of journalists. “I must have shown 10,000 of them around the site – and that’s a conservative estimate – including all the newspaper editors. But I never found that intimidating. When you’re young, you don’t understand the gravitas of these people.”

 

Adam even gave Boris Johnson a tour. “Of course, Boris wandered off to get into the ‘spirit’ of the dome, and almost ended up in wet concrete. I sometimes wonder how the London political scene would be different if he’d ended up face down, like a concrete Han Solo.”

 

Adam’s colleague at the time was Ross White, who recalls Adam’s professionalism. “Adam had to deal with [Channel 4 show] The Mark Thomas Project when they invaded the Dome to stage a protest. Despite a raging hangover, he was extremely professional defusing the situation with his unique humour and charisma.”

 

He adds: “Adam is passionate about his work, always wanting to achieve the best results. This focus, combined with a strong intelligence and charisma, makes him an excellent communicator. He has an instinctive grasp of what the media need and he never loses sight of what he also wants to achieve. Not only does he have a strong strategic vision, he also knows how to deliver.”

 

The Dome was making front page news on a daily basis, and in general all was going well – “up until that fateful New Year’s Eve fiasco”, when the majority of VIP guests were unable to get there until about 10. “That was the turning point. Then the press were looking for bad news, literally camping out looking for problems. That next year was a lesson in high level crisis management. At one point it was threatening to destabilise the government.”

 

Adam admits he “probably covered more in that year than most PRs do in ten” – what with the funding problems, a new CEO and a daring raid by diamond thieves – but he stuck it out for the whole year, and stayed a couple of weeks after.

 

Although the end point had always been in sight, Adam admits he had no idea what he was going to do when it came around. But when he was offered the chance to work with the world’s biggest record company, he knew it was too good a chance to pass up. Universal has operations in 70 countries and its news agenda was a cocktail of new artists, new execs, quarterly results, along with issues of music piracy – his time there coinciding with the growth of Napster. “It was nice to be working for an international company, even though the music industry was and remains under pressure.”

 

Here, he worked with Adam White (now the group’s VP, communications) who recalls: “What soon became obvious was Adam’s fearlessness. There was almost nothing that threw him off- balance, and it was comforting to have that in a colleague. Especially as the music business hit the turbulence of the Noughties.

 

“Another of his virtues is his ability to absorb a brief very quickly, and get to work. That’s been a real asset for him at the BPI.”

 

Sadly, in 2004, Adam was made redundant once again – but during his gardening leave he took a call from former colleague Ross Cook. Then working in BT’s newsroom, he told Adam there was a vacancy and suggested he apply. “He could vouch for my tenacity and attention to detail. In the end, I was there for five years.”

 

BT was, and is, “an enormous organisation”, with 15 million customers and a colossal business division. “There were 250 people in the comms function; with around 20 press officers alone,” recalls Adam. “So I saw it as an opportunity to thrive and develop.”

 

Initially on the B2B side, Adam later moved to work on consumer products and issues in the newsroom, including broadband and BT’s TV launch. “BT’s broadband offering remains one of UK’s biggest. And it was the first time a national IPTV platform had been launched in Britain.”

 

When personalisation technology company Phorm began a project that would inject targeted ads into the browsing stream, BT faced massive opposition from internet rights groups. Adam spent a year defending BT’s involvement. Meanwhile, his experience in the music business meant he was well-placed to formulate a comms strategy for music piracy on BT networks. A tough brief. “But I’m someone who enjoys the challenge of difficult issues.”

 

Communicating financial issues – including a new corporate strategy and the organic loss of 10,000 jobs – was a test Adam relished. “One of fantastic things about working at BT was that it manages the comms on its own financial results, including the quarterlies and the AGM. It’s rare in the FTSE 100 to not use a big financial PR company. But it was a brilliant experience. “

“The success or failure of my work is judged on the absolute outcomes – are we reducing illegal downloading? I don’t sit down and analyse each piece of messaging. I don’t have time. I have to measure the overall tone and success of coverage”

Although enjoyable, Adam found himself lured by an even greater challenge: heading up comms at the BPI, the voice of the UK music industry, which was and is fighting music piracy.

 

“It would be very easy to secure a well-paid job in media relations for a company with no issues,” Adam muses. “I know people who do that. They get involved in the results once a quarter and handle ad hoc issues, but that’s it. I see it as being a footballer. You want to be on the pitch. That’s why you’re in the game.”

 

The appointment saw Adam move from an organisation of 100,000 to an outfit of around 35, but he was attracted to the fact that he’d have sole responsibility for communications. Adam sees three strands to his role. The first is to raise awareness of the importance of music. “I have to remind people how much they love it, and that it has to be created and paid for. Artists have the right to earn a living.” He recently promoted a campaign, Music Matters, raising awareness of the value of music through videos.

 

The second strand is to campaign to educate people about legal digital music services and copyright law. In 2010, along with the film and TV industry. he produced a guide for parents and teachers to music and film content, and the perils of acquiring it illegally.

 

And the third is the creation of a meaningful deterrent. “When nothing is done to stop people using music for free, there’s no deterrent. So we’re lobbying for the Digital Economy Act and for the Government to send educational letters to those found filesharing music – and for those that persist, there’s the prospect of invoking technical measures to their broadband account.”

 

The BPI’s lobbying campaign has been vehemently opposed by ISPs and search engines. “There’s a lot of scaremongering about dystopian and fanciful consequences which won’t come to pass.”

 

And, as he reminds us, the communications function is far from being a ‘juggernaut’. “I’m the comms director, there’s a director of public affairs, and we share a manager. But when messages come from the BPI, that’s me.”

 

The campaigning effort is unrelenting, so specific evaluation and measurement is a luxury. “The success or failure of my work is judged on the absolute outcomes – are we reducing illegal downloading? I don’t sit down and analyse each piece of messaging. I don’t have time. I have to measure the overall tone and success of coverage.”

 

It’s fortunate that, away from work, Adam is “obsessed with music”. He has a large music collection and plays keyboards and guitar too. “It’s only for fun. I’m not going to threaten the top 40.” After his two-and-a-half year old daughter, his other passions revolve around the “classic triumvirate of interests for men in their late 30s”: photography, cycling and whiskey. The usual, then. All of which sounds far too normal and human for an all-powerful campaigning juggernaut.