Rock agent Copeland dies

Ian Copeland, the US rock music agent and entrepreneur who represented The Police, REM, Adam Ant, and other seminal rock groups that emerged in the 1970s and 1980s New Wave and Punk scenes, has died. He was 57.

Copeland died on Tuesday of melanoma, family spokeswoman Amy Grey said in Los Angeles.

He was one of three brothers in the family who became prominent figures in the music industry.

Younger brother Stewart was the drummer for The Police. Older sibling Miles founded record label International Records Syndicate.

In the mid-1970s, Copeland moved to Macon, Georgia, where he worked for an agency booking tours for several Southern rock groups, including Charlie Daniels, Lynyrd Skynyrd and The Allman Brothers Band.

Word of London’s emerging punk rock scene excited Copeland, who sought to get the agency he was working for to bring the raw new British bands to US venues.

It didn’t work. But when his brother Miles signed the British band Squeeze, the two siblings arranged for the band to tour small clubs in the US.

They used the same strategy to promote other bands, including The Police and the B-52s.