Music Industry News Roundup For The Week Of 3/17/17

Here’s the Music Industry News Roundup for the week of March 17th, 2017. There’s lots of interesting speculation on new services, and not a mention of Spotify for once. Let’s get into it.

Facebook trying to solve “social music.” No one else has cracked it, but the company is taking music very seriously.

Will AI and chatbots disrupt the music industry? AI is already being used for streaming recommendations, but there may be other places for it as well.

Ed Sheeran claimed 9 of the top 10 chart spots in the UK. And 16 of the top 20, and that’s worrying a lot of people. Are free streams are screwing up the charts because they’re weighted the same as paid streams? Apple’s Jimmy Iovine has a lot to say on this.

Is Taylor Swift getting into the streaming business.  She just filed for 9 trademarks for “Swifties,” but all we know is that it’s for a website. Speculation runs high here.

Pandora finally launched its premium tier. The company tries to capitalize on its 175 million users, but is this too little too late?

Alibaba to launch an artist management company. The Chinese company is going global and has committed to spending more than $7 billion on entertainment in the next 3 years. Look out Google, Apple and Amazon.

Airbnb is getting into the music business. It’s launched its “Music Experience” which provides not only accommodations, but prime tickets as well. Now available in 12 cities but soon expanding to 40 globally.

And Amazon is getting into the festival business. No announcement, just a job posting about wanting to dramatically improve the festival experience. Who wouldn’t be for that?

Google Play Music has new audio playback options. You can now change between 4 different levels of audio quality, which suggest some hi-res music in the future. The problem is there’s no explanation about the specs.

You’ll be shocked at the top vinyl records in each state. Classic rock still rules, which is kind of sad in a way. I like the fact that vinyl buyers understand the quality of the musical period, but it’s time for some new blood.

That’s the Music News Roundup of what went on in the music industry last week. Have a great week ahead!