Category Archives for "Music Industry News"
June 30, 2017
You Might Not Like It, But Facebook Now Has 2 Billion Users
Every few months there seems to be a new post or article regarding how much Facebook is slipping in one demographic or another. The cries that millennials, Gen X and Gen Yers were abandoning the platform for something new have scared many artists and bands from using it, or made them reluctant to give the […]
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June 28, 2017
Taylor Swift Makes A Bundle Since Returning To Streaming
One of the reasons that management pulled the Taylor Swift catalog from all streaming services in 2014 was that the revenue from streaming wasn’t sufficient to warrant it being there. Swift was the biggest artist in the world at the time and didn’t need the additional exposure, and she was still selling CDs, so other […]
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June 26, 2017
The Proposed Tesla Music Service Might Not Be What Everyone Thinks
The last few days has seen plenty of news copy about the rumor of new Tesla music streaming service, and, as usual with anything that has to do with Elon Musk, the hype builds on itself. Let me throw the cold waters of reality on this rumor. Even if it does come to pass, it […]
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June 21, 2017
Apple Music Quietly Launches $99/ Year Tier
Apple has been pretty diligent about keeping the price of Apple Music at $9.99 per month with no discounts (except for the $14.99 family plan) since it launched, but now it looks like a new $99 per year option is now available as well. recently spotted this new tier, and found that the interesting thing […]
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June 19, 2017
Major Holdout Bob Seger Finally Comes To Streaming
Some fans thought it would never happen, but the Bob Seger catalog has finally come to Spotify and Apple Music. 13 of the singer’s most popular albums are now available to most streaming services, with the exceptions being Tidal and Pandora. The interesting thing here is not that Seger made it online at all, but what […]
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June 16, 2017
YouTube And ASCAP Do A Deal
The music business has long been critical of YouTube not only for its 55/45 split (45% going to YouTube), but for the fact that songwriters and publishers frequently go unpaid. This could soon change for songwriters signed to ASCAP as the organization has agreed to a new plan that shares songwriter information with the video […]
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June 14, 2017
Apple Music Up To 27 Million Users
Spotify may be in the lead when it comes to paid streaming subscribers, but Apple Music is closing the gap fast. The company announced last week during its presentation at the World Wide Developers Conference that its streaming service is now up to 27 million users. Spotify still leads the pack with 50 million, but […]
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June 12, 2017
Pandora Fails To Get The Message In Its Deal With Sirius XM
The streaming music service Pandora’s in trouble and it has been for some time. Its user base is shrinking, its losses are increasing, and it’s not able to generate enough revenue, a bad combination if there ever was one. Reports are that the company actually rejected a total acquisition by the satellite radio company Sirius […]
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June 7, 2017
Sony Music Folds RED Distribution Into The Orchard
Sometimes consolidation is a good thing, and that certainly looks like the case with Sony Music folding its RED distribution into its Orchard operation. The move is being made in the name of efficiency, and no jobs will be lost in the transition, which is unusual. This is actually happening on a worldwide basis as […]
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June 5, 2017
Arianna Grande’s Manchester Benefit Concert – It’s The Right Thing To Do
There was a time when music artists led the charge for social awareness, eschewing commercialism in favor of some greater public good. “Selling out,” was about the worst thing you could do during those days, and a quick way to become ostracized not only from fellow musicians, but a large portion of the music consuming public […]
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May 29, 2017
Does Music Piracy Still Exist Even In The Age Of Streaming?
Streaming seems to have wiped out music piracy, but not according to the IFPI. The global recording industry organization claims that piracy is still alive and well but just in another form. While illegal downloads dominated piracy a few years ago, now it’s attributed to stream ripping (illegally saving music while streaming it). Here’s a chart […]
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May 24, 2017
The MP3 Is Not Dead, And I Can Prove It
There’s been a flurry of articles lately about the death of the MP3, and most of them have got the story wrong. The format itself is, in fact, far from dead, and I’m going to prove it to you. First, what is an MP3? It’s a file format that basically takes a very large-sized high-bandwidth […]
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May 23, 2017
Engineer Eric “Mixerman” Sarafin On My Latest Inner Circle Podcast
Engineer Eric Sarafin has had great success with artists like The Pharcyde, Tone Loc, Ben Harper, Lifehouse, Barenaked Ladies, Amy Grant, and Foreigner, among many others. He’s a great engineer/producer, and certainly deserves all the accolades that he’s received for that, but you might know him better for his writing under the name of Mixerman. […]
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May 15, 2017
Is Part Of Universal Music Up For Sale?
Universal Music’s parent company Vivendi recently put a public price tag of $22 billion on the company, which seems odd since it hasn’t valued this asset before. In fact, the only good reason to do so is if Vivendi either wants to sell all or part of Universal or to take the company public to reap […]
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May 10, 2017
Spotify Tries To Bring Back The QR Code
The QR code feels so yesterday. For a year or so you found them everywhere, then they all seemed to disappear at once, at least on a retail level. Spotify thinks that they can be a quick way for sharing music though, and it’s trying to bring them back only in a different form. There’s […]
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