Category Archives for "Music Industry News"
July 29, 2016
A SoundCloud Demise Would Create A Void For Indie Artists
SoundCloud is seeking a buyer, and that could make it much more difficult for indie music artists across all genres to have their music heard. The streaming music service is reportedly seeking a sale in the $1 billion range in a deal that could alter that part of the music landscape for a long time. According to […]
Continue reading
July 27, 2016
Do You Really Need A Record Label?
Here’s a very interesting video from The Economist that looks at the new dynamics of the record business and whether an artist really needs a record label these days. It’s a veiled advert for Kobalt, but frankly, that company is way ahead of the game when it comes to not only collecting artist royalties, but […]
Continue reading
July 22, 2016
Deezer Launches In The U.S., But Does Anybody Care?
After a year run up, the streaming service Deezer has finally launched in the United States. Spotify’s major competitor in Europe is now in the world’s largest market, but the question is, does it have enough to differentiate itself from the rest of the current streaming contenders in the space? The Paris-based service launched in […]
Continue reading
July 20, 2016
Apple’s Publishing Royalty Proposal Is A Shot At Spotify
Who says Apple’s music executives aren’t smart? In what may end up being a brilliant strategic move, the company discretely made a proposal to the governing Copyright Royalty Board to increase the song publishing royalty rate to 9.1 cents per 100 interactive streams, a significant increase over what is currently paid, according to the NY […]
Continue reading
July 18, 2016
Warners Stops Selling To Small Record Stores
In another blow to the mom and pop music store, Warner Music has cut off more than 100 accounts that do less than $10,000 in business per year with the company, according to a post on Pitchfork. That means that in order to have a direct account with Warners to get the best pricing, a […]
Continue reading
July 8, 2016
The Album Is Dying, And Good Riddance
The music business was once all about the single song, transitioned to the album, and looks to be transitioning back again, as album sales sink lower and lower. While the writing may be on the wall that the concept of an album may be as outmoded as a buggy whip, artists, bands and record labels […]
Continue reading
July 4, 2016
Buying Tidal Is A Terrible Waste Of Apple’s Money
A report from the Wall Street Journal yesterday has Apple in talks to buy Jay-Z’s Tidal streaming service, and even though Tim Cook’s company has a truck load of cash on hand, this is one acquisition that seems to be a waste of money. When Apple purchased Beats two years ago for around $3 billion, […]
Continue reading
June 13, 2016
Big Tax Break Coming For Recording In New York
Everybody likes to save money and saving money on taxes is no exception. That’s why numerous states (like North Carolina and Louisiana) and countries (like Canada) have issued their own versions of a tax break to entertainment companies to lure production to their locations in recent years. Now New York is getting into the act, […]
Continue reading
May 25, 2016
Pirate Radio Stations On The Rise Again
Once upon a time pirate radio stations were big business and a big influence, with Radio Caroline, Radio Luxembourg and XERF all helping birth the modern radio and music industries. Most pirate stations have been long closed, and it was thought that they’d be gone for good thanks to the Internet. Surprisingly, pirate radio is […]
Continue reading
May 24, 2016
Pandora’s Largest Investor Worried About Its Future
Pandora’s largest investor is so concerned about its future that it sent a letter to the company’s CEO and board members asking them to reconsider its strategy and explore the possibility of a sale. According to a report in Music Business Worldwide, Corvex Management LP, the investor that sent the letter, owns 8.3% of Pandora and is fed up […]
Continue reading
May 20, 2016
Facebook’s New Slideshow Feature Just For Music Videos
It’s obvious that Facebook has been gunning for YouTube for some time now, and the service now claims that it now has more video viewers (although that’s debatable). That’s not enough though, as Facebook will soon introduce a feature called Slideshow that will allow users to create their own soundtracks from a list of licensed popular songs. Although only […]
Continue reading
May 18, 2016
Steve Miller’s Rock n’ Roll Hall Of Fame Rant
I’ve been no fan of the Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame, as you probably know if you read this blog. I don’t believe there should be such an institution, since there’s really no way to quantify who should be in it, unlike a sports HOF where there are plenty of statistics to gauge someone’s […]
Continue reading
May 17, 2016
YouTube Adopts A New Tool For Faster Royalty Payments
One of the things that bugs artists, songwriters and labels about YouTube is that it’s pretty difficult to get precise information about views and payments. In many cases, views aren’t counted and in other cases payments take too long to arrive. YouTube is hoping to alleviate those problems by implementing a new tool based on the […]
Continue reading
May 16, 2016
Universal Music Makes Nearly $4 Million A Day From Streaming
Who says that there’s no money in streaming? It seems that all of those micro-payments add up after all as Universal Music Group is making about $3.9 million per day just from streaming music, according to its parent Vivendi’s first quarter earnings statement. In fact, UMG’s streaming revenue was up almost 60% over the previous quarter, […]
Continue reading
May 12, 2016
Spotify To Launch 12 Original Video Shows
Spotify recently announced that it was getting into the original content business by launching 12 new shows, and guess what? They’ll all be on video. According to the company, the video shows will be “centered around three main themes – music performances, music profiles and music culture,” and the episodes will be up to fifteen minutes long. The foray […]
Continue reading