We've covered the music business each day since 21 Jun 2002 Today's email is edition #5047 | |
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| | Sean Combs hands publishing rights back to artists | Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs has reassigned song rights to a number of artists who were previously signed to his Bad Boy label, despite having received mega-bucks offers for his company’s publishing catalogue. | | LATEST JOBS |
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| | | | | | | | | TOP STORY | ONE LINERS | LABELS | APPROVED | LIVE | DIGITAL | AND FINALLY... |
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Sean Combs hands publishing rights back to artists |
| Tom Jones, King Creosote, Music Leaders Network | Virgin Music expands into Nigeria | Duvet's Double A side | Miley "didn't make a dime" from Bangerz tour | Spotify bans white noise podcasts from ads scheme | National Album Day ambassadors are all THRILLED |
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| Sean Combs hands publishing rights back to artists | One Liners: Tom Jones, King Creosote, Music Leaders Network | Virgin Music expands into Nigeria | Approved: Duvet | Miley "didn't make a dime" from Bangerz tour | Spotify bans white noise podcasts from ads scheme | National Album Day ambassadors are all THRILLED |
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TOP STORY | Sean Combs reassigns publishing rights back to Bad Boy artists | Sean 'Diddy' Combs has reassigned song rights that his Bad Boy Entertainment company previously acquired from artists it worked with back to those artists. This is despite the rapper reportedly being offered mega-bucks by various parties interested in buying his company's publishing catalogue.
According to sources, Bad Boy has been liaising with various artists regarding the rights in their songs for a couple of years now. The company seemingly acquired most of those rights via record deals, in an era where labels in some genres often sought a slice of publishing from their artists, usually securing a long-term interest in those rights.
Billboard reports that Ma$e, Faith Evans, The LOX, 112 and the estate of the Notorious BIG are among those to have completed deals to reclaim their rights. Terms of those deals are not known. Under American law, songwriters who assign copyrights to business partners can actually terminate those assignments after 35 years, although that termination only applies to the copyright within the US.
The rapper Cam’ron actually alluded to Ma$e's deal with Bad Boy in an Instagram post last week, noting "he just got his publishing back from Puff, just finished the paperwork for that yesterday - congrats".
The deal with Ma$e is perhaps the most significant, given the criticism he has made in the past about his one-time mentor. After Diddy criticised the music industry for taking black artists for granted when receiving an Industry Icon award during 2020's Grammys weekend, Cam’ron hit out on social media, arguing that the Bad Boy boss himself had exploited artists formerly signed to his label.
That dig specifically mentioned Diddy owning Ma$e’s publishing "from 24 years ago" for which "you gave me $20k". Things like that, he added, "makes me never want to work with you - as any artist wouldn’t - this is not black excellence at all". | Read Online | |
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| ONE LINERS | Tom Jones, King Creosote, Music Leaders Network + more | APPOINTMENTSTimothy Xu has been appointed as Chair and CEO of Universal Music Greater China. "I am THRILLED to welcome Timothy to lead our operations in Greater China”, says overall CEO Lucian Grainge. “He's a real music exec, given his deep experience generating creative and commercial success in the region. I'm confident Timothy will be instrumental as we continue to drive growth in the exciting and vibrant Chinese music market”.
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENTUK-based women’s leadership programme Music Leaders Network has launched its first international outpost with Music Leaders Network Nordic, which will cover all countries in the Nordic region. “Music is an international business and Music Leaders Network needs to reflect this to create opportunities for its current and future members”, say co-founders Remi Harris and Tamara Gal-On. “We want to facilitate all our participants to engage across the industry, regardless of the country in which they are based. It's our goal to see more women in leadership in the music industry".
RELEASESKing Creosote has announced that he will release his first album for seven years, ‘I Des’, on 3 Nov. He’ll also be touring around the release, including a show at EartH in London on 9 Nov. Out now is new single ‘Blue Marbled Elm Trees’.
Kojaque has released new single ‘Woof’, featuring Biig Piig. The track, he says, is about “when you get to that pointless stage of an argument with someone where neither of you are communicating anymore: no one’s looking for a resolution. Karma Kid sent the beat during lockdown and Biig Piig absolutely crushed it. She was one of the very first people I clicked with when I came to London, so I’m delighted we finally got to work together”.
Gazelle Twin will release new album ‘Black Dog’ on 27 Oct. Listen to the title track here. Live dates are set for November, kicking off with a show at Bush Hall in London on 10 Nov.
Scalping have announced that they have changed their name to Scaler and have also released new Daniel Avery-produced single ‘Loam’. “As this band has grown and the opportunity to travel further afield has presented itself, we've become aware of the wider context surrounding our previous name and how offensive it can be to indigenous cultures”, say the band. “We want to apologise for this, it was never our intent to offend. Everything else remains the same”.
GIGS & TOURSTom Jones will head out on a five date UK arena tour in December, including a show at the O2 Arena in London on 17 Dec. Tickets go on general sale on Friday.
UB40 Featuring Ali Campbell have announced UK tour dates in April next year, including a show at London’s O2 Arena on 11 Apr. Tickets go on general sale on Friday. | Read Online | | LABELS & PUBLISHING | Virgin Music expands into Nigeria | Universal Music's label and artist services business the Virgin Music Group last week confirmed a further expansion of its operations in Africa, with artist manager and former Warner Music exec Olukorede 'Kay' Ikazoboh appointed to head up a new office in Lagos, Nigeria.
From launch, Virgin Music Nigeria will be working with artists Darkoo and Reekado Banks, as well as Afrobeats label Dvpper.
Says Virgin Music co-CEO Nat Pastor: “The global appetite for the incredible musical creativity springing from Africa has never been stronger. Establishing a presence in Nigeria is another important step in our commitment to serving independent African artists and entrepreneurs throughout the region".
Meanwhile Michael Roe, MD of Virgin Music International, adds of the company’s choice of boss for its Nigerian base: “Kay is known throughout Nigeria as a champion of independent labels and artist development. Her relationships, expertise and insight into the local market make her the perfect executive to lead our operations in this very important music market”.
Ikazoboh herself says: “Nigeria has become a hugely important creative hub, producing some of the most exciting music anywhere in the world. I’m looking forward to working with independent labels and artists to help them build their fanbases both here and around the world. I am truly honoured to lead this mission with my team and look forward to the incredible journey ahead". | Read Online | | APPROVED: DUVET | Having self-released a handful of jagged post-punk singles over the last year, Duvet are set to release a double A-side seven-inch through Fear Of Missing Out Records next month. It features the songs ‘Girlcow’ and ‘Sweaty Dog’, the first of which is out now.
"'Girlcow' is a song that includes a bit of fictional storytelling about a confident cowboy pursuing a playgirl bunny type character”, say the band. “The lyrics are a bit scattered, stream of consciousness and all over the place, with the verse and chorus switching from the two perspectives”.
“Given that”, they go on, “it only felt natural to write something that’s quite erratic to go with the words. It’s a very up and down song and that was kind of our intent, to put together something that’s slightly nauseating but still catchy”.
Guitarist Tamsin Stephens adds: “We all mutually find cowboys quite funny. I think we all live through cowboys somehow”.
This sense of humour runs throughout the band’s music, offsetting the raw delivery of their songs - something they have done intentionally, Stephens explains.
“The reason we tend to write songs [about] more of the fun side of life is because myself and Grace [Walkden, vocals] had many conversations at the start about how people only expect us to only talk/sing about harsh topics that affect a lot of women”, she says.
“We tried it, but it didn’t work for us. Maybe in the future it will, but we came to the conclusion that we are here to have fun with the band and escape that side of life”.
“You come to the practice room with a smile on your face because this is meant to be fun and that’s why we hopefully write songs that we think are fun”, adds the band’s other guitarist Seth Lloyd. “We are here to distract from the shit things in life”.
The seven-inch will be available from 6 Oct. Listen to ‘Girlcow’ now. | Read Online | | LIVE BUSINESS | Miley Cyrus says she "didn’t make a dime" from 2014 Bangerz Tour | Miley Cyrus has revealed that she didn't make any money at all from her 2014 Bangerz Tour because of the high production costs.
Although making money from live shows is challenging when artists are playing smaller venues, it's generally thought that once you are at arena and stadium level concerts are a cash cow. However, even when you are selling out major venues, the profitably of the show does depend on how much you spend on production.
And in 2014, Cyrus - in the middle of reinventing herself, from child star to provocative pop star - spent big on props and staging.
The Sun quotes Cyrus reminiscing about the tour that followed the release of her 2013 album 'Bangerz', noting "I didn’t make a dime".
“It was an investment in myself", she says. “A lot of these ideas were so outlandish that no one wanted to support me in making these items. I had big puppets, oversized beds, I arrived on stage by sliding down [a giant model of] my own tongue".
“I didn’t make a dime on this tour because I wanted it to be excellent", she goes on, "and when everyone kept saying ‘why are you doing this - you are going to do, like, a hundred shows and you are not going to make any money?’, I said there is no one I would rather invest in than myself”. “I paid for it all to make it exactly what I and the fans deserved", she concludes.
Which is nice. I just hope the fans appreciated it, giant tongue and all. | Read Online | | DIGITAL & D2F | Spotify bans white noise podcasters from Ambassador Ads programme | Spotify is cutting off a specific advertising revenue stream from the makers of white noise podcasts, because when you stick on a podcast that just consists of white noise, you're probably not paying much attention to any promotional messaging.
It's Spotify's Ambassador Ads programme - where podcasters get paid to promote Spotify's own products - that the makers of white noise podcasts will no longer be able to participate in, oblivious of how many listeners and streams they might boast.
There have been rumours for a few weeks now that Spotify was looking to change its policies in relation to the white noise podcasts, although it wasn't entirely clear what that meant.
But, clearly, paying for promo messages that appear during podcasts where most listeners will have the audio on very much in the background is not the best use of Spotify's own marketing budgets, especially when its podcasting business is looking to cut costs.
According to Bloomberg, white noise podcasters will no longer be eligible to participate in the Ambassador Ads programme from next month.
The prevalence and popularity of functional audio on Spotify more generally has become a bigger talking point this year, of course.
Where audio files containing white noise, the sound of rainfall or bird song, or whatever, is delivered to the streaming services via the music industry's distributors, it is then counted as music for royalty purposes. This means that some of the revenue pool shared with the music industry is allocated to the makers of that audio.
That is pissing off the music industry and especially the majors, resulting in calls for a change to the way streaming services allocate money each month, segmenting out functional audio so it gets a smaller share of the cash. | Read Online |
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| | AND FINALLY... | National Album Day, Gabrielle, Tricky, Extreme, Nuno Bettencourt, Declan McKenna | The ambassadors for this year’s UK National Album Day have been announced. And with the big event this year celebrating albums of the 90s, organisers have selected a group who can provide a unique insight into that time, with three being popular during that decade and one being born as it all unfolded. They are Gabrielle, Tricky, Extreme’s Nuno Bettencourt and Declan McKenna.
Gabrielle had hits with songs like ‘Dreams’ back in the early 90s, while Tricky was at the forefront of the then emerging trip hop scene alongside the likes of Massive Attack and Portishead. Bettencourt, meanwhile, sits in two camps, having had a massively successful career with Extreme and now performing as part of Rihanna’s live band. And Declan McKenna was born in 1998, but is aware that there was music in the 90s, despite being too young to remember any of it.
"I am THRILLED to be an ambassador for National Album Day”, says Gabrielle. “I released my album ‘Rise’ in the 90s and it is the one I am most proud of. I've recently started collecting albums on vinyl myself and really enjoy that they encourage you to listen to a body of work in its entirety”.
Yeah, vinyl’s nice, and it’s also nice to be so comfortable with the feeling that you never bettered the very first thing you did.
Bettencourt is a bit more consistent in his view of his work with Extreme, saying: "I never wanted to put any music out for the sake of putting music out. When you listen to an Extreme album, you're getting something that we're really proud of”.
“Albums are a labour of love”, he continues. “They are a snapshot of a time in the artist's life. A story needing to be told. When I think of my favourite artists, I think of the records that I wore out. The experience of getting lost in the music and taking a journey with the band”.
“I'm excited to be an official ambassador for National Album Day because that is what rock is about”, he then says. Rock is about being an official ambassador for National Album Day? No, silly. It’s about “the body of work. The connection with the listener. Experimenting and taking chances. Expressing yourself and connecting with the listener”.
“So”, he concludes, “put on your favourite record, or put on something new, and take that journey with the artist. The way it was meant to be”.
Yes, do that, but do make sure you wait until National Album Day to do it. Or at least until we’ve got through all these quotes, because all four ambassadors have something to say about the album format and we’re all going to sit here until they’ve all had their turn.
"I'm very happy to be an ambassador for National Album Day as the album holds such an important place in an artist's career”, says Tricky.
“In today's world where so much is designed around short-form or bite-size content the album format is an important antidote. It provides the artist with the opportunity to work without compromise and create something truly enduring”.
Of course, these artists are all looking back with misty-eyed nostalgia about a time when the album ruled and everyone was swimming in money.
Times have changed now. It’s all playlists and micro-payments these days. We need a fresh perspective. And I guess that’s why McKenna is here, to give the view of someone who was born in 1998 and missed the album’s heyday.
So, here we go, get ready for some truth bombs about the album’s archaic and redundant place in today's culture. Strap the fuck in.
"Albums are still the best way for fans to connect with the true intention of art, and to enjoy and understand the vision of an artist”, he says. “They create true artists and in turn create true fans”.
Oh, for fuck’s sake McKenna. Tell you what, why don’t you just give us a potted history of the creative process in the 90s and how it influenced the course of music up to the present day?
“The 90s was a time of huge change in the world of music”, he proclaims. “The recording process was evolving to something closer to the accessibility that exists today, and so it has a legacy containing many records that are completely timeless, and many others that feel at the least somewhat stuck in their time”.
“This is what happens”, he reckons, “when artists push things forward and why the 90s has so many niches that belong to it. It's a beautifully varied era of music”.
Yeah, sure. Actually, that was a very good summary of the decade. But I’m old, so I have to pretend that all young people are idiots. Shut up, McKenna. Get a real job.
Anyway, all this talk of albums and the 90s has probably got you excited to find out what it’s all about for yourselves. Well, don’t all rush off just yet, you’ll have to wait a little bit longer. This year’s National Album Day is set for 13 Sep. On that day you’ll be able to listen to as many 90s albums as you like, so just hold on until then. | Read Online |
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