We've covered the music business each day since 21 Jun 2002 Today's email is edition #5052 | |
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| | FanFair Alliance announces new plan to tackle ticket touting | The UK’s FanFair Alliance has launched a three-point plan to tackle the ongoing issues caused by ticket touting, which includes a call for a new law banning the for-profit resale of tickets | | LATEST JOBS | CMU's job ads are a great way to reach a broad audience across the industry and offer targeted exposure to people at all levels of seniority who are looking for new jobs. Our job ads reach tens of thousands of people each week, through our email, and our dedicated jobs pages.
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| | | TOP STORY | ONE LINERS | APPROVED | DIGITAL | LABELS | LOBBYING | STREAMING | MEDIA | AND FINALLY... |
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FanFair Alliance calls for ticket tout ban |
| Melanie C, Flo Milli, Dagny + more | Haru Nemuri | Believe criticises Deezer's ‘reverse Robin Hood’ | Defected partners with LabelRadar | UK Music calls on government to secure future | Ivors boss heads stateside to run DiMA | New show for John Kennedy | Ed Sheeran does Sheerany things |
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| FanFair Alliance calls for ticket tout ban | One Liners: Melanie C, Flo Milli, Dagny + more | Approved: Haru Nemuri | Believe criticises Deezer's ‘reverse Robin Hood’ | Defected partners with LabelRadar| UK Music calls on government to secure future | Ivors boss heads stateside to run DiMA | New show for John Kennedy | Ed Sheeran does Sheerany things |
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TOP STORY | FanFair Alliance calls for ban of for-profit ticket touting in the UK | The FanFair Alliance campaign group against ticket touting yesterday set out a new agenda, for the first time calling for the introduction of legislation to ban the for-profit resale of tickets in the UK.
At a meeting of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Ticket Abuse, FanFair set out a three-point plan that seeks to tackle the ongoing issues faced by artists, promoters and fans as a result of industrial-level ticket touting on platforms like Viagogo and StubHub.
As well as new laws, FanFair wants platforms like Google to stop touts buying their way to the top of search lists, and is calling on the live music industry to give more visibility to price-capped ticket resale initiatives, to support their overall viability.
Ticketing resale in the UK is now regulated to a certain extent, thanks mainly to past work by the FanFair Alliance and politicians like Sharon Hodgson MP, who has long campaigned on this issue. Changes to the law - and better enforcement of existing laws - have forced companies like Viagogo and StubHub to alter the way they promote and manage their services. Meanwhile, National Trading Standards has gone after some of the touts who broke the law in the way they acquired and promoted the tickets they were selling.
However, FanFair says more needs to be done.
At yesterday’s event the FanFair Alliance said that it believes it is “now imperative for the UK to adopt legislation similar to countries including Ireland, France and Australia - outlawing the resale of tickets for profit, while ensuring customers who can no longer attend an event are being provided with viable services to resell at the price they paid or less".
FanFair's new three-point plan - including the call for a ban on for-profit touting - is backed by a stack of booking agents, artist managers, tour promoters and music industry organisations. | | |
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| ONE LINERS | Melanie C, Flo Milli, Dagny + more | RELEASES
Flo Milli has released new single ‘Chocolate Rain’. The track is taken from her upcoming new album ‘Fine Ho, Stay’.
Dagny has released new single ‘Ray-Bans’. “Inspired by the 90s melodic and melancholic pop; ‘Ray-Bans’ offers a different mood and shows a slightly more vulnerable side than some of my previous music”, she says. “I hope it can soundtrack the melancholia of the autumn, for those who might need it”. The track is taken from the first of a planned trilogy of mini-albums ‘Elle’, which will be out later this year.
Jaakko Eino Kalevi has released new single ‘Palace In My Head’, featuring Alma Jodorowsky. “I had an early demo of this for many years on my computer and didn’t know how to finish it”, he says. “I re-recorded it in the studio and luckily got Alma to help me finish the chorus part. The chorus and verse are from different worlds, in my opinion. The verse is very dramatic and dark and then the chorus is bright and comforting”. His new album ‘Chaos Magic’ is out on 17 Nov.
GIGS & TOURS
Melanie C has announced that she will play a one-off show at Koko in London on 12 Jan 2024 to mark her 50th birthday. Tickets go on general sale on Friday.
AWARDS
The nominations for this year’s Production Music Awards have been announced - see the complete shortlists here. “We’re delighted to once again be celebrating the best and brightest talents in the production music industry”, says awards founder Richard Canavan. “The standard of entries this year has been so high, once again illustrating the wealth of talent we have in both the composers and teams working at the libraries”. The ceremony will take place at Outernet’s Here venue in London on 20 Nov.
| | | APPROVED: HARU NEMURI | Emerging over the last few years with a series of EPs and two studio albums, Haru Nemuri blends a dizzying array of influences into her sound, including pop, hip hop, electronic music and hardcore punk. Returning later this month with new EP ‘Insaint’, she leans further into the harder edges of that sound, as heard on new single ‘I Refuse’.
“Due to being a socially assigned gender of ‘woman’, there are instances where music is treated as if it is not fundamentally a form of expression”, she says of the new song. “This is closely intertwined with the labelling of those who are not considered ‘able-bodied’, ‘conventionally beautiful’ or ‘a male’ in this society have faced and continue to face, even up to the present day. I felt the need to refuse all of that and to have a song that would redefine its significance”.
These themes are explored further across the new EP, she adds, saying: “In the world we live in, being ‘normal’ and ‘physically healthy’ individuals is often incredibly challenging. This is because the very structure of society itself often embodies exploitation, inequality and discrimination. Once you deviate from the norms, you're often treated as a different kind of person, sometimes ridiculed, and your existence may be marginalised, which can gradually make it difficult to maintain your sanity”.
“For everyone who feels left behind by the system and the confines of what is considered ‘normal’, who continue to doubt themselves and suffer while living in the present, may this EP, the hardcore punk of 2023, the feminism, exist for you”, she continues. “It was created with all my prayers”.
‘Insaint’ is set for release on 29 Sep. Nemuri will then be in the UK and Ireland for tour dates the following month, including a show at Studio 9294 in London on 11 Oct.
Watch the official live performance video of ‘I Refuse’ here. | | | DIGITAL | Believe criticises ‘reverse Robin Hood’ elements of Deezer's new artist-centric model for payments | Artist and label services company Believe has responded to the announcement last week that Deezer will change the way it allocates revenues to tracks later this year, initially in France, adopting what it has dubbed an "artist-centric" model.
Believe - which also owns DIY distributor TuneCore - welcomes Deezer's plan to remove third-party functional audio from its platform and its commitments to further ramp up its efforts to combat streaming fraud. However, perhaps unsurprisingly, it is not so keen on the decision to treat plays from 'professional artists' differently to those by 'non-professional artists'.
Deezer's grand plan was informed by a research partnership it entered into with Universal Music. That followed an internal memo from Universal boss Lucian Grainge at the start of the year in which he declared that "the economic model for streaming needs to evolve".
The more divisive part of Deezer’s strategy is the plan to provide a 'double boost' to 'professional artists'. This basically means that their plays will count twice for allocation purposes.
To qualify as a 'professional artist', a music-maker needs to get at least 1000 streams from at least 500 unique users each month. Artists who fall below that threshold - some of them hobbyist musicians, but some of them self-releasing artists at an early stage in their career - will get a lower average per-stream payout under the new system.
In a statement yesterday, Believe took aim at that latter proposal, saying: “As a company working with artists and labels at all levels Believe considers that all artists shall be compensated equally by streaming services regardless of their stage of development".
“We strongly oppose an unfair ‘reverse Robin Hood’ system that is centred around taking compensation from rising artists to allocate it to top and established artists", it went on. “Further, it is our belief, based on data, that such a system would reduce diversity and discourage creativity". | | | LABELS & PUBLISHING | Defected partners with LabelRadar for demo submissions | Defected Records has announced a partnership with demo submission platform LabelRadar. The partnership, says Defected, “streamlines the demo submission process and democratises access to key decision-makers in the music industry”.
The move marks the first time the house music label has publicly opened its doors to demo submissions. The deal covers not only the main Defected label but also sub-labels such as D4Dance, DFTD and Glitterbox.
“This deal enables our artist community to have access to decision-makers at Defected, giving them their shot with one of the greatest labels in the world. We are delighted to welcome them to LabelRadar”, say Ed Brew of LabelRadar.
Wez Saunders, CEO of Defected Records, adds: “Having worked with developing acts for nearly two decades, finding and nurturing new talent is high on my agenda. Demos have historically been a challenge for us.
However, with LabelRadar we believe we have found a solution that will help streamline this process and enable our A&Rs more quality time to check and review demos for the labels within the Defected ecosystem”.
“Navigating the deluge of demos that flood any record label can be an exhilarating yet demanding experience”, concurs Allan Nicoll, Head A&R of Defected Records. “I have spent many years trying to find the best way to deal with an unrelenting inbox”.
LabelRadar is part of Beatport’s Music Services division, headed up by Alex Branson. Defected Records joins labels including Toolroom and Armada in using LabelRadar for demo submissions. | | | LOBBYING | UK Music calls for government support to secure the future of the music industry | UK Music has unveiled its Manifesto For Music, calling for a comprehensive government strategy to secure the industry's future and placing emphasis on preventing a "lost generation" of musical talent through significant investment in music education.
Coming in the run-up to party conference season, the manifesto lays out a five-point action plan aimed at both the short-term and long-term growth of the industry. Central to the plan is a call for substantial investment in music education, including the recruitment and training of music teachers. UK Music's Interim Chief Executive, Tom Kiehl, emphasises the urgent need to boost music education to prevent a "lost generation" of musical talent, citing a 45% drop in A-level music uptake since 2010.
"We run a real risk of a lost generation of musical talent in the UK without urgent action to stem the decline in music education”, he says. “The government must put music education front and centre by recruiting and training an army of new music teachers to give young people the chance to learn to play an instrument and the potential of a rewarding career doing something they love”.
“Unless we invest in our young people and give them the opportunity of musical education, there will be an existential threat to the talent pipeline on which the music industry relies”, he goes on. “That will make us poorer as a nation both culturally and economically and cannot be allowed to happen”.
In addition to the educational focus, the manifesto also calls for AI copyright standards to support human creativity, a Cultural Touring Agreement with the EU to ease touring difficulties, tax incentives to encourage UK music production, and the regulation of secondary ticket sales practices. | | | LABELS & PUBLISHING | Ivors boss to head up US streaming service trade group | The boss of The Ivors Academy, Graham Davies, is leaving the UK songwriter organisation to head up the Digital Media Association - or DiMA - in the United States. DiMA represents the interests of the big streaming services, including Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, YouTube and Pandora.
Confirming Davies as the new President and CEO of the organisation, the DiMA board says: “Graham has long championed initiatives that bring the music industry together through collaborative discussion and action. His demonstrated track record of working constructively across diverse stakeholders - and across borders - for the betterment of creators and the music ecosystem as a whole resonated with us".
Davies joined The Ivors Academy - then still known as BASCA - in 2018, having previously worked in a number of roles at PRS. His stint leading the songwriter organisation coincided with the Economics Of Music Streaming Inquiry in the UK Parliament, which was in no small part prompted by the Fix Streaming campaign instigated by the Ivors Academy and the Musicians' Union.
He has played a key lobbying role in seeking to reform the way the streaming business works through that inquiry and the subsequent government-led work on data, transparency and music-maker remuneration. He also co-founded the Credits Due campaign, which is focused on the data issues in the digital music supply chain that can impact if and when songwriters get paid.
The UK’s parliamentary inquiry around streaming ultimately focused more on the relationship between music-makers and their music industry business partners. So, record labels, music publishers and collecting societies. Though there were also calls on the streaming services to embrace and support new transparency and data initiatives.
At the same time as this was happening in the UK, the US was focused on the Copyright Royalty Board hearings that considered what the song royalty rate for streaming should be. That was very much a battle between the songwriters and publishers on one side and the streaming services on the other.
A deal was ultimately done that both sides supported, though an early task for Davies in his new job will likely be seeking to improve songwriter/service relations after years of Copyright Royalty Board battling.
Commenting on his new job, Davies says: “DiMA has taken a forward-leaning approach to initiatives that benefit the entire music industry and the brightest future for music is one where key players work together. It’s critical that we accelerate industry dialogues that reward creativity".
"In my new post", he adds, "I look forward to listening, engaging in conversation, and looking at ways continued innovation can create new opportunity". | | | MEDIA | John Kennedy launches X-Posure Daily show on Global Player | John Kennedy’s long-running ‘X-Posure’ new music show on Radio X has got a new daily spin-off, which is the first on-demand show available on the Global Player, the streaming platform from Radio X owner Global.
“I’m very excited about being able to bring the newest releases to the world via Global Player”, says Kennedy. “It’s a new chapter for ‘X-Posure’ which has been discovering new talent and sharing it on the airwaves since February 1999. Long may it continue!”
Each hour-long episode of ‘X-Posure Daily’ will be available for a week before dropping off the platform. The first two episodes are available on Global Player now - listen here.
The main ‘X-Posure’ show airs on Friday and Saturday nights, 11pm to 2am. | | |
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| AND FINALLY... | Ed Sheeran crashes couple’s wedding to promote new album | Ed Sheeran recently crashed a couple’s wedding to perform a song, because he's nice like that. They were fans, so apparently weren’t even annoyed that it was all just a ruse to promote his new album.
Sheeran revealed that he had butted in on the nuptials of Jordan and Carter Lindenfield in a post on Instagram, performing unreleased song ‘Magical’ and then hanging around to watch the couple actually tie the knot. He even signed his name as a witness on their marriage certificate. What a guy.
In her own post, Jordan said: “We’re still processing what an unforgettable moment this was! Thank you [Ed] for truly making our special day magical”.
‘Magical’ is taken from Sheeran’s new Aaron Dessner-produced album ‘Autumn Variations’, which is out on 29 Sep. | |
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