| We have vast resources that, if fully utilized, could provide invaluable mechanisms in our country’s vaccine distribution.. Because we are shuttered, we are able to offer the full weight of our industry to support vaccine distribution beginning immediately. | | |
| |  | American dreamer: Willie Jones' debut album, "Right Now," is out now on Penthouse/Empire.
(Gordon Clark/Shore Fire Media) |
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| | | “We have vast resources that, if fully utilized, could provide invaluable mechanisms in our country’s vaccine distribution.. Because we are shuttered, we are able to offer the full weight of our industry to support vaccine distribution beginning immediately.” | |
| | (Keep Feeling) Vaccination
What if the live event industry doesn't have to wait for enough people to get their Covid-19 vaccinations before it goes back to work? What if it can put itself back to work as part of the vaccination effort itself? That's the lightbulb of an idea that a broad industry coalition including LIVE NATION, AEG and the NATIONAL INDEPENDENT VENUE ASSOCIATION proposed in a letter to PRESIDENT BIDEN Tuesday.
“Live events is one of the best prepared, best equipped, most experienced industries in America to manage and control large crowds in a rapid, organized fashion," they wrote. "Moving people in, out, and around a public gathering space swiftly and safely is the foundation of our industry." And because the companies and their venues are largely shuttered, they add, they're ready to get to work immediately.
The Wall Street Journal's ANNE STEELE notes (paywall) that the FORUM in Los Angeles is among the venues that have already been turned into public vaccination sites. But the coalition behind the letter represents urban, suburban and rural locations across the US equipped with, among other features, refrigeration systems and staffs who know how to use ticketing systems efficiently.
I'll note that NIVA—a leading force in successfully lobbying Congress for rthe $15 billion SAVE OUR STAGES act—represents independent venues who normally see industry giants Live Nation an AEG as rivals, if not existential threats. Reaching across the aisle to join forces with those threats sounds like a good example of, to use a current term of art, unity. "It's human nature to come together in good times and bad," Live Nation CEO MICHAEL RAPINO said. It's rock and roll nature to do that with a little swagger. "If the live event industry was tasked with vaccination distribution" Rapino tweeted last week, "we would have it done in a weekend, sold t-shirts and beer and a meet and greet with Fauci."
Separate MODERNA, PFIZER and FAUCI t-shirts, please, if you wouldn't mind.
New Rules?
Does the music biz need new/better rules and protocols for a world where you can buy (or lease) a beat on the internet Monday, record a song on your laptop on Tuesday, have a viral hit in TIKTOK on Wednesday and have labels and managers blowing up your phone on Thursday? By which time your original lease agreement for the beat could already be on its way to expiring (if, for example, too many people are streaming the song)? Here's a story of one particular mess involving 20-year-old songwriter CALEB HEARN—whose viral blowup in December took a few more days than that, but not that many more—and a young manager, JUSTIN GOLDMAN, which has led to legal threats, an online war and questions about how prepared new artists have to be in such a fast-moving space and where exactly the border is between what managers (or anyone else in the business) can do when they come across that artist, and what they *should* do. When does monetization become exploitation? What do both sides need to know about the music business come Thursday and, maybe more important, what does the music business need to know about them?
And You Won't Have to Walk Down 6th Street
SXSW may be a virtual affair in 2021 but that apparently isn't stopping the fest from filling up a week in March with an onslaught of bands from around the world. A PLACE TO BURY STRANGERS, THEON CROSS, WAVY THE CREATOR, SQUID and ASTRID SONNE are among the first 100 artists announced for showcases that will be livestreamed from in a musical blitz starting March 16. WILLIE NELSON will deliver SXSW's keynote speech. Presumably/hopefully someone's hard at work putting together a raft of unofficial parties, if only so someone else can put together a comprehensive unofficial guide to all those events. Wristbands will be virtual, obviously... Props to the WalesOnline's headline about "World's first DEPECHE MODE-themed barber shop" for its implication that at some point there'll be a second.
Rest in Peace
SoundCloud rapper 6 DOGS... Chicago (the city, not the band) drummer JOE CAMARILLO, best known for his long tenure with the WACO BROTHERS... British folk singer and radio presenter MICK PEAT.
| | | Matty Karas (@troubledoll), curator |
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| |  | Rolling Stone |
| | Buying Beats for Viral Songs Is Becoming a Popular (and Messy) Business | | by Elias Leight | | Execs are scooping up the beats behind hits — sometimes without singers’ knowledge. Some see the practice as shrewd business, but others say the murky ethics can turn a breakthrough into “a nightmare.” | |
 | Money 4 Nothing |
| | Consent Decrees | | by Saxon Baird and Sam Backer | | What’s a consent decree and why did one over 80 years old recently make headlines? Sam and Saxon explore the Department of Justice's latest decision to NOT remake the music industry, before diving into the history of ASCAP, BMI, and Tin Pan Alley to figure out some of the shady battles at the heart of payouts and this whole performing rights thing. | |
 | Vanity Fair |
| | The Charming Billie Eilish | | by Keziah Weir | | In the last year, Billie Eilish scored five Grammys, went multiplatinum eight times, released the new Bond theme, and had to cancel a world tour. Then, she turned 19. | |
 | New York Post |
| | How rebel ad exec Stan Cornyn turned Warner Bros. into rock’s hottest label | | by Reed Tucker | | The headline was brutally honest, reading: "How We Lost $35,509 on the 'album of the year' (dammit)." The advertisement described how Warner Bros. Records had poured a huge amount of money into promoting young artist Van Dyke Parks and his avant-garde album "Song Cycle," which had won raves from critics but sold just 10,000 copies. | |
 | Refinery29 |
| | The Evolution Of Monsta X | | by Natalie Morin | | Five years ago, the K-pop group led with in-your-face intensity. Now, the industry veterans have evolved into a more at ease Monsta X. | |
 | The New Yorker |
| | Rewinding Jimi Hendrix’s National Anthem | | by Paul Grimstad | | His blazing rendition still echoes throughout the years, reminding us of what is worth fighting for in the American experiment. | |
 | GQ |
| | The Vibes Still Run Deep in This Topanga Canyon Artist Compound | | by Eric Ducker | | Mike Milosh is out with a new Rhye album. His girlfriend Geneviève Medow-Jenkins runs the funky Secular Sabbath event series. Together-and with friends like Beck and Diplo-they’re communing with LA’s hippie history. | |
 | The Guardian |
| | 'Bridgerton' inspires rise in demand for classical pop song covers | | by Lanre Bakare | | Netflix drama’s use of string versions of Ariana Grande and Billie Eilish hits has tripled streaming figures for Vitamin String Quartet. | |
 | Billboard |
| | ‘It’s Bigger Than Politics’: Country Artists Take On Roles as Healers In Divisive Moment | | by Tom Roland | | Country artists have been repeatedly criticized for steering clear of politics, but a number of acts in the genre are now united behind a single patriotic idea: unification. | |
 | RADII |
| | Listeners of the World, Unite! Why Stressed Out Students are Turning to Revolutionary Songs | | by Ting Lin | | Will the revolution be digitalized? One of China's biggest music streaming platforms has become an unlikely gathering place for Leftist-leaning young people. | |
| needles in the camel's eye |
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|  | Dweller |
| | Techno is Black, Tekkno is German | | by Deforrest Brown Jr. | | There was no human or culture attached to the electronic rhythm and soul music that Germany's "no future generation" experienced, and this anonymity and detached quality would be a key feature of how the Berlin underground rave culture would peel apart the layers of the third wave, Black technological music and drape over it the diplomatic logos of German intellectualism. | |
 | Electronic Beats |
| | The Evolution of Music in Video Games | | by Günseli Yalcinkaya | | Games are to the 21st century what cinema, pop, and TV were to the 20th century-the most important and most innovative entertainment medium of our time. | |
 | Tape Op |
| | Aaron Dessner: Collaboration and his Long Pond Studio | | by John Baccigaluppi | | Outside the National, Aaron Dessner is a prolific songwriter and producer and the owner of Long Pond Studio in upstate New York. I talked to him about working on Sharon Van Etten’s "Tramp" and Taylor Swift's "folklore" and "evermore." | |
 | TechCrunch |
| | Walking with Dolly | | by Brian Heater | | And Shawn Mendes, Draymond Green and Uzo Aduba, courtesy the Apple Watch. | |
 | them. |
| | 'Do You Listen to Girl in Red?': How a Queer Pop Artist Became TikTok Code | | by Michelle Kim | | Though LGBTQ+ people have long invented their own language, this is how Gen-Z users have used a pop star’s name to form identity and build community. | |
 | Variety |
| | Did Billie Eilish Finally End the Grammys’ Best New Artist Curse? | | by Jeremy Helligar | | A year after Eilish's new artist win was one blessing among many, the "curse" associated with winners like Starland Vocal Band and A Taste of Honey seems a thing of the past... although recent years have their share of short-lived triumphs. | |
 | The Tennessean |
| | Thad Cockrell almost quit his music career. Then Jimmy Fallon heard his song | | by Dave Paulson | | One day after he declared he was going to look for a new career, Thad Cockrell was invited to perform on 'The Tonight Show.' | |
| Variety |
| | Paris Hilton’s ‘Stars Are Blind’ Soundtracks Key Scene in ‘Promising Young Woman’: The Story Behind the Song | | by Jazz Tangcay | | A key scene in Emerald Fennell's " Promising Young Woman" has audiences falling in love with Paris Hilton 's underrated 2006 single, "Stars are Blind." The film's Stars Carey Mulligan and Bo Burnham dance to the song affectionately while in a local pharmacy. | |
 | First Floor |
| | The Unique Potential of Online Forums | | by Shawn Reynaldo | | An interview with patten about his 555-5555 platform and the vibrant community it's cultivated. | |
| The Guardian |
| | Axing Courtney Pine from music A-level shows how easily schools ignore Black stories | | by Lavinya Stennett | | After an outcry, Pearson Edexcel restored the jazz artist to its syllabus. But a diverse curriculum is still a long way off, says Lavinya Stennett, founder of The Black Curriculum. | |
| |  | | Music of the day | | "American Dream" | | Willie Jones | | "That American dream ain't cheap." |  | YouTube |
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"That American dream ain't cheap." | "It's reparations that I seek." |
| | Music | Media | Sports | Fashion | Tech | | “REDEF is dedicated to my mother, who nurtured and encouraged my interest in
everything and slightly regrets the day she taught me to always ask ‘why?’” | |  | | Jason Hirschhorn | | CEO & Chief Curator |
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