I think we have to do kind of organizing as musicians and take seriously that we are laborers and can make demands. 'Cause like a lot of capitalism, the whole industry is designed to disguise the labor. | | | | Daniel Casimir and Nubya Garcia at the Love Supreme Jazz Festival, Brighton, England, June 30, 2018.
(Tabatha Fireman/Redferns/Getty Images) | | | | |  | “I think we have to do kind of organizing as musicians and take seriously that we are laborers and can make demands. 'Cause like a lot of capitalism, the whole industry is designed to disguise the labor.”
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| | rantnrave:// "He wants to erase this world, and I am its memory." That's the THREE-EYED RAVEN, aka the all-seeing savant formerly known as BRAN STARK, explaining on Sunday's episode of GAME OF THRONES why the evil NIGHT KING would like to eliminate him. In this here world, the ARCHIVE OF CONTEMPORARY MUSIC, which I wrote about a month ago, is our memory, or at least one of our memories, of the sound and shape of music. Should a zombie dragon come along and destroy the internet with a single icy breath, or should an iron banker buy up all the copyrights in the world and then refuse to license them to anyone, the history of recorded music will continue to live within the 3 million sound recordings and 3 million pieces of related stuff stored on the Archive's citadel-like shelves. As long as the shelves are still there, that is. The Archive is still short of its fundraising goal to save them. You should send money if you haven't already... DAN RUNCIE is a REDEF friend and his fantastic TRAPITAL newsletter provides invaluable insight into the business side of hip-hop. It also sometimes rubs up against the non-business side of my brain, which is the side responsible for most of my spending on music. RUNCIE is far from alone in believing that "When die-hard fans spend the same money on a product that a casual fan does several months later, money is left on the table." I take it for granted he represents the prevailing industry wisdom, whether the subject is mixtape prices, the economics of streaming exclusives, or concert ticketing. (He's used the line twice this month, in essays about two of those subjects.) There seems to be an enormous table somewhere in LA or NY or Atlanta with piles and piles of cash on it, and everyone on the industry side of the industry hates that. But in most of these cases, that so-called money left on that figurative table is real money that those die-hard fans get to keep in their actual wallets. Leaving money on the table is often the most decent thing an artist can do for her biggest fans. The perfect business model, if you ask me, is one that always keeps both sides of *that* table in mind. The one in which artists worry about what their fans can realistically afford and fans worry about what artists (and songwriters and producers and session players and roadies and everybody else) realistically need to keep doing what they do. I would make a terrible CFO, I know. Don't hire me. But also please don't gouge me, if you wouldn't mind... So this is why you were supposed to license all those songs... In three weeks, JEOPARDY! superstar JAMES HOLZHAUER has muffed exactly 15 questions. Four of them are music-related. So much for him ever taking my job ... A certain woman named SHARONA can answer questions about a certain song called "MY SHARONA" (paywall)... RIP HEATHER HARPER and GEORGE HOCUTT.
| | | - Matty Karas, curator |
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 | Billboard |
| With Monday (April 22) the final day to submit comments to the Copyright Office, tasked with choosing between two groups to form the mechanical licensing collective (MLC) created by the Music Modernization Act, the politicking and yes, a little mud slinging, has moved into high gear. | | |
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 | The New York Times |
| Over a half-century, the eclectic and beloved live-music and food event has grown inseparable from the cultural ecosystem of its hometown. | | |
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 | Refinery29 |
| What happens when Black people try to enjoy the culture that they helped make mainstream? For Black women, it can be a harrowing experience. | | |
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 | The Verge |
| The world’s blackest black made a Coachella stage look mind-warping. | | |
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 | GQ |
| In the three years since his last album, West Coast rapper Schoolboy Q has kept a low profile. He also did what a lot of guys do in their early 30s: He got really into golf. So before he launches his new LP, "Crash Talk," we asked Q to gather some friends and hit the links. | | |
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 | BuzzFeed News |
| Years after Nick, Joe, and Kevin Jonas first conquered tween hearts, they’re the first boy band to reach No. 1 in almost two decades. What’s changed? | | |
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 | Variety |
| While the Tribeca Film Festival usually has strong music entries, this year has such a bounty that narrowing our top picks down to 10 was a challenge. | | |
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 | Penny Fractions |
| Damon Krukowski's book "Ways of Hearing" is a lively transcription of his 2017 Radiotopia podcast by the same title. It examines Krukowski’s experience of sound growing up in New York, labor and power within the music industry, and the ever-changing meaning of sound. | | |
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 | soundcharts |
| The second part of our interview with Stephen Phillips, CEO of Mawson, an A.I. lab applying machine learning to solve fundamental problems in creative industries. We talk about Mawson's current projects, generative networks in audio, how A.I. will change the music industry and what the word "artist" would mean to the future generations. | | |
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 | VentureBeat |
| Gaana, India's biggest music-streaming service, today announced that it is introducing videos to its app and offering artists more listener data as it races to attract both users and talent and widen its market dominance. The eight-year-old service, owned by conglomerate Times Internet, also revealed that it has amassed 100 million monthly active users, up from some 80 million announced in December of last year. | | |
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 | Red Bull Music Academy |
| An in-depth look at how Easy Mo Bee, Public Enemy, De La Soul, A Tribe Called Quest and other influential artists changed the sound of rap with their cassette decks. | | |
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 | Touré Show |
| Corey Glover is the lead singer of the biggest Black rock band that ever lived-Living Colour. He’s got stories to tell about band chaos, gigging in the south, and shooting "Platoon" with Charlie Sheen. | | |
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 | Paper |
| It was inevitable. "Survivor: The Destiny's Child Musical" aims to premiere in Houston next year, with plans for Broadway, London, and a world tour. The show is being created by Beyoncé's dad, Mathew Knowles (who's Destiny's Child's co-creator and manager), along with writer, producer, and director Je'Caryous Johnson. | | |
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| Billboard |
| Six female songwriters featured on BTS' "Map of the Soul: Persona" album discuss their work on the album and with the group. | | |
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| The Verge |
| Fitness companies are transforming into entertainment companies, and customers are paying the price. | | |
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 | Trapital |
| Frank Ocean, Beyoncé, and others helped push forward the highly-debated album release strategy that continues to evolve each year. | | |
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| Variety |
| Cameron Crowe jokes that David Crosby is following his career path. The star's frankness and tell-it-like-it-is demeanor has resulted in "Rolling Stone" magazine's invitation to set up the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer's next act as a rock Dear Abby of sorts with his new column: "Ask Croz." | | |
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 | Voicebot |
| At Vocalize.ai we predict that a company branded voice user interface (VUI) will soon be a must-have feature for almost all mobile phone apps. We already see music streaming services leading the path forward for the multimodal app evolution of voice. | | |
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 | Mixmag |
| It's time to end the devious promotion practice that makes smaller DJs pay to fill their own gigs. | | |
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 | The FADER |
| At a graveyard in Manhattan, Kevin Morby talks about his new album, "Oh My God," a secular rock record consumed by religious imagery. | | |
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 | YouTube |
| | | | | | From the "Moments" EP, out now on Gudu Records. |
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| © Copyright 2019, The REDEF Group |
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