When I see a debate between Taylor Swift or Justin Bieber and their labels with Spotify about streaming rates, the calculus that goes into that has no bearing on my [independent music] community. We’re, in a weird way, collateral damage for a bigger debate. | | | | Sticking to it: Jimmy Cobb circa 1960.
(Gai Terrell/Redferns/Getty Images) | | | | |  | “When I see a debate between Taylor Swift or Justin Bieber and their labels with Spotify about streaming rates, the calculus that goes into that has no bearing on my [independent music] community. We’re, in a weird way, collateral damage for a bigger debate.”
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| | rantnrave:// Los Angeles, which may have shut down a few crucial days too late in March, is taking some steps toward reopening today, hopefully not a few crucial days too early. Retail stores can reopen at half capacity (too late for the now-closed AMOEBA MUSIC space on Sunset Boulevard; too soon for Amoeba's not-yet ready new location a few blocks away on Hollywood Boulevard). So can drive-in theaters, but not walk-in theaters or any of the other places where most of us are used to hearing live music. (Don't get me started on the HOLLYWOOD BOWL and certain well-meaning people of means.) People who don't live together can go to church or public protests together but other get-togethers are restricted. ZOOM may still be the best way to go for collaborative projects in the home base of the US record industry—or any other home base of the US record industry. What you might call normalcy presumably remains a very long way off. And not just here, obviously. It's kind of amazing how much has changed in two months, and it's kind of impossible to imagine the music business won't be permanently scarred and permanently changed before this extended breakdown is over. There are ongoing conversations about the future of touring and livestreaming and gaming and retail, all connected to the global pandemic. Healthy discussions all, as constructive as they are predictable in this unusual moment. The outlier, if you ask me, is the tangled web of parallel threads going on right now about the streaming economy, which carry the seeds of a battle to come. It's the one part of the music biz that actually may have benefited from the slowdown of the world economy. And artists, deprived of so many other sources of income, are getting louder and louder with their not-new concerns that they're not getting their fair share. The willpower to seek alternatives seems stronger than ever. Is something about to snap? *Must* it snap? Will streaming services come to the table? Will labels? Are artists prepared to walk away if they don't?... One possible signal from a label in regards to all that: WARNER MUSIC, in formally announcing the IPO that will take the company public after nine years of privacy, is forecasting an increase in streaming subscription prices. Assuming the prediction is right, how much of *that* will filter down to artists, especially those in music's middle class?... ON THE RECORD, the documentary about sexual harassment allegations against RUSSELL SIMMONS, which OPRAH WINFREY and APPLE TV PLUS walked away from earlier this year, debuts today on HBO MAX. One of Simmons' accusers, SIL LAI ABRAMS, tells VARIETY the music industry, because of its clubby culture, "will not have a #MeToo movement. Absolutely not." Another accuser, former DEF JAM and ARISTA exec DREW DIXON, says, "Someone once told me that the record business is high school with money and that’s true." (Simmons denies all the accusations)... Heavy metal ice cream truck (minus the ice cream)... Bolivian orchestra trapped in German castle... CHRISTOPHER CROSS said "hard no" to the 1975, but the band persisted... RIP JIMMY COBB, MORY KANTÉ, BOBBY DIGITAL, MOON MARTIN, STEVEN HANFORD, BUCKY BAXTER, WILLIE WILD SPARKS, KJ BALLA and SAL CAPOZUCCA. | | | - Matty Karas (@troubledoll), curator |
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 | Music Business Worldwide |
| The case for Len Blavatnik having made the smartest acquisitive move in record industry history. | | |
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 | VICE |
| With a slew of potential alternatives to Spotify, both new and old, there’s never been a better time to leave mainstream streaming services behind. Now it’s the responsibility of music fans to jump ship. | | |
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 | The Ringer |
| With the world under lockdown, pop stars and indie artists alike are taking new approaches to video creation. | | |
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 | British GQ |
| From Travis Scott's performance in Fortnite to The Offspring's gig in World Of Tanks, live music and video games are colliding. Where will it go next? | | |
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 | The New Yorker |
| The Beastie Boy on growing up, mellowing out, and the importance of snacks. | | |
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 | Music Industry Blog |
| The risk with trying to imagine what the future might look like is to simply think it is going to be a brighter, shinier version of today. At this precise moment in time, this has perhaps never been truer. The COVID-19 lockdowns were a seismic shock to the economy, one which will take months, possibly years to recover from. | | |
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 | The Guardian |
| From Q Magazine to smaller free sheets, many publications hit hard by Covid-19 lockdown. | | |
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 | Richmond Times-Dispatch |
| A local adult contemporary station has turned toward upbeat and nostalgic tunes and is playing fewer new songs and fewer songs that reference death. | | |
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 | The Quietus |
| What links a bland mainstream club EP to the structures of finance capital and gentrification? Ed Gillett discusses the ongoing creeping class issue of underground dance music in 2020. | | |
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 | The Christian Post |
| “This is not a post I ever thought that I would write, but now I feel like I really need to,” Steingard wrote on Instagram. “I’ve agonized over whether to say this publicly, and if so, how to do it, but I now feel that it’s less important how I do it, and more important that I do it.” | | |
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 | Are We On Air? |
| With an adolescent ear towards classical music, Chris Blackwell signals to his father’s 78s as the earliest imprint in his musical history. In this episode, the Island Records founder offers enlightenment for the practices of musicians and any artists alike: do your own thing and don’t emulate, because the art will always come first and the “market” will follow. | | |
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| VICE |
| There are only five people in New York capable of fixing antique jukeboxes. Unless they can find someone to carry on their line of work, it might go extinct. | | |
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| The Guardian |
| The makers and subjects of "On the Record" talk about bringing alleged sexual abuse by Russell Simmons to light and why Oprah Winfrey disowned the film. | | |
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 | NME |
| Acts wishing to play in the UK post-Brexit must pay £240 for visas for each member and prove they have savings of around £1000. | | |
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 | Resident Advisor |
| With tourism expected to plummet this summer, local DJs and promoters are coming together to make the most of a tough situation. Musically, it might be just what the island needs. Carlos Hawthorn investigates. | | |
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 | NPR Music |
| Congregating in person for concerts is out of the question this spring and for the foreseeable future, so music fans have gotten used to watching performers livestream from home. What's less obvious is that segments of the Nashville music community that work out of view have been equally resourceful in finding virtual stopgaps during lockdown. | | |
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 | Vulture |
| Lucinda Williams, the Drive-By Truckers, Jason Isbell, and Steve Earle have each released albums that speak to the stress of being alive right now. | | |
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 | The New York Times |
| The last surviving member of that landmark album’s sextet, he was a master of understatement, propelling his bandmates with a quiet persistence. | | |
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 | Attack Magazine |
| Want to start a business in the music industry? We spoke to Mixcloud to find out how they established the company. | | |
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 | Guitar World |
| "I see the guitar as a microphone - I try to keep my melodies very simple so that everyone can understand the message" | | |
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 | American Songwriter |
| From 1991. Never before or since has he spoken so directly and extensively about songwriting itself, about walking that fine line between unconscious and conscious creation, and ultimately achieving what he defines here himself as “gallantry.” | | |
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 | YouTube |
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