We really do believe that we have a responsibility to our subscribers and our customers to have people recommend what a playlist should look like and who the future superstars are. | | | | YBN Cordae at the Varsity Theater in Minneapolis, April 5, 2019. His debut album, "The Lost Boy," is out today on YBN/Atlantic.
(Stephen Maturen/Getty Images) | | | | | | “We really do believe that we have a responsibility to our subscribers and our customers to have people recommend what a playlist should look like and who the future superstars are.”
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| | rantnrave:// The TAYLOR v. SCOOTER controversy that dominated the headlines over the hookup between SCOOTER BRAUN's ITHACA HOLDINGS and SCOTT BORCHETTA's BIG MACHINE effectively crowded out other issues that might have been worth a discussion. And might still be. Like, say, the blockbuster merger of management and label interests. Asked by BILLBOARD's HANNAH KARP how an artist managed by the same company that's signing her to a label deal can know she's getting a good deal, Borchetta said artists "love" not having "a wall between artist, label and management," which sounds super duper we're-all-in-this-together awesome until you think it through for three or four seconds and remember who the wall is there for. (Spoiler: It's not for the label.) He also tells Karp the record business has reached a singularity of transparency in which "artists, managers and lawyers know what the industry standards are," which maybe, I don't know, means artists no longer need either managers or lawyers and can stop giving away all those percentages? What say you? And how is this similar and/or not to the ongoing spat between Hollywood writers and their agents? Where do we stand on the appearance of conflicts of interest, not to mention actual conflicts of interest, in 2019?... In un-hooking-up news, VIVENDI has selected investment banks as it pursues the sale of up to 50 percent of UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP—whose revenues are booming thanks to the usual suspect, streaming... WOODSTOCK 50 is looking more and more like SHA NA NA and less and less like JIMI HENDRIX every day. Having failed to secure a permit for a three-day anniversary fest in upstate New York, organizers have set their sights on the MERRIWEATHER POST PAVILION in Columbia, Md., for a show in three weeks for which there are apparently no artists, no tickets sold and a venue that doesn't know on which days the festival would take place but "we are ready to do a show if they have one"... Those Woodstock organizers say the fest, if it happens, will be a benefit for voting and climate change nonprofits, which is at least on brand for music fests in summer 2019. It isn't just about plastic bottles and littering anymore. Festivals are paying attention to everything from what kind of tent you bring to what brand of glitter you wear, and other corners of the business are starting to watch their carbon footprints, too. Are they doing enough? MusicSET: "Green Days: The Music Biz Tackles the Environment"... Teenage climate change activist GRETA THUNBERG is now singing for the cause, with help from the 1975... DRAKEO THE RULER acquitted of murder... A$AP ROCKY formally charged with assault... It's FRIDAY and that means new music from CHANCE THE RAPPER, YBN CORDAE, BURNA BOY, CUCO, YOUNG DOLPH & KEY GLOCK, JUSTIN MOORE, FOUR TET, FLORIST, CLARK, SUGAR RAY, ONLY CHILD TYRANT, OF MONSTERS AND MEN, CAAMP, DUDE YORK, BJ THE CHICAGO KID, NF, JAUZ/BITE THIS!, THY ART IS MURDER, MINI MANSIONS, BILL RYDER-JONES, KAISER CHIEFS, ANDY GRAMMER, HOT SINCE 82, DELBERT MCCLINTON, HOUSTON PERSON, VIOLENT FEMMES, LLOYD COLE and E-40... And the best of SPOON.. RIP BEN JOHNSTON, YAO LI and STEVE MITCHELL. | | | - Matty Karas, curator |
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| As collaborations among top-tier artists become more common -- and more lucrative -- labels are taking the resulting battles for credit, and market share, to a new level. | | |
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| Top 40 radio still segments white rappers and black rappers, which places more effort on rappers and media outlets to account for the difference. | | |
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| The Swedish left is getting tough on crime to fend off the far right--and an American rapper is caught in the middle. | | |
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| The Runaways' Cherie Currie and Fanny's Brie Darling, trailblazers both, have teamed up for a new album. | | |
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| Since launching stateside in 2011, the green logo of Spotify has come to be, almost like Kleenex, synonymous with the weird new world of streaming. So, dozens of billions of dollars later, what's up? | | |
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| The Swedish company Teenage Engineering has won over kids -- and professionals -- with a revolutionary idea for a synthesizer: Make it simple. | | |
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| "Pulling a Beyoncé" has always been a fairly elastic concept. Even when the phrase came into vogue at the end of 2013, when she surprise-released her self-titled visual album and, in her own words, "changed the game with that digital drop," people were crediting her with both the surprise album trend and the visual album trend. The album was undeniably influential in both regards. | | |
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| The British avant-garde pop band that thrilled audiences throughout the ’90s and early ’00s, has returned. But don’t expect a nostalgia cash grab. | | |
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| It isn't just about plastic bottles and littering. Music festivals are paying attention to everything from what kind of tent you bring to what brand of glitter you wear, and other corners of the business are starting to watch their carbon footprints, too. Are they doing enough? | | |
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| Bassist and bandleader Marcus Shelby explores the legacy of the Negro Leagues as part of a new album from his orchestra. | | |
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| In 15 months, Oliver Schusser streamlined Apple’s premier service and united its divided ranks. Is a “grown-up” what the company needs to chart a course to global growth and profitability? | | |
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| "Puerto Ricans are waking up." We explore Residente, iLe and Bad Bunny's sharp-edged takedown of Gov. Ricardo Roselló and its influence on the protesters in the streets. | | |
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| From the nominees to the betting odds. | | |
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| Not only scoring HBO's controversial new series, Labrinth is the man behind Beyoncé's 'Lion King' work and tracks from the likes of Eminem & Nicki. | | |
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| There’s an unspoken perception that the companies currently dominating this space — TikTok, Snap, Instagram, Triller and so forth — are too big to fail and/or beat. But there is now an equally powerful force moving consumers away from mass-audience media, and more towards niche networks and forums for self-expression. | | |
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| Sony's Walkman turned 40 earlier this month. But look to the TC-50 before it for some of the technology and usability innovations that changed the world -- and joined the Apollo mission -- plus a glimpse of where music might boldly go next. | | |
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| Meek Mill's 2008 drug and gun conviction has been overturned. His attorney Jordan Siev breaks down what impact this decision has on Meek's future. | | |
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| He even walks in stereo. So proclaims a kid on a stoop toward the beginning of "Do the Right Thing"; he’s stunned by the sun but also by the sight and sound of Radio Raheem. | | |
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| We devote this year's Music 45 to those behind-the-scenes players who too infrequently get a chance to take a bow. | | |
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| Songwriter JD Souther on writing music for other people, the connection between poetry and songwriting, and the value of making room for new ideas to come through. | | |
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| | | | | | | Live on "Jimmy Kimmel Live," July 23, 2019. "African Giant" is out today on Atlantic. |
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