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Street Mob Records has signed a worldwide deal with Cinq Music to distribute the label and expand its opportunities in branding, sponsorships, merchandising and synchronization. The deal will also include new talent discovery for Street Mob Records.
Founded by Fuerza Regida’s frontman Jesús Ortiz Paz (a.k.a. JOP), Street Mob Records’ artists include Chino Pacas, Calle 24, Ángel Ureta, Chuy Montana, Linea Personal and more rising regional Mexican music — or música mexicana as it is also called — acts.
“We have worked with Cinq for years and know that they’re committed to the genre,” said Paz in a statement to Billboard Español. “It’s only natural that we should partner with them to grow and expand Street Mob – combining their infrastructure, experience, and reach with our talent.”
“We bet on people, not just music, and it’s obvious that Jesus Ortiz Paz is going to carry his success as an artist into his label,” added Cinq Music president Barry Daffurn. “We are excited to team up with Street Mob Records to accelerate their growth. Cinq already brings billions of streams a month to the music world – now, we’re going to add incredible fuel to that fire with these important artists.”
Since 2018, Cinq Music has also been working with Rancho Humilde — Fuerza Regida’s label — another independent label at the forefront of música mexicana’s recent growth.
“Regional Mexican [music] is one of the hottest and fastest genres in the world right now, so to have that relationship with someone like Jesús means a lot to us,” continued Daffurn. “From the time we first started working in regional Mexican music, and the first time I sat down with Jimmy [Humilde] of Rancho Humilde, our goal was to bring this music global. The vision at that point was not to make it regional Mexican music, but more música mexicana, expanding it outside that network, to all the countries outside of [Latin America.] Corridos are leading that global expansion.”
Earlier this month, Street Mob Records and Cinq Music teamed up to release Chino Pacas’ “Yo Preferí Chambear,” which was the premiere of their new partnership. The video already racked up 2.1 million views on YouTube since it dropped 11 days ago.
In March, Chino Pacas entered the Billboard Hot 100 with “El Gordo Trae El Mando,” the artist’s first entry in the historic, all-genres chart.
“We’re operating as a distributor, from a technical standpoint, but as a company, we don’t work with everyone. The artists and labels that we do work with are very high touch,” said Daffurn. “We’re helping them with administrative support, full service marketing, and there’s money involved to make investments so they can build their own infrastructure and grow that way.”
Fuerza Regida earned its first entry on Billboard Hot 100 in January with “Bebe Dame” alongside Grupo Frontera, a romantic cumbia jam with a grupera swing that peaked at No. 25. Since then, they’ve placed three other tracks on the all-genres chart, “Ch y La Pizza” with Natanael Cano, “Igualito a Mi Apá” with Peso Pluma, and their latest “TQM” on their own.
Garage rock revivalists The Hives and their management company, ATC, signed with music distributor FUGA to release the band’s first album in over a decade. The Death Of Randy Fitzsimmons arrives Aug. 11, though the group has already released two singles with videos — the scorchers “Bogus Operandi” and “Countdown to Shutdown.” The sharp-dressed Swedes, who made a splash in the early-aughts with singles including “Hate to Say I Told You So” and “Main Offender,” haven’t released a new album since 2012’s self-released Disque Hives. “Bridging the gap between old and new, FUGA’s digital-first approach will help lead The Hives into this new era of music consumption, and allows us the flexibility and transparency the band were looking for with their new release partner,” said Matthew Greer of ATC.
Synthpop confectioners Magdalena Bay signed with Mom+Pop Music. The duo of Mica Tenenbaum and Matthew Lewin recently played Coachella, with Lollapalooza on deck later this summer, and are coming off the April release of digital EP Mini Mix Vol. 3 and its accompanying VHS-quality video. The band’s debut album, Mercurial World, was released in October 2021 by Luminelle. Details on their upcoming Mom+Pop releases will be announced later this year, the label said.
Red Dirt mainstays Josh Abbott Band signed with Make Wake Artists / Deep Roots Management. The Texas road warriors will be co-managed by Make Wake’s Chris Happy and Deep Roots’ Dylan Wright and be day-to-day’d by Make Wake’s Eric Berger. Since singing with new management — they were previously with Triple 8 — the band has dropped two singles off their Pretty Damn Tough imprint: “Country Nights” and “My Dad And His Truck.” JAB’s agent remains Henry Glascock at WME.
Rapper-producer Cash Cobain signed to Giant Music, the label venture launched last year by Irving and Jeffrey Azoff. The NYC artist’s first release on Giant, “Slizzy Gods,” dropped last month. Giant Music’s roster includes Tay B, Ayleen Valentine, K.Flay, New West (with Republic), and SwaVay (with Def Jam). Cash’s managers are Makeda Tewodros, Glyn Brown and Will Foster.
Nashville (by way of Long Island) singer-songwriter Ben Goldsmith signed with Sony Music Nashville, UTA and Universal Music Publishing Group Nashville, and over this past weekend played a little festival called Bonnaroo. Not bad for an artist who graduated high school less than two weeks ago. Goldsmith has released four tracks to date, the most recent being the big-voiced ballad “Flowers In Your Hair,” which’ll be part of his debut album, The World Between My Ears, coming Sept. 22. He is managed by Mike Crowley of Crowley Artist Management.
Chris Lane established his own label, Voyager Records, and formed a partnership with Jay DeMarcus’ Red Street Records ahead of new music. The country star previously was signed to Big Loud, scoring three No. 1s on Country Airplay — most recently with 2019’s “Big, Big Plans” — and a pair of No. 8s on the Top Country Albums chart. In explaining his pair-up with Red Street, Lane said the label “supports my vision for music” and called DeMarcus a “great friend.”
Nashville-based alternative pop group Nightly signed with ONErpm, which will release their sophomore album Wear Your Heart Out on Aug. 25. The trio consisting of Jonny Capeci, Joey Beretta and Nick Sainato have been featured on a slew of tracks in recent years, including by Ayokay (“Sleepless Nights,” “Amnesia”), NOTD (“About You”) and Vaultboy (“why u gotta be like that”). They recently dropped the up-tempo title track off the upcoming album. Nightly’s manager, Nikki Boon of Neon Coast, commented, “Because of the quality of Nightly’s new music and their headline touring alongside our new partner ONErpm, we believe that Nightly is poised to have their biggest year yet and grow their fanbase on an even larger international level.”
Seattle hardcore band Filth is Eternal has signed with MNRK Music Group for a worldwide deal ahead of new music this fall. Scott Givens, MRNK’s senior vp of rock & metal, says, “Filth Is Eternal are an amazing band and an amazing addition to our roster. MNRK Heavy is committed to breaking new artists, and we look forward to working together with the band to bring their artistic vision to the masses.” FIE are managed by Mike Messina at Quiet Panic and booked by Ian Koletsis aT Sound Talent Group.
Singer-songwriter Kyla Imani signed with PULSE Music Group and Stargate as part of their LAAMP Music initiative for new talent. Imani, a NYC native, has already reeled in millions of streams for her songs, including “These Boys Ain’t It” and “it’s not that deep.” — and earlier this month released the track “21 Forever.” She is managed/booked by L. Londell McMillan and The NorthStar Group.
Virtual characters Jun Akane and Yuki Kitashiro have been added to the roster of the PRISM Project, a virtual talent management agency in the Sony Music Entertainment family of virtual talent brands.
Music City Signings: Concord Music signed Lindsay Ell to a publishing administration deal … Singer-songwriter Joey Hendricks reached a joint-venture publishing agreement with Warner Chappell Nashville and daschent … Houston native Triston Marez inked a management contract with the Erv Woolsey Co.
D. Tobago Benito started his first brick-and-mortar record store in Atlanta in 1996. At the time, “there were about 400 to 500 Black-owned record stores around the country,” he recalls. “There were a lot of conferences. When I came in, senior store owners took me under their wing and showed me how the business operated.”
Benito’s still in physical retail 27 years later, running DBS Sounds. But the pool of Black-owned record stores has been decimated, falling to around 70, according to his count. (Some think it’s closer to 60.) Depending who you ask, there are between 1,800 and 2,100 independent record stores in the U.S., which means that Black-owned outlets now represent just a sliver of this market.
The decline is at odds with the popularity of Black music. R&B and hip-hop’s share of overall consumption was 26.8% in 2022, according to Luminate. While R&B and hip-hop doesn’t fare as well in the physical market, it still accounted for 14.3% of physical sales last year. Yet “we make up about 3% of the record stores out there,” Benito says. “It’s unacceptable. There are major markets around the country with no Black-owned stores: Birmingham, Nashville, Charlotte.”
“The numbers are astounding,” adds Sharod Bines, owner of Retrofit Records in Tallahassee, Florida. “A generation ago, it was not as uncommon to be a Black record store owner.”
While vinyl sales have been growing for 17 consecutive years, this rising tide hasn’t yet led to a major lift in the number of Black store owners. Benito is spearheading an effort he hopes will change that: In 2021, he joined with more than 20 other Black-owned stores to create the F.A.M.S. Coalition (Forever a Music Store). Some of the hurdles facing Black record stores are systemic — the racial wealth gap, gentrification, bias in the loan-application process. But for outlets that have overcome these obstacles, F.A.M.S. is intent on gaining more support from the music industry. This could be financial assistance as well as windowed exclusives, vinyl variants and release parties pegged to notable albums that might boost the presence of coalition members.
“We need people like Tobago to push to say, ‘we’re here, we’re growing, and we need equality,’” says Drew Mitchell, owner of 606 Records in Chicago. “We need to make sure there is equal opportunity for minority-owned stores — in the music business and in any business.”
In the early ’90s, “Black independent stores were really thriving, and they were an important part of the ecosystem when it came to breaking records,” adds Steve Corbin, Warner Music Group’s senior vice president of sales, counsel and culture. “We are in discussions with [F.A.M.S.] and working with them, whether it’s mentoring store owners or figuring out other ways to get involved with the community.”
One of the coalition’s biggest wins to date came when Beyoncé released the vinyl version of Renaissance in October 2022; F.AM.S. stores were given the chance to sell the LP a week before their peers. At the time, the coalition contained 26 stores — it’s now at 22 — which sold more than 1,000 copies of Renaissance combined. “That was huge for us,” says Marketta Rodriguez, a F.A.M.S. member from Houston who runs Serious Sounds. The first week of June, F.A.M.S. stores were able to boost their profile by hosting listening parties for Janelle Monae’s The Age of Pleasure three days before the album hit streaming services.
Some Black-owned stores serve up all styles of music — “I cover as many bases as possible,” Bines says — while others focus on historically Black genres. The latter camp faces a challenge as it tries to stabilize and ultimately grow. “There is a lack of new releases and catalog that are not available physically in rap and R&B,” explains Steve Harkins, vp of sales and marketing at Ingram Entertainment, the distributor that has been working closely with F.A.M.S. “It’s getting better with new releases, but these stores need more product in the marketplace. And this is also product that would benefit other independent stores as well.”
D. Tobago Benito
Raphael Simien
Rap was quick to embrace the digital economy — first through free download sites like Datpiff, which hosted copious amounts of mixtapes, and then through streaming, where hip-hop soared. But perhaps as a result of this success, the genre hasn’t paid much attention to the old-fashioned physical market. Harkins notes that “labels have said they’ve had challenges convincing artists and management to release their titles physically in some cases.”
While Tyler, the Creator and Kendrick Lamar have both sold heaps of vinyl, many major rappers still don’t release actual LPs. Often they would “rather put their money into music videos and digital marketing,” says Nima Nasseri, who manages the producer Hit-Boy. And vinyl still requires long lead times — it could be three to four months — which is a drawback in a genre that has thrived thanks in part to its relentless release pace. “By the time that a project is out, the majority of these artists are already working on the next project; they’re just over it,” says Aaron “Ace” Christian, who manages the rapper Cordae.
But around half of vinyl buyers don’t even own a turntable, according to Luminate, suggesting that fans want to support artists they favor through physical purchases even in cases when they can’t actually play the record they buy. And “especially when it comes to recouping, vinyl can put a huge dent in whatever you’re owing to these labels,” says Justin Lehmann, founder of Mischief Management. “It’s a missed opportunity for other artists if they’re not taking advantage of that,” he adds.
Lehmann has worked with his client Aminé to put out a vinyl version of every one of the rapper’s albums. Same goes for Cordae. “We sold out everything,” Christian says of his client’s LPs. “Fans like the memorabilia aspect of it.” “The popularity [of vinyl releases] is rising,” Nasseri adds. “Doing 1,000 copies for the diehard fans is a smart move.”
On the catalog front, some Black record store owners also worry about the “big void for ’90s R&B and hip-hop,” says Phillip Rollins, owner of Offbeat in Jackson, Mississippi. Labels are “re-pressing everything else, like 1,000 Grateful Dead live box sets,” he continues. “Where’s SWV and early Usher?” “It’s starting to look really weird when you can re-press 30 Rolling Stones records but not a core R&B title from the ’70s,” Rodriguez agrees.
Joe Lyle, owner of No Pulp Records in New Orleans, says F.A.M.S. has been working to make the labels aware of the demand for some of this classic material. Benito is starting to see some progress, pointing to represses of LPs from Mary J. Blige, Erykah Badu and Kingpin Skinny Pimp. In addition, Harkins helped secure a commitment from the manufacturer GZ North America to set aside capacity for both new hip-hop and R&B titles and represses.
There’s more to come: At the Music Biz conference in Nashville in May, members of F.A.M.S. met with Corbin to talk about the need for additional catalog releases. “What we agreed to is having them be somewhat of a curator — ‘we really think this Anita Baker record would be worth bringing out and repressing on vinyl,’” Corbin says. “Rather than us dictating and saying, ‘Hey, we’re gonna re-release these classic R&B records,’ we’re making it a collaborative effort,” and taking cues from the store-owners who are in touch with record buyers on the ground.
Benito’s dream is to grow the Black-owned sector of independent record stores to more than 5% of the total over the next five years. But for some owners, even just forming the coalition represents a victory. “We’re a minority within the minority of record store owners — it can feel like you’re kind of on an island out here,” Bines says. “It’s been nice to see there’s others out there trying to sustain the same thing that I am.”
Shares of SM Entertainment gained 15.3% this week, making the K-pop company the greatest gainer among the 21 music stocks in the Billboard Global Music Index. Although the company wasn’t the subject of any significant news items that typically affect share prices — earnings, investments or partnerships — its shares nonetheless rose to 117,600 KRW ($92.07), bringing the year-to-date gain to 53.3%.
It’s not just SM Entertainment, though. K-pop is booming in 2023. Shares of the index’s other South Korean music company, HYBE, gained 6.1% this week and have gained 71.5% in 2023. Outside the index, JYP Entertainment and YG Entertainment have gained 100.6% and 88.4%, respectively, year to date.
With 16 of its 21 stocks in positive territory this week, the Billboard Global Music Index improved 5% to 1,334.28, its best one-week performance since November. The biggest contributors to the index’s value posted strong single-digit gains. Spotify improved 6.3% to $159.99, Universal Music Group gained 3.8% to 20.16 euros ($22.11) and Warner Music Group jumped 9.3% to $27.16. Meanwhile, Live Nation gained 7.2% to $90.18 and on Thursday (June 15) closed above $90 for the first time since Sept. 15.
Two other stocks had double-digit gains this week. Streaming company LiveOne added 13.3% to $1.53, bringing its year-to-date gain to 137.6%, while Sphere Entertainment Co. climbed 10.9% to $29.29. Since Sphere separated from MSG Entertainment’s concert promotion business on April 20, its shares have gone up more than 14%. On Sept. 29, U2 will launch the MSG Sphere at the Venetian with a residency that extends through Dec. 16.
While stocks were generally up this week, music stocks fared better than the major indexes. The S&P 500 gained 2.6% to 4,409.59, its best week since March. The Nasdaq composite improved 3.2% to 13,689.57, also marking its best week since March. Outside the United States, South Korea’s Kospi index dropped 0.6% to 2,625.79, while the FTSE 100 in the U.K. gained 1.1% to 7,642.72.
German promoter and ticketing company CTS Eventim had the week’s largest decline at 18.2%, making it the only music stock on the index with a double-digit loss. As Billboard reported on Wednesday, the German company’s share price fell precipitously in the two days following a critical segment on the German public television show ZDF Magazin Royale.
Michael Jordan is finalizing a deal to sell the majority share of the Charlotte Hornets, the franchise announced Friday, leaving the 30-team NBA without any Black majority ownership.
Jordan is selling to a group led by Gabe Plotkin and Rick Schnall, the Hornets said. Plotkin has been a minority stakeholder in the Hornets since 2019. Schnall has been a minority owner of the Atlanta Hawks since 2015 and is in the process of selling his investment in that team.
It’s not clear how long the process of selling will take to be finalized by the NBA’s Board of Governors. Jordan plans to keep a minority stake in the Hornets, the team he bought in 2010 for about $275 million.
Jordan’s decision to sell ends his unsuccessful 13-year run overseeing the organization.
“In the same way that it’s wonderful that one of our greatest, Michael Jordan, could become the principal governor of a team, he has the absolute right to sell at the same time,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said earlier this month at the NBA Finals. “Values have gone up a lot since he bought that team, so that is his decision.”
In that same news conference at the finals, Silver said the Board of Governors are focused on diversity in ownership groups.
“I would love to have better representation in terms of principal governors,” Silver said. “It’s a marketplace. It’s something that if we were expanding that the league would be in a position to focus directly on that, but in individual team transactions, the market takes us where we are.”
The sale price was not immediately announced; ESPN, citing sources, said the franchise was being valued at $3 billion. The most recent sale of an NBA team came when Mat Ishbia bought the Phoenix Suns, a deal that when struck in December valued that franchise at $4 billion.
Jordan declined comment on the sale through his spokesperson, Estee Portnoy.
For as great as Jordan was on the court — national champion at North Carolina, two-time Olympic gold medalist, six-time NBA champion and in the never-ending conversation for best player ever — the Hornets never reached a championship level during his time as the owner.
Charlotte went 423-600 in his 13 seasons in charge, the 26th-best record over that span. It never won a playoff series in that time and hasn’t even been to the postseason in the last seven seasons.
Other members of the new potential Hornets ownership group — pending the approval — are recording artist J. Cole, Dan Sundheim, Ian Loring, country music singer-songwriter Eric Church, Chris Shumway and several local Charlotte investors, including Amy Levine Dawson and Damian Mills.
Along with the Hornets, HSE ownership includes the NBA G League’s Greensboro Swarm and NBA 2K League’s Hornets Venom GT, as well as managing and operating the Spectrum Center, each of which is included as part of the sale.
When Jordan, who grew up in Wilmington, North Carolina, purchased majority ownership in the team, it created a great amount of buzz.
But the Hornets’ struggles and inability to turn things around bothered Jordan. The first inclination that he was looking to get out of the NBA ownership business came in 2020, when he sold a minority stake to Plotkin and Sundheim.
The Hornets are coming off an injury-plagued 27-55 season and hold the No. 2 pick in the NBA draft. Victor Wembanyana is expected to go first overall on Thursday night, leaving Charlotte with the choice of either G League star guard Scoot Henderson or Alabama’s Brandon Miller.
Charlotte’s biggest star is LaMelo Ball, and the team still has some decent foundational parts to build around including Terry Rozier, Gordon Hayward, P.J. Washington and Mark Williams, the team’s starting center who played well last year as a rookie.
Jordan was often criticized as an owner for not spending enough in free agency to make the Hornets competitive.
He took over a team in 2010 that had won 44 games the year before but had been swept by the Orlando Magic in the first round.
It went downhill from there.
Charlotte — still the Bobcats at the time — was 34-48 in its first year under Jordan and then an NBA-worst 7-59 the following year. But despite the abysmal record, Charlotte failed to land the No. 1 pick in the NBA draft lottery and Anthony Davis.
Charlotte got back to the playoffs in 2013-14 but was swept by the Miami Heat. Two years later, the Hornets won 48 games but lost again to the Heat in the first round, this time in seven games.
In the seven years since, Jordan’s Hornets have had only one winning season and have twice exited early in the play-in tournament as the 10 seed.
Charlotte has not won a playoff series since the 2001-02 season and has never won an NBA championship
Jason Ellis joined independent dance music label Armada Music as global senior A&R director. Ellis will also serve as an acquisition consultant for BEAT Music Fund, the company’s recently launched dance music investment arm. Based in London, Ellis will be responsible for sourcing and developing up-and-coming talent while consulting on future BEAT acquisitions. He joins […]
Billboard is introducing a peer-voted award to run alongside its annual R&B/Hip-Hop Power Players list of the genres’ most influential executives. This new R&B/Hip-Hop Power Players’ Choice Award will honor the executive in the genres whose peers believe has had the greatest impact across the music business over the past year, from recording and publishing […]
BMG acquired the recording catalog of British band (and Rock & Roll Hall of Famers) The Hollies. The deal includes over 20 studio, compilation, live and tribute album titles and rarities that are wholly owned by the group, including Evolution and Butterfly (1967), Hollies Sing Dylan and Hollies Sing Hollies (1969), Confessions of the Mind (1970); Distant Light (1971), Romany (1972), Out on the Road (1973); Hollies (1974), Another Night (1975), Write On and Russian Roulette (1976), Hollies Live Hits (1977), A Crazy Steal (1978), Five Three One – Double Seven O Four (1979), Buddy Holly (1980), and Then, Now, Always (2009). The agreement encompasses eight of The Hollies’ most-streamed tracks, including “Carrie Anne,” “King Midas In Reverse,” “Jennifer Eccles,” “On A Carousel,” “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother,” “Long Cool Woman (in a Black Dress)” and “The Air That I Breathe,” as well as the group’s cover versions of “4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)” (Bruce Springsteen), “Boulder to Birmingham” (Emmylou Harris) and “Say It Ain’t So, Jo” (Head).
Soundtrack Your Brand, a global music streaming service for businesses, announced a $15 million pre-growth round led by Matt Pincus‘ MUSIC in partnership with Liontree, JS Capital Management and Schusterman Family Investments. The round also included funding from music investors Dundee Partners and was supported by all major existing Soundtrack Your Brand investors including Balderton Capital, Fuel Venture Capital, Industrifonden, Telia and DIG. The investment will allow Soundtrack Your Brand to “double down” on its go-to-market strategy, according to a press release. Along with MUSIC’s investment, Pincus will join Soundtrack Your Brand’s board. In 2024, the company plans to raise an additional growth round.
ADA Worldwide partnered with Rostrum Records to distribute the indie label’s entire catalog and new releases. Recent Rostrum releases include Fat Nick’s “Songs on the Radio” and DC The Don’s “Funeral” as well as new music from Alé Araya and Brevin Kim. Forthcoming releases include music from Fat Nick, Lou Phelps and My Favorite Color.
Yoto, an audio platform for kids that’s behind screen-free portable audio players the Yoto Player and Yoto Mini, signed a deal with Warner Music Group that will make music from some of WMG’s artists available on the players. The partnership kicks off in June with music from Super Simple Songs, a popular YouTube channel boasting original children’s songs and traditional nursery rhymes that’s been distributed by WMG’s arts music division since 2020. Next year, Yoto will create “cards” featuring music from a curated group of WMG’s pop, rock and soul artists.
Believe signed a marketing and distribution deal with Global Records Germany, the new Berlin branch of independent label Global Records. The first release under the agreement is “Party Songs” by Gamuel Sori & INNA, which dropped June 9.
Would you rather own the rights to Bruce Springsteen’s song catalog or the musical scores to hit Nickelodeon TV shows such as iCarly, Victorious and Henry Danger?
While those tween comedies may not be household names, fans stream them worldwide, and unlike Springsteen’s masters and publishing rights — which Sony bought for $500 million in 2021 — the rights to their scores sold for tens of millions, presenting, for some, an appealing and approachable investment.The Nickelodeon shows’ music is an example of the kinds of deals being done by a new crop of music investment funds that are focused on acquiring the one type of music they know best, often for a much lower price than the deals making headlines.
Funds like Armada Music’s BEAT (focused on dance), Jamar Chess’ Wahoo Music Fund One (Latin), Singapore’s blackx (the Asian music market) and Multimedia Music (film and TV music) have all launched in roughly the last 18 months with similar aims: to exploit their specialized genre knowledge and industry connections to buy rights to songs in one category and earn a return.
The principals of these funds, which have raised between $100 million (BEAT, blackx) and $200 million (Multimedia) from banks and investment firms, say the primary difference between them and funds like Primary Wave and Hipgnosis, which have institutional and private equity backing, is that their success hinges on a lower cost of entry and therefore present less risk.
“It’s a niche within a niche,” says Phil Hope, founder/CEO of Multimedia Music, which recently bought the music income and copyrights to scores from the Nickelodeon shows. “People see that there’s a well-priced opportunity in what we’re doing. Is it as obvious or as sexy as buying a big artist’s catalog? It needs a bit of explaining.”
Each fund faces its own challenges, but in an investment class, where the slowing of streaming growth and high interest rates are prompting greater investor scrutiny, these funds present the next natural step, says Bob Valentine, president of Concord. “We are now at the evolution stage of the investment thesis,” says Valentine, who will become Concord’s CEO in July. “There is still supersize growth in some of these genres — like Latin, dance, EDM. Investment managers are thinking, ‘The cost of capital is going up. Let’s find the genres that are going to outpace that index trend. Then, if the cost of capital goes up, we still outpace it.’ ”
Founded in late 2021 by Hope and James Gibb, Multimedia Music has acquired the rights to dozens of film and TV scores, including James Newton Howard’s catalog (Pretty Woman, Fantastic Beasts and the Hunger Games films), the STX music library catalog (Bad Moms, The Foreigner) and in-demand composers like Tyler Bates (the Guardians of the Galaxy and John Wick franchises, Deadpool 2).Multimedia has raised $200 million in debt and investment from Metropolitan Partners, Pinnacle Financial Partners and others to buy the rights to film and TV music that is reliably played — whether streamed, broadcast or licensed by filmmakers.
“Initially, investors were excited but didn’t understand it. They kept saying, ‘I don’t know who’s going to be streaming film and TV music on Spotify,’ ” Gibb says. “What we’re looking at are the TV shows and films that have longevity so that every time they get played anywhere in the world, we get streaming royalties paid back to us.”
Chess, whose Latin music-focused Wahoo Music Fund One launched in 2022, says he also spends time educating prospective investors. “You’re buying into cultural artifacts and less into a net publisher’s share of now. That’s why it’s a good deal,” says Chess, whose grandfather, Leonard Chess, co-founded Chicago’s legendary Chess Records.
Last year, Wahoo acquired a 50% stake in the publishing and recording catalog of Oro Solido, a classic merengue group, for an undisclosed amount. Chess says he is in talks to acquire two more catalogs that are also considered classics in the Latin genre — a status that makes them marketable for new recordings and sampling by current Latin artists.
But despite the surging popularity of Latin American music — recorded-music revenue grew by nearly 26% in Latin America last year, according to IFPI — Chess says investor interest is still lagging.“We are not competing against a Sony buying [Bad Bunny’s label] Rimas,” says Chess, who is also president of Spirit Music Latino. “There is a wealth of opportunity across the [Latin American] territories, and sometimes lining up investors can be a challenge.”
BEAT Music Fund was launched in April by independent dance music label Armada Music. Its first acquisitions were rights belonging to artists it has ties to, like Detroit techno forefather Kevin Saunderson’s KMS Records and Russian DJ ARTY. BEAT enters the investment space at a time when the global dance music industry grew by 34% to $11.3 billion in revenue in 2022. Its fan base is also growing 10 times faster than hip-hop on TikTok, according to a new report from MIDiA Research.
“Our plan is to invest $100 million in its first two years and increase the investment to at least $500 million in coming years,” says Nadine van Bodegraven, COO for the fund. “Our goal is to announce at least one new deal every month this year.”
Senior figures from Believe, Warner Music, Google/YouTube, AEG and Primary Wave are among the first wave of speakers confirmed for All That Matters 2023, set for this September in Singapore.
Among those VIPs are Denis Ladegaillerie, founder and CEO of Believe; Paul Smith, managing director, YouTube Music, APAC; Marshall Nu, COO, Asia, Anschutz Entertainment Group; and Arica Ng, president, Asia Pacific, Warner Chappell Music.
This year’s ATM celebrates its “coming of age” 18th edition. Artificial intelligence (AI) “will be a burning issue that will weave itself through a lot of our conversations,” reads a statement from organizers Branded, the full-service live media specialist.
More than 2,000 guests turn up in a regular year for the event, which creates an umbrella conference featuring complementary tracks of music, sports, gaming, marketing, digital, Web3, and arts, all under one roof.
Widely considered the most important music conference in Asia, All That Matters will once again be held at the Singapore Hilton Orchard from Sept. 11-13.
Confirmed speakers in the first round include reps from FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023, Napster, The Raine Group, Microsoft, NODWIN Gaming, VSPO, Coca-Cola, Activision Blizzard, Mastercard, Animoca Brands, SoundCloud, Asia Sports Tech, World Federation of Advertisers, Enjinstarter and more.
The 2022 edition featured guest speakers Universal Music Group Lucian Grainge; Spotify’s global head of editorial Sulinna Ong; TikTok’s global head of music Ole Obermann; and Adam Wilkes, president, AEG Presents Asia Pacific, among others.
Earlier this year, the Singapore subsidiary of Nodwin acquired a 51% stake in Branded, bringing the confab and showcase event into the Nodwin Gaming family.
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