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SAG-AFTRA members have voted to ratify the 2024 Sound Recordings Code which requires the record labels — Warner Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group and Disney Music Group — to abide by its AI safety rules. Notably, these are the first-ever explicitly defined compensation requirements for the release of sound recordings containing AI voices.
With a vote of 97.69% to 2.31%, SAG-AFTRA members, which include actors as well as singers and recording artists, now will receive this protections, effective immediately, for the term of 2021-2026. Now, the term “artist,” “singer” and “royalty artist” under this agreement only can refer to human talent. “Clear and conspicuous” consent is required prior to the release of a sound recording that uses a digital replication of an artist’s voice.
Artists who are replicated are also entitled to receive specific details about the replica’s intended use and to minimum compensation. Compensation for artists must align with the royalty share the artist would earn on other sound recordings under their contract, and sessions singers must receive a minimum of three sides per project. A minimum of 28 hours notice of any recording session for the purpose of creating a digital replica is expected and that session time should be paid as work time.
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Additionally, blanket consent for digital or AI replication is prohibited. Instead, record labels must obtain consent on a per-project basis — a provision which will prevent labels from asking artists to sign away their digital likeness for lengthy terms as part of their deals.
In the year since Ghostwriter’s fake-Drake song “Heart On My Sleeve” brought conversations about AI voices to the forefront, little has been done to actually enforce the protection of artists’ identities. While the federal government is considering a few bills (like the draft NO FAKES Act and the NO AI FRAUD Act) to create a nationwide right of publicity that would create uniform protection for artists’ names, images, and voices, these protections, for now, remain a patchwork of varying state laws that were largely written before artificial intelligence presented new use cases for AI.
“Singers and recording artists have a profound impact on our culture, and I’m thrilled that they’ve achieved a contract that not only recognizes their value with significant wage increases, but also provides them essential protections around artificial intelligence,” said SAG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher. “We celebrate our human performers! I applaud the negotiating committee and staff, the record labels, and SAG-AFTRA members for getting this contract across the finish line!”
SAG-AFTRA National Executive Director & Chief Negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland said, “This contract secures groundbreaking A.I. guardrails while also achieving crucial and substantial wage increases, and other key wins for singers and recording artists. Protecting human artistry will always be SAG-AFTRA’s priority, and I’m heartened that our members have a contract that provides immediate gains and recognizes the importance of human contributions to the industry. I also want to acknowledge Negotiating Committee Chair Dan Navarro and the entire committee and staff for their outstanding and dedicated work in achieving this agreement.”
Sound Recordings Code Negotiating Committee Chair Dan Navarro said, “Members’ feedback played a key role in the formation of this contract and the negotiating committee prioritized the concerns that were most crucial to the singers and recording artists impacted by these terms. We’re proud to have achieved these essential wins in A.I. protections along with substantial wage increases and gains in health and retirement funding.”
Other wins included wage increases and gains in health and retirement funding. To read the full list of provisions, see here.
Ticketing for live events is not only under the Justice Department’s microscope but front and center for music fans across the country. This focus places our industry at a crossroads. We can either stay with the status quo, in which events are egregiously expensive and funds go to resellers rather than artists and venues, or we can use this moment to support reform that benefits the broader live event ecosystem.
For too long, fans, artists, and venues have been caught in an unchecked marketplace riddled with speculative ticketing, deceptive practices and exorbitant price gouging.
But all is not lost. We have an opportunity to establish guardrails that protect fans, create trust and promote a healthy live event industry.
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The Fans First Act is the right bill, at the right time. If passed, this important bipartisan legislation will bring much-needed enforcement and transparency, prohibit deceptive websites, disclose resellers, and ban speculative ticketing. That is why we call on Congress to pass this important legislation and move it to the White House for signature.
The Problem
To understand why we need the Fans First Act requires a full understanding of the problem and how we got here.
Fans find themselves in a perfect storm. Amid inflation and an unpredictable economy, they face bots, brokers and skyrocketing prices for live experiences (concert ticket prices have increased by 35% since 2019), according to Pollstar. While fans are eager to see their favorite acts and artists live, too many cannot.
Music festivals are a prime example of live events looking to adapt to the current economic environment of increased costs for fans (tickets, travel/lodging and food) and rising production fees. Unfortunately for fans, this means canceled events. This year, manyfestivals have been canceled as organizers look to consolidate and adjust to rising fees and economic constraints.
Dig deeper into the fan experience and we find that many fans’ first engagement with live entertainment is through a reseller on a secondary ticketing site, sometimes posing as the actual venue.
Fans are often asked to cough up well over $500 for a decent ticket on the secondary market, and that’s for real tickets. A buyer has no sense of clarity about the primary ticket seller. For example, Seattle fan Kerry Dellisanti had her own dream crushed when her $895 nosebleed ticket for a Taylor Swift concert turned out to be speculative (fake). Her friends ended up enjoying the show without her.
Fans across genres and localities are frequently deceived by fake tickets. Many book non-refundable travel and hotels for concerts they think they have a real ticket for, but they’ve been scammed.
Everyone is losing in this environment.
Unscrupulous brokers and illegal bots have been increasingly detrimental to consumers. As they resell tickets at the highest possible price, it’s having a direct impact on the full ecosystem of live events, harming fans, artists and venues alike.
Sky-high profit margins for the secondary ticket seller means fans are seeing fewer shows and spending less on venue concessions and merchandise that sustain organizers and artists. When fans show up at a venue with a fake or overpriced ticket, the predatory seller who defrauded them is nowhere to be found. It is the venue owners, artists and small businesses who are left to pick up the pieces of this unchecked ticketing ecosystem.
The Solution
Our industry is at a crossroads. Cater to the resellers and brokers who have no investment in the concerts? Or swing the power of the live performance industry back into the hands of fans, artists and venues?
We call on Congress to pass the Fans First Act. Fans, artists and venues are the lifeblood of the live entertainment industry and their experience should always be at the forefront. The time is now to give the industry back to the people who make it tick and get back to what makes live events and music so important — and what fuels local economies across the country.
The connection. The experience.
Julia Hartz is co-founder, CEO and executive board chair of Eventbrite.
Stephen Parker is executive director of the National Independent Venue Association (NIVA).
Crook & Chase, Diane Rehm, Larry Elder and Richard Blade are among the well-known radio professionals who are nominated for the Radio Hall of Fame. Howard Stern, who has long had a love/hate relationship with the institution, is not among the 24 nominees announced today by The Museum of Broadcast Communications. The nominees were chosen […]
As a former executive at music companies in Singapore, Hong Kong, New York and Los Angeles, Wendy Ong certainly has the globe-trotting credentials to help a roster of music artists including Lana Del Rey, Ellie Goulding and Noah Cyrus navigate an increasingly global business. But Ong charted the flight path she took to her current role as global co-president/chief marketing officer of the artist management and publishing company TaP Music largely on her own because, she says, mentors for an Asian American/Pacific Islander (AAPI) music executive were virtually nonexistent then.
As a result, Ong — who was raised in Malaysia and Singapore and worked at BMG, Arista, RCA, the Metropolitan Opera, EMI, Capitol, Interscope and Roc Nation — says she makes it a priority to be one herself, particularly for Asians and Asian Americans. Her mentorship has been aided by her participation in Gold House — a community of Asian Pacific entrepreneurs, creatives and other leaders — after, she says, she was invited to one of the organization’s dinners “by accident.” She adds that when opportunity presents itself, “it depends on what you do with it.”
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Ong sat down with Billboard to discuss the continued importance of music festivals, the work of Gold House and the promise of artificial intelligence (AI), among other topics.
Lana Del Rey returned to Coachella this year as a headliner. Do festival bookings still move the needle?
When you’re strategic about it, it allows you to make getting into smaller markets cost-effective. It’s hard to do proper global touring these days, and even in the U.S., festivals allow an artist to complement their overall touring strategy. From the TaP perspective, it’s still a very key component, especially for developing artists. It’s the same reason that collaborations work because it’s crossing over to other artists’ audiences. And not just for young people. I’m supposed to be the jaded music executive, but I’m not. The Justice set [at Coachella] blew me away. I actually went and checked immediately [to see if they’re touring] because I wanted to see it again.
Prior to Coachella, what other major wins has TaP scored in the past 12 months?
Ellie [Goulding] is one of the most multifaceted artists anywhere. She had a No. 1 single and album last year [with “Miracle” featuring Calvin Harris and fifth full-length Higher Than Heaven] in the same week in the U.K. That was stunning. And Caroline Polachek’s album [Desire, I Want To Turn Into You, which debuted at No. 9 on Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart]. I love that Caroline and Mookie Singerman, who manages her, have been together since the beginning of [Polachek’s former band] Chairlift. There’s something to be said for loyalty. Sometimes when an artist gets bigger, they feel they need to switch up their teams. They are the CEO of their own company, so they need to make tough calls sometimes. But it’s nice to see those that remain loyal.
After Ong spearheaded a Fifty Shades of Grey classical compilation at EMI, she says author E L James’ lawyer sent her a cease-and-desist notice. “I flew to London,” she says, and successfully proposed releasing Fifty Shades of Grey: The Classical Album, which put her on the radar of radio departments at Capitol when programmers called to say, “ ‘We heard you released a BDSM classical album.’ ”
Yasara Gunawardena
How are label layoffs affecting management?
Significantly. I always look to partner with our major labels in the best possible way, and when things are up in the air, it makes it very challenging to understand how much support we’re going to have. The company that [TaP co-CEOs] Ben [Mawson] and Ed [Millett] have built is very much on the ethos of self-sufficiency. Going back to Lana, at the beginning of her career, they had a lot of pushback. She signed to Universal Germany because nobody believed in her. And that was and still is today a big takeaway for how we function as a company. We try to do as much for our artists as we can without overly relying on third parties, whether it’s a label, a brand, a social [platform] or a [digital service provider]. We need that agency to be able to make a difference.
What does that entail today?
All anybody wants to talk about right now is superfans. And it’s such a wake-up call. Fans want that close, direct relationship with the artist, and we were all slow in realizing that we need to take control of this relationship. We, as a management company, have made big strides in CRM [customer relationship management]. We have someone employed specifically at our company to do CRM. We’re platform agnostic, whether that’s OpenStage or Community or Laylo. What is important for us is to be able to take back the data. I say “data,” but that’s the fans. Artists need to be able to talk to their fans directly, and I think we’re leading the charge on the management side. It’s a testament to how [much] we value our artists’ fans.
Ong’s great-grandmother, with whom she lived in Malaysia while attending preschool, gave her this pendant.
Yasara Gunawardena
You’ve talked about not having a mentor in the industry. When you switched to management, was it even more apparent?
It was glaring. I wish that wasn’t my answer, by the way. I wish I could say that, “Oh, yeah. So-and-so really lifted me up and helped me out so much.” Younger people, whether it’s on social media or in real life, often reach out to me, and I do my best to play whatever small part I can because I think that my path may have been a little less rocky if I had more guidance early in my career. And the very reason I had no mentors is because there weren’t enough people that looked like me when I was coming up in the industry. Now there’s K-pop, so that has changed things in the best possible way.
How does Gold House encourage more mentorship and visibility of the AAPI community in music?
With Gold House, I think it’s the first time that I became a part of something greater for the AAPI community. It makes it easier to give back and to spotlight minority communities like ours. I’m also very proud to be part of the Gold House Music Accelerator program. The spotlight K-pop has put on the AAPI community is wonderful, but being a judge on the Gold House Music Accelerator program helps to shine a light on other types of artists, whether it’s indie-rock or R&B.
Why has K-pop become an umbrella term in the United States for all Asian music right now?
Because we’re dealing with the greater media that is not Asian, it eclipses all these other interesting artists and music that’s coming out from countries like Indonesia and the Philippines and Taiwan. Nowhere else in the world would you put South Asians, Chinese, Koreans, Japanese, Filipinos, Indonesians all under one umbrella. It makes no sense outside of America. We have to do it in this country because we’re all minorities and we can have a bigger voice if we band together. It’s a challenge, though, because K-pop has changed so much of what we think pop music looks like. So now that we have a sliver of an opening, I hope that we get to demonstrate through Gold House efforts, for example, other types of music made by Asians.
A sweatshirt embroidered with the face of Ong’s recently deceased dog, Patches, whom she rescued 16 years ago on the island of Tobago and “was my rock through and through.”
Yasara Gunawardena
What genre would you like to see gain prominence?
I’m so excited about South Asian Desi music. It is so much fun and joy and rhythm and bass. That joyousness is similar to how I view a lot of Latin music. It’s inevitable that a Desi artist is going to break through, and I’m excited for that to find its way into America.
TaP has its publishing, philanthropic, fashion and sports divisions, but is there another sector you would love to see the company tackle in the future?
I am very excited and a huge advocate for all the positive changes that AI can bring. But I also have that personality of an early adopter. I think that in two years’ time the music industry is going to look extremely different — maybe more so on the publishing side because that’s where it’s the most scary. When things are challenging, that is when opportunity comes. It’s whether we can find a way to leverage it.
Outside of new music, what are you looking forward to this year?
The Gold Music Alliance. It was really encouraging when [the organization] had the chance to do the event around the Grammys this year. It was the first experience for me as a member of the Recording Academy to realize that there was interest in growing the AAPI membership base. Because I don’t think we’re very represented.
Yasara Gunawardena
Do you think that will change with this year’s nominations?
In 2023, two AAPI trustees were elected to the academy’s national board of trustees. I think that is a sign that we are getting more representation. And I want to use my platform to encourage more AAPIs to become members of the Recording Academy. I know K-pop dominates in terms of consumption, but recognition is what I’m speaking about. I would be really excited to see a non-fan-voted award with K-pop. We should be represented not just in Billboard sales charts, but also in critical acclaim. Once again, I hope that K-pop forges the path for other types of Asian music.
The academy added a best African music performance category this year. Would you like to see a similar addition for K-pop?
How amazing would that be, but it’s a double-edged sword. Like, why isn’t K-pop just part of pop? It’s [like asking] why is there a best actor and a best actress at the Oscars? Sometimes I think it’s necessary because we can’t [bestow] the right amount of acclaim and recognition by putting everyone in the same bucket. We’ll see more changes due to AI than we’ll see anything else. I wish technological advances could help advance this type of conversation — maybe that’s the challenge.
This article originally appeared in the April 27, 2024 issue of Billboard.
Concord Label Group has promoted Joe Dent to executive vp of operations and Jill Weindorf to executive vp of marketing, the company announced Tuesday (April 30). Weindorf is based in Los Angeles while Dent is located in Concord’s Nashville headquarters.
The promotions, some of the first under newly-appointed Concord Label Group CEO Tom Becci, aim to modernize Concord’s structure to support an expanding roster of talent while increasing the company’s ability to sign, develop and support artists within the global ecosystem.
Weindorf began her career in marketing at Elektra Records and has spent 17 years at Concord. In her new role, she will lead marketing efforts across Concord’s eight active labels and, in conjunction with Concord’s label presidents, continue to develop career artists globally.
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Dent previously spent a decade at Fat Beats Distribution, where he rose to GM. Since joining Concord, he has led the charge to stabilize the company’s vinyl pipeline during the COVID-19 pandemic, increased its in-house spatial audio capacity and developed a business-to-business (B2B) system for interacting with artists. In his new capacity, Dent will continue to concentrate on improving processes across the active label and back-office teams. He will also build further internal system efficiency and interconnection while working with external partners on capacity, supply chain and process efficiencies.
“Music is about connection and Jill’s ability to devise a marketing strategy in concert with an artist, while considering their priorities, who they are, the place they want to be, and then work tirelessly in support of that plan is unparalleled,” said Becci in a statement. “Having Jill in this role will certainly allow Concord to remain competitive in an increasingly complicated and global market. Joe has an incredible understanding of how to look at a classically messy system, identify areas for improvement, and make real and lasting corrections. I have no doubt that Joe will continue guiding Concord towards further operational efficiencies in support of our artists.”
“My focus has always been the artists and music,” Weindorf said in a statement. “Concord has offered me the opportunity to build long-term trust with so many career artists and I love being part of the journey with them. I’m also excited by our legacy recordings and the depth and historical relevance of our catalog. Many executives don’t get the chance to work across such a wide breadth of repertoire; I have been here for 17 years, and I am still excited by that opportunity every day.”
“What I genuinely appreciate about Concord is that, despite our size, we are still incredibly nimble,” added Dent. “If we believe there is a superior way that we can do things, there is a reasonable chance that we will do it that way. I’m incredibly grateful for the trust that so many amazing artists put in us and I’m excited to continue finding ways we can better support them. This really is a dream come true for a punk from New Jersey.”
The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee convened on Tuesday (April 30) to discuss a proposed bill that would effectively create a federal publicity right for artists in a hearing that featured testimony from Warner Music Group CEO Robert Kyncl, artist FKA Twigs, Digital Media Association (DiMA) CEO Graham Davies, SAG-AFTRA national executive director/chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, Motion Picture Association senior vp/associate general counsel Ben Sheffner and the University of San Diego professor Lisa P. Ramsey.
The draft bill — called the Nurture Originals, Foster Art, and Keep Entertainment Safe Act (NO FAKES Act) — would create a federal right for artists, actors and others to sue those who create “digital replicas” of their image, voice, or visual likeness without permission. Those individuals have previously only been protected through a patchwork of state “right of publicity” laws. First introduced in October, the NO FAKES Act is supported by a bipartisan group of U.S. senators including Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.).
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Warner Music Group (WMG) supports the NO FAKES Act along with many other music businesses, the RIAA and the Human Artistry Campaign. During Kyncl’s testimony, the executive noted that “we are in a unique moment of time where we can still act and we can get it right before it gets out of hand,” pointing to how the government was not able to properly handle data privacy in the past. He added that it’s imperative to get out ahead of artificial intelligence (AI) to protect artists’ and entertainment companies’ livelihoods.
“When you have these deepfakes out there [on streaming platforms],” said Kyncl, “the artists are actually competing with themselves for revenue on streaming platforms because there’s a fixed amount of revenue within each of the streaming platforms. If somebody is uploading fake songs of FKA Twigs, for example, and those songs are eating into that revenue pool, then there is less left for her authentic songs. That’s the economic impact of it long term, and the volume of content that will then flow into the digital service providers will increase exponentially, [making it] harder for artists to be heard, and to actually reach lots of fans. Creativity over time will be stifled.”
Kyncl, who recently celebrated his first anniversary at the helm of WMG, previously held the role of chief business officer at YouTube. When questioned about whether platforms, like YouTube, Spotify and others who are represented by DiMA should be held responsible for unauthorized AI fakes on their platforms, Kyncl had a measured take: “There has to be an opportunity for [the services] to cooperate and work together with all of us to [develop a protocol for removal],” he said.
During his testimony, Davies spoke from the perspective of the digital service providers (DSPs) DiMA represents. “There’s been no challenge [from platforms] in taking down the [deepfake] content expeditiously,” he said. “We don’t see our members needing any additional burdens or incentives here. But…if there is to be secondary liability, we would very much seek that to be a safe harbor for effective takedowns.”
Davies added, however, that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which provides a notice and takedown procedure for copyright infringement, is not a perfect model to follow for right of publicity offenses. “We don’t see [that] as being a good process as [it was] designed for copyright…our members absolutely can work with the committee in terms of what we would think would be an effective [procedure],” said Davies. He added, “It’s really essential that we get specific information on how to identify the offending content so that it can be removed efficiently.”
There is currently no perfect solution for tracking AI deepfakes on the internet, making a takedown procedure tricky to implement. Kyncl said he hopes for a system that builds on the success of YouTube’s Content ID, which tracks sound recordings. “I’m hopeful we can take [a Content ID-like system] further and apply that to AI voice and degrees of similarity by using watermarks to label content and care the provenance,” he said.
The NO FAKES draft bill as currently written would create a nationwide property right in one’s image, voice, or visual likeness, allowing an individual to sue anyone who produced a “newly-created, computer-generated, electronic representation” of it. It also includes publicity rights that would not expire at death and could be controlled by a person’s heirs for 70 years after their passing. Most state right of publicity laws were written far before the invention of AI and often limit or exclude the protection of an individual’s name, image and voice after death.
The proposed 70 years of post-mortem protection was one of the major points of disagreement between participants at the hearing. Kyncl agreed with the points made by Crabtree-Ireland of SAG-AFTRA — the actors’ union that recently came to a tentative agreement with major labels, including WMG, for “ethical” AI use — whose view was that the right should not be limited to 70 years post-mortem and should instead be “perpetual,” in his words.
“Every single one of us is unique, there is no one else like us, and there never will be,” said Crabtree-Ireland. “This is not the same thing as copyright. It’s not the same thing as ‘We’re going to use this to create more creativity on top of that later [after the copyright enters public domain].’ This is about a person’s legacy. This is about a person’s right to give this to their family.”
Kyncl added simply, “I agree with Mr. Crabtree-Ireland 100%.”
However, Sheffner shared a different perspective on post-mortem protection for publicity rights, saying that while “for living professional performers use of a digital replica without their consent impacts their ability to make a living…that job preservation justification goes away post-mortem. I have yet to hear of any compelling government interest in protecting digital replicas once somebody is deceased. I think there’s going to be serious First Amendment problems with it.”
Elsewhere during the hearing, Crabtree-Ireland expressed a need to limit how long a young artist can license out their publicity rights during their lifetime to ensure they are not exploited by entertainment companies. “If you had, say, a 21-year-old artist who’s granting a transfer of rights in their image, likeness or voice, there should not be a possibility of this for 50 years or 60 years during their life and not have any ability to renegotiate that transfer. I think there should be a shorter perhaps seven-year limitation on this.”
A dip in SiriusXM‘s paid subscribers in the first quarter caused the satellite radio giant’s stock to fall by more than 7% on Tuesday (April 30), even as first-quarter revenue beat analysts’ expectations.
The company reported that first-quarter revenue inched 0.8% higher to $2.16 billion — analysts polled by the London Stock Exchange were expecting $2.13 billion — thanks mainly to a 7% uptick in ad sales revenue.
Ad revenue totaled $402 million in the quarter, enough to offset a 1% decline in subscription revenue, which came in at $1.68 billion and contributes nearly 80% of the company’s overall earnings.
A 1.4% decline in self-pay subscribers to 31.58 million customers in the quarter contributed to “slightly higher churn” as an increase in sales of vehicles with existing subscriptions led to those subscribers shifting into unpaid trials, SiriusXM CFO Tom Barry said on a call with analysts.
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Executives reiterated their 2024 guidance and said they expected improvements in their subscription revenue, trial subscriptions and ad revenue in the second half of the year.
Despite the rollout of a new and costly streaming app with features SiriusXM says allow it to tailor content to subscribers, executives faced questions from analysts over what will charge future growth.
“On the business side, it’s really about reinvigorating demand,” SiriusXM CEO Jennifer Witz said on the call. “It’s taking longer than we’d hoped in terms of the rollout of the new platform and our ability to capitalize on improvements in marketing. But the key opportunities to build demand … are clear, across price, discovery and control, and we have this multipronged effort to [drive] these things.”
The company is hopeful that the revamped app, which launched in December and costs $9.99 per month, will attract new subscribers and drive revenue growth.
Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) rose 4% to $650 million. The company’s gross profit edged 0.6% higher to $1.13 billion, while the gross profit margin held flat at 53% in the quarter compared to last year. Total operating expenses held roughly flat at $1.73 billion.
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway is a big investor in SiriusXM, having purchased nearly 9.7 million shares worth approximately $44 million last fall and then another 1.9 million shares worth $50 million of its tracking stock earlier this month.
In February, SiriusXM laid off 3% of its workforce affecting around 170 workers at the company, which said the cuts would enable it to invest in content and new technologies.
SiriusXM’s stock closed at $2.92 on Tuesday (April 30), down 7.2%.
This is The Legal Beat, a weekly newsletter about music law from Billboard Pro, offering you a one-stop cheat sheet of big new cases, important rulings and all the fun stuff in between.
This week: Tupac’s estate threatens to sue Drake over his use of the late rapper’s voice; Megan Thee Stallion faces a lawsuit over eye-popping allegations from her former cameraman; Britney Spears settles her dispute with her father; and much more.
THE BIG STORY: Drake, Tupac & An AI Showdown
The debate over unauthorized voice cloning burst into the open last week when Tupac Shakur’s estate threatened to sue Drake over a recent diss track against Kendrick Lamar that featured an AI-generated version of the late rapper’s voice.In a cease-and-desist letter first reported by Billboard, litigator Howard King told Drake that the Shakur estate was “deeply dismayed and disappointed” by the rapper’s use of Tupac’s voice in his “Taylor Made Freestyle.” The letter warned Drake to confirm in less than 24 hours that he would pull the track down or the estate would “pursue all of its legal remedies” against him.“Not only is the record a flagrant violation of Tupac’s publicity and the estate’s legal rights, it is also a blatant abuse of the legacy of one of the greatest hip-hop artists of all time. The Estate would never have given its approval for this use.”AI-powered voice cloning has been top of mind for the music industry since last spring when an unknown artist released a track called “Heart On My Sleeve” that featured — ironically — fake verses from Drake’s voice. As such fake vocals have continued to proliferate on the internet, industry groups, legal experts and lawmakers have wrangled over how best to crack down on them.With last week’s showdown, that debate jumped from hypothetical to reality. The Tupac estate laid out actual legal arguments for why it believed Drake’s use of the late rapper’s voice violated the law. And those arguments were apparently persuasive: Within 24 hours, Drake began to pull his song from the internet.
For more details on the dispute, go read our full story here.
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Other top stories this week…
MEGAN THEE STALLION SUED – The rapper and Roc Nation were hit witha lawsuit from a cameraman named Emilio Garcia who claims he was forced to watch Megan have sex with a woman inside a moving vehicle while she was on tour in Spain. The lawsuit, which claims he was subjected to a hostile workplace, was filed by the same attorneys who sued Lizzo last year over similar employment law.BRITNEY SETTLES WITH FATHER – Britney Spears settled her long-running legal dispute with her father, Jamie Spears, that arose following the termination of the pop star’s 13-year conservatorship in 2021. Attorneys for Britney had accused Jamie of misconduct during the years he served as his daughter’s conservator, a charge he adamantly denied. The terms of last week’s agreement were not made public.TRAVIS SCOTT MUST FACE TRIAL – A Houston judge denied a motion from Travis Scott to be dismissed from the sprawling litigation over the 2021 disaster at the Astroworld music festival, leaving him to face a closely-watched jury trial next month. Scott’s attorneys had argued that the star could not be held legally liable since safety and security at live events is “not the job of performing artists.” But the judge overseeing the case denied that motion without written explanation.ASTROWORLD TRIAL LIVESTREAM? Also in the Astroworld litigation, plaintiffs’ attorneys argued that the upcoming trial — a pivotal first test for hundreds of other lawsuits filed by alleged victims over the disaster — should be broadcast live to the public. “The devastating scale of the events at Astroworld, combined with the involvement of high-profile defendants, has generated significant national attention and a legitimate public demand for transparency and accountability,” the lawyers wrote.BALLERINI HACKING CASE – Just a week after Kelsea Ballerini sued a former fan named Bo Ewing over accusations that he hacked her and leaked her unreleased album, his attorneys reached a deal with her legal team in which he agreed not to share her songs with anyone else — and to name any people he’s already sent them to. “Defendant shall, within thirty days of entry of this order, provide plaintiffs with the names and contact information for all people to whom defendant disseminated the recordings,” the agreement read.R. KELLY CONVICTIONS AFFIRMED – A federal appeals court upheld R. Kelly’s 2022 convictions in Chicago on child pornography and enticement charges, rejecting his argument that the case against him was filed too late. The court said that Kelly was convicted by “an even-handed jury” and that “no statute of limitations saves him.” His attorney vowed a trip to the U.S. Supreme Court, though such appeals face long odds.DIDDY RESPONDS TO SUIT – Lawyers for Sean “Diddy” Combs pushed back against a sexual assault lawsuit filed by a woman named Joi Dickerson-Neal, arguing that he should not face claims under statutes that did not exist when the alleged incidents occurred in 1991. His attorneys want the claims — such as revenge porn and human trafficking — to be dismissed from the broader case, which claims that Combs drugged, assaulted and surreptitiously filmed Dickerson-Neal when she was 19 years old.
Mike Wheeler says he has 16 gigs lined up in April at clubs in his hometown of Chicago — a solid run but nowhere near the number he was playing before the pandemic. “Things are 50% normal,” says the veteran singer-guitarist, who has performed with Buddy Guy, the late B.B. King and Koko Taylor. “[There are] more clubs open now, but mostly Wednesday through Sunday. We’re trying to find the most gigs I can get in the city, but as far as tours and revenue, it’s kind of limited.”
Even in a blues mecca like Chicago, the genre has taken a significant hit over the past few years. Artists and club owners in musically vibrant cities cite numerous culprits — rising crime rates, the lingering pandemic-era habit of staying home, competition from nearby music festivals, home alcoholic-beverage delivery and the recent deaths of such headliners as Lonnie Brooks, Jimmy Johnson, James “Tail Dragger” Jones and members of The Kinsey Report.
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“It is sporadic, to say the least,” says Lisa Pellegrino, who manages Chi-town’s famed Kingston Mines blues club. “I don’t think anybody’s having a banner year.”
While Tony Mangiullo, founder and owner of nearby Rosa’s Lounge, is more upbeat — “The business is good, that’s all you need to know,” he says — he acknowledges the pandemic changed fans’ concert-going habits. “By 1:30, 2 in the morning, people are tired, the musicians are tired, and we’re tired. In the past, you would have people staying late. I’m really hoping we go back to that.”
Through its rickety constellation of indie labels, roadhouses and juke joints, the blues business is reinventing itself. Its biggest stars have died, retired or reduced their touring activity, leaving fewer headliners to carry festivals and weekend club dates. And while artists like Wheeler and clubs like Rosa’s keep the lights on with hard-drinking customers, door fees and ticket sales, the pandemic and its aftermath have forced many to rethink their models.
Mangiullo has invested in livestreaming and hopes to release live album compilations this fall; venerable Chicago-blues indie label Alligator Records partnered in 2021 with a new music company, Exceleration Music — founded by former Concord Music Group CEO Glen Barros — to handle physical distribution and other functions; and a new generation of stars, from singer Shemekia Copeland to guitar hero Christone “Kingfish” Ingram, has expanded the playing field from traditional clubs to gigs at arts centers and festivals, social media and satellite radio.
U.S. streaming numbers for the genre have increased 41% since 2020, from 1.7 billion in 2020 to almost 2.5 billion last year, according to Luminate. (In comparison, Taylor Swift racked up 17.5 billion on her own.) But owners of indie blues labels say the revenue has little impact on their bottom lines. “It takes a lot of streams to make a nickel,” M.C. Records owner Mark Carpentieri says. “Our better-known classic artists, like Hound Dog Taylor, Koko Taylor and Albert Collins, have a lot of life in the streaming services,” says Bruce Iglauer, founder of 53-year-old Alligator Records. “Our lesser-known artists do not particularly benefit from them.”
The genre remains reliant on touring, and if blues stars use social media to market to their older-skewing fan bases, they’re more likely to use Facebook instead of TikTok. They also sell albums and CDs at gigs for autograph-seekers, and labels are scrambling to make as many titles as possible available on vinyl.
Ingram, whom Iglauer calls Alligator’s “big success story,” is a 25-year-old guitar hero who has grown into an international festival headliner, even though his most popular album, 2021’s 662, has just 9.3 million streams in the United States and has sold 29,000 copies. Many in the blues business point to him as the future, a young talent who can refresh the genre. At first, Ingram’s friends were into hip-hop and didn’t much care for blues; today, he tells Billboard, “I see a resurgence in young people liking it, especially young Black kids.”
Ingram’s manager, Ric Whitney, says blues artists are expanding their audiences by supplementing club gigs with shows at festivals, arts centers and other venues that feature a wider range of music genres and styles. “There are a lot more places that are open to booking blues talent that aren’t necessarily blues clubs,” he says.
Veteran blues-rock guitarist Joe Bonamassa, who estimates his post-pandemic ticket sales are “back and then some,” says he has broadened his marketing efforts to rock fans who attend Foo Fighters, Eagles and Red Hot Chili Peppers shows. “We’ve always looked at it from the point of view [that], ‘If Eric Clapton can pull 15,000 people in a market, there’s clearly 15,000 people who like this kind of music,’” Bonamassa says. “It’s a classic rock-/blues-based audience, and that’s where you want to target.”
Bonamassa suggests artists and clubs identify fan base demographics through Google Analytics and other data tools, then “laser-focus marketing to the people that love this shit.” An effective blues cross-marketer has been Copeland, who uses her show on SiriusXM’s Bluesville channel to promote her albums and steady weekend touring. “This year is going to be one of the best financially that she ever had,” says her manager, John Hahn.
Joe talks with Billboard’s Behind the Setlist podcast about touring, covering Tom Waits, and which younger blues musicians he thinks are exciting.
Others are struggling or modifying their business strategies. Terra Blues, the 34-year-old club in New York’s Greenwich Village that books acoustic locals such as guitarists SaRon Crenshaw and Jr. Mack, relies on the lenience of a landlord. “If not for that, we probably would be closed,” owner Ilan Elmatad says. “Bluesmen do not tour anymore. It’s too expensive. These days, they’re staying where they are, whether it’s Mississippi or Arkansas. There are no blues clubs from Philadelphia to Montreal. We’re the only one.”
The departure of reliable artists from the touring circuit, whether they’ve retired or died, led Austin talent buyer Zach Ernst to rethink his approach to booking acts at Antone’s Nightclub and the Austin Blues Festival. For years, the club’s late founder, Clifford Antone, was strict about sticking to traditional artists, but Ernst says he’s “lucky if I can do one or two blues shows a month.” And whereas blues festivals throughout the United States once relied on straight-down-the-middle artists from Luther Allison to Koko Taylor, the Austin Blues Festival has expanded its lineup beyond the genre, much like the New Orleans Jazz Festival in recent years. This year’s festival stars Buddy Guy (whom Ernst calls “the last Chicago blues headliner, period”), Brittany Howard and blues-adjacent acts from Big Freedia to Dumpstaphunk.
“Everywhere, promoters are dealing with: ‘How do you deal with an aging fan base? How do you deal with a reduced number of headliners that are appealing to the baby boomer generation?’” Ernst says. “We don’t get too prescriptive by explaining exactly what we’re doing. We’re just like, ‘Hey, this is great music. Have a great time.’”
This story appears in the April 27, 2024, issue of Billboard.
Reservoir Media plans to sell an additional $100 million of securities, according to an S-3 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday (April 29). The funds may go toward acquisitions, debt repayment, share buybacks and other general corporate purposes, according to the filing.
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The company will often offer common stock, shares of its preferred stock, debt securities, depository shares, warrants, purchase contracts or a combination of these offerings, according to the filing. Reservoir Media currently has an authorized capital stock of 825 million shares — 750 million common shares and and 75 million shares of preferred stock. As of Feb. 5, it had 64.82 million shares of common stock outstanding. No shares of its preferred stock have been issued.
Tapping the market for additional capital now would enable Reservoir Media to benefit from a recent upswing in its share price. Its stock, which trades on the Nasdaq, reached a 52-week high of $9.20 per share on Friday (April 26) — and its highest point since May 4, 2022 — and closed at $9.03 on Monday(April 29), up 26.6% year to date. Reservoir Media went public in 2021 by merging with Roth CH Acquisition II, a special purpose acquisition corporation, or SPAC.
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The company’s pipeline of potential deals was roughly $2 billion in total value, CEO Golnar Khosrowshahi said during the company’s Feb. 7 earnings call. “We remain a highly respected and regarded partner,” she said, “and our proven reputation for being a steward for catalogs through value enhancement initiatives allows us to acquire some of the best assets in the market.”
Since its inception in 2007, Reservoir Media has invested $938 million, according to its latest investor presentation — with $770 million of that amount spent on acquisitions of catalogs and companies. It owns Chrysalis Records, Tommy Boy Music and Philly Groove Records and manages artists through Blue Raincoat Music and Big Life Management.
In February, the company reported first-quarter revenue growth of 19%, to $35.5 million, and raised its guidance for full-year revenue to $140 million to $142 million, implying 15% annual growth at the midpoint.