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For the last two years, I’ve poured my angst, joy, wonder and grief into a musical project called Current Dissonance.
I read the news voraciously, and every few days, a story resonates with particular thunder. I sit with that story in mind, as inspiration and intention, and then record a piece of solo piano music, composed on the spot, in reaction. Most often, Current Dissonance subscribers receive the new track within minutes of its completion.
I love engaging with this project. It’s become a cathartic practice and wordless diary, connective tissue when so much around us seems to be fracturing, something full of guts and blood and soul that feels deeply personal and unapologetically human.
Given all that, I find it both thrilling and jarring that AI music creation has advanced to a point where well-crafted algorithms could largely take my place as the brain, heart and fingers behind this project.
At its core, the fusion of AI and music creation isn’t new, and its evolution from tweaky curiosity to full-on cultural juggernaut has been fascinating to watch. My first exposure came via Digital Audio Workstations (DAWs) — the complex software suites used to produce nearly all new music. Years ago, I experimented with an early AI feature that allowed virtual drummers to bang out rudimentary grooves tailored to my songs-in-progress; another utility let me stretch and distort audio samples in subtle or grotesque ways. Later, I wrote coverage of a startup that used machine learning to auto-generate soundtracks for video.
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Some of those legacy AI utilities felt promising but imperfect, others inelegant to the point of unusability. But they all showed the potential of what was to come. And it’s not hard to see that what was coming has now arrived — with the force of a freight train.
Welcome To The New A(I)ge
Examples of AI’s growth spurt permeate the music world. For cringe-worthy fun, check out There I Ruined It, where AI Simon & Garfunkel sing lyrics from “Baby Got Back” and “My Humps” to the melody of “Sound of Silence.” Then visit Suno, where single-sentence prompts yield remarkably realistic songs — fully-produced, with customized lyrics — in electronica, folk, metal and beyond. Open up Logic Pro and hear just how big and vivid its AI mastering utility can make a track sound in seconds. These developments are just the overture, and there’s no technical reason why a vast array of musical projects — including my own — couldn’t be AI-ified in the movements to come.
For example, I’ve created 154 short piano pieces for Current Dissonance, as of the writing of this article. Hours more of my piano work are publicly accessible. An AI model could be trained on those recordings to look for patterns in the notes I play, the chord voicings I choose, the ways I modulate volume and manipulate rhythms — all the subtle choices that make me sound like me, as opposed to anyone else sitting at a piano.
The algorithm would also need to learn the relationship between each Current Dissonance movement and the news article it reinterprets, building a map of correlations between facets of the written story and recorded music. Do Locrian-mode motifs in 7/8 permeate my playing when I’m reflecting on South Asian politics — and are C#s twice as likely to appear when I reimagine headlines that are less than four words long? I have no idea, but a well-trained AI model would parse those potential patterns and more.
In the end, my hypothetical AI Current Dissonance would function like Suno does for popular music formats. To hear a Michael Gallant-style piano reaction to anything, type in your prompt and see what erupts.
While this may sound like a daydream, the key technical bedrock exists right now, or will exist soon. Following a similar development pathway, I doubt it’ll be long before we can also hear how Tchaikovsky might have reacted symphonically to war in Ukraine, or how McCoy Tyner could have soloed over “Vampire,” “Believer,” or any other tune written after his death. Elvis Presley reimagining Elvis Costello, Billie Holiday reinterpreting Billie Eilish, John Philip Sousa composing marches to honor nations that didn’t exist when he did — the possibilities are stunning.
But where does all of this innovation leave today’s music professionals?
Old Theme, New Variations
Recent conversations with fellow music-makers have yielded gallows humor, dark jokes about obsolescence at the hands of the robots — but also a sense of resilience, the feeling that we’ve heard this tune before.
Take for example the advancement of synthesizer technology, which has certainly constricted market demand for musicians who make their living playing in recording sessions. And the ubiquitousness of affordable, powerful DAWs like Pro Tools, Ableton Live and GarageBand has snuffed out a generation of commercial studios and their engineers’ careers. Those losses are real and devastating, but they’re only part of the story.
Inventing, programming and performing with synthesizers has become a thriving musical specialty of its own, creating new professional opportunities amidst ashes of the old. The same can be said for the brilliant minds who make every new bit of music software even more amazing. And democratized music production due to GarageBand and its ilk has made possible the global ascent of DIY artists who could never have afforded to work in traditional studios.
As the duality of loss and regrowth takes hold in the AI era, everyone involved in music must amplify the latter, while keeping the former as muted as possible. There are key steps that communities and countries alike can take to ensure that AI music technology boosts existing creators and inspires new ones — that it enhances human creativity more than it cuts us down.
Shedding for the Future
The biggest error music-makers can commit is pretending that nothing will change. When it comes to AI, willful ignorance will lead to forced irrelevance. Let’s avoid that future.
Instead, I encourage all music-makers to learn as much about AI music technology as possible. These tools are not secret weapons, siloed away for the rich and privileged; with an internet connection and a few hours, any music-maker can gain at least a high-level look at what’s going on. It’s incumbent on all of us to learn the landscape, learn the tools and see how they can make our human music-making better.
Music-makers must also double down on human connections. For artists with followings large or small, this means rededicating ourselves to building meaningful relationships with audiences, strengthening the human connection that AI can only approximate. Taking time to greet listeners at each performance, making space to bond with superfans — just as in-person concerts will grow in meaning as fiction and reality become increasingly indistinguishable in the digital world, so will the importance of face-to-face conversations, handshakes and high-fives, hugs between artists and those who see beauty in their music.
For music-makers who spend their time in studio settings, reinforcing connections with clients and collaborators will also be key. While I currently rely on AI-fueled music tools in some contexts, I cherish every opportunity to team up with fellow humans, because I’m blessed to work with great people who elevate and inspire me. That’s another vital connection that AI cannot now — or hopefully ever — replace.
It Takes a Movement
Music-makers, those who support them in commerce and industry, and those who weave music into their lives as listeners — all of us must help build a movement that cherishes human creativity lifted through technology.
There’s already hard evidence that protecting artists’ digital integrity is an all-too-rare consensus issue within American politics; check out Tennessee’s bipartisan ELVIS Act for more. Music-makers in any community can push their local and national leaders to ride Tennessee’s momentum and reproduce its successes against AI abuse. As a voting member of the Recording Academy, I’m proud of the organization’s pro-human activism efforts when it comes to federal copyright law and other vital issues. Every music-related entity should make noise in favor of similar protections.
Granted, even the smartest laws will only go so far. AI music technology is so accessible that trolls and bad actors will likely be able to manipulate musicians’ voices, privately and anonymously, without suffering real consequences — a dynamic unlikely to change anytime soon. But the more our culture brands such exploitative recordings as tasteless and taboo, the better. We cultivate respect for human creators when we marginalize the consumption of non-consensual, AI-smelted musical plastic.
Consent is one key; control is another. While industry executives, music-makers of all shapes and flavors, influencers and lawmakers must collectively insist that musicians remain masters of their own voices, I recommend we go further by empowering artists themselves to take the lead.
It would be brilliant, and fair, for Madonna or Janelle Monáe, Juanes or Kendrick Lamar, to release interactive AI albums that they, the artists, control. Such properties could allow fans to create custom AI tracks from raw material exclusively recorded for that purpose. Under no circumstances should AI assets be leveraged for any use without the explicit permission — and compensation — of the humans responsible for the music on which those algorithms were trained.
…And I Feel Fine
In the face of AI’s explosion, we must remember to stay curious, hungry and optimistic. Investors, inventors and tech companies must look beyond novelty song creation as the technology’s highest musical goal; I can’t imagine how far AI will go when applied to creating new instruments, for example. Much of the music I make is improvisational, formed in my brain milliseconds before it’s realized by my fingers. How amazing would it be to jam with live band members — as well as an AI algorithm trained to create instant orchestrations, in real time as I play, using a never-before-heard chimera of Les Paul overdrive, volcanic glass vibraphone and a grizzly bear roaring?
AI presents massive challenges to human creators of any sort, but if we proceed with thoughtfulness and respect, new innovations will lift music-making communities everywhere. I for one will be thrilled to learn who the first Beethoven, Beyoncé and Robert Johnson of the AI era will be, and to hear the masterpieces they create.
Michael Gallant is a musician, composer, producer, and writer living in New York City.
Members of the 1980s new wave band The Plimsouls have won a legal ruling against the group’s guitarist over the trademark rights to the band’s name – the music industry’s latest battle over the names of classic rock groups.
In a decision issued last week, a federal trademark tribunal sided with Peter Case and two other members of the Plimsouls – best known for their 1983 hit “A Million Miles Away” from the movie Valley Girl – in their fight with guitarist Eddie Munez.
The band had accused Munez of effectively going rogue, including performing under “The Plimsouls” with new musicians and seeking to secure his own trademarks to the name. They claimed fans “unwittingly bought tickets” to the shows because they thought it was the real band.
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On Wednesday (May 18), the federal Trademark Trial and Appeal Board said it was “crystal clear” that the band collectively, and not Munez alone, owned the rights to “The Plimsouls” name – thanks in part to the fact that they were all continuing to receive royalties.
“[Munez] had and continues to have his cake (royalties from the band). But he cannot eat it too (exclusively own the band’s mark),” the board wrote. “The public associates the … THE PLIMSOULS with the group, not just its lead guitarist.”
The battle between the members of the Plimsouls is just the latest clash between bandmates over the legal rights to classic group names. Journey, Stone Temple Pilots and Jefferson Starship have all fought protracted litigation over their trademarks, as have members of the Rascals, the Ebonys, the Commodores and the Platters.
Such disputes often arise out of one question: Who truly constitutes the band? Is it the band members, or an LLC that owns the rights to the name? Is it the original lineup, or the one that produced the biggest hits? Does one key member and a bunch of replacements count? Fans, band members and lawyers will likely give you different answers.
In the case of the Plimsouls, the band argued that all four members had always been members of a partnership that equally split control of the band’s intellectual property, including the trademarks to the band’s name.
Munez argued back that the band had “abandoned” any such rights because his bandmates had failed to perform any live concerts under the name since 2007. But in its ruling last week, the trademark board rejected that argument.
“Petitioner has not abandoned its mark The Plimsouls because the band’s music has remained on sale … throughout the band’s 45-year existence,” the judge wrote. “The [trademark] has always identified their group, based on the group’s music, and live and filmed performances. This explains why consumers have complained to [the band] after mistaking [Munez]’s band for [The Plimsouls] and being disappointed as a result.”
Neither side immediately returned a request for comment on Wednesday.
A bipartisan group of four senators led by Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is recommending that Congress spend at least $32 billion over the next three years to develop artificial intelligence and place safeguards around it, writing in a new report released Wednesday that the U.S. needs to “harness the opportunities and address the risks” of the quickly developing technology.
The group of two Democrats and two Republicans said in an interview Tuesday that while they sometimes disagreed on the best paths forward, it was imperative to find consensus with the technology taking off and other countries like China investing heavily in its development. They settled on a raft of broad policy recommendations that were included in their 33-page report.
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While any legislation related to AI will be difficult to pass, especially in an election year and in a divided Congress, the senators said that regulation and incentives for innovation are urgently needed.
“It’s complicated, it’s difficult, but we can’t afford to put our head in the sand,” said Schumer, D-N.Y., who convened the group last year after AI chatbot ChatGPT entered the marketplace and showed that it could in many ways mimic human behavior.
The group recommends in the report that Congress draft “emergency” spending legislation to boost U.S. investments in artificial intelligence, including new research and development and new testing standards to try and understand the potential harms of the technology. The group also recommended new requirements for transparency as artificial intelligence products are rolled out and that studies be conducted into the potential impact of AI on jobs and the U.S. workforce.
Republican Sen. Mike Rounds, a member of the group, said the money would be well spent not only to compete with other countries who are racing into the AI space but also to improve Americans’ quality of life — supporting technology that could help cure some cancers or chronic illnesses, he said, or improvements in weapons systems could help the country avoid a war.
“This is a time in which the dollars we put into this particular investment will pay dividends for the taxpayers of this country long term,” he said.
The group came together a year ago after Schumer made the issue a priority — an unusual posture for a majority leader — and brought in Democratic Sen. Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, Republican Sen. Todd Young of Indiana and Rounds of South Dakota.
As the four senators began meeting with tech executives and experts, Schumer said in a speech over the summer that the rapid growth of artificial intelligence tools was a “moment of revolution” and that the government must act quickly to regulate companies that are developing it.
Young said the development of ChatGPT, along with other similar models, made them realize that “we’re going to have to figure out collectively as an institution” how to deal with the technology.
“In the same breath that people marveled at the possibilities of just that one generative AI platform, they began to hypothesize about future risks that might be associated with future developments of artificial intelligence,” Young said.
While passing legislation will be tough, the group’s recommendations lay out the first comprehensive road map on an issue that is complex and has little precedent for consideration in Congress. The group spent almost a year compiling the list of policy suggestions after talking privately and publicly to a range of technology companies and other stakeholders, including in eight forums to which the entire Senate was invited.
The first forum in September included Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and owner of X, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates and Google CEO Sundar Pichai.
Schumer said after the private meeting that he had asked everyone in the room — including almost two dozen tech executives, advocates and skeptics — whether government should have a role in the oversight of artificial intelligence, and “every single person raised their hand.”
The four senators are pitching their recommendations to Senate committees, which are then tasked with reviewing them and trying to figure out what is possible. The Senate Rules Committee is already moving forward with legislation, voting on Wednesday on three bills that would ban deceptive AI content used to influence federal elections, require AI disclaimers on political ads and create voluntary guidelines for state election offices that oversee candidates.
Schumer, who controls the Senate’s schedule, said those election bills were among the chamber’s “highest priorities” this year. He also said he planned to sit down with House Speaker Mike Johnson, who has expressed interest in looking at AI policy but has not said how he would do that.
Some experts warn that the U.S. is behind many other countries on the issue, including the EU which took the lead in March when they gave final approval to a sweeping new law governing artificial intelligence in the 27-nation bloc. Europe’s AI Act sets tighter rules for the AI products and services deemed to pose the highest risks, such as in medicine, critical infrastructure or policing. But it also includes provisions regulating a new class of generative AI systems like ChatGPT that have rapidly advanced in recent years.
“It’s time for Congress to act,” said Alexandra Reeve Givens, CEO of the Center for Democracy & Technology. “It’s not enough to focus on investment and innovation. We need guardrails to ensure the responsible development of AI.”
The senators emphasized balance between those two issues, and also the urgency of action.
“We have the lead at this moment in time on this issue, and it will define the relationship between the United States and our allies and other competing powers in the world for a long time to come,” Heinrich said.
When Drake dismissively told Metro Boomin to go and “make some drums” in one of his recent diss tracks during his beef with Kendrick Lamar, the superproducer went off and did just that — and the result marked a turning point for the use of AI in music production.
The beat, titled “BBL Drizzy,” pairs a vintage-sounding soul vocalist over some 808 drums. The producer released it to SoundCloud on May 5, encouraging his fans to record their own bars over it for the chance to win a free beat, and it swiftly went viral.
But soon after, it was revealed that the singer from the “BBL Drizzy” beat didn’t exist — the voice was AI-generated, as was the song itself. The vocals, melody and instrumental of the sample were generated by Udio, an AI music startup founded by former Google Deep Mind engineers. Though Metro was not aware of the source of the track when he used it, his tongue-in-cheek diss became the first notable use case of AI-generated sampling, proving the potential for AI to impact music production. (A representative for Metro Boomin did not respond to Billboard’s request for comment).
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As with all AI tracks, however, a human being prompted it. King Willonius, a comedian, musician and content creator, had put together the Udio-generated song on April 14, pulling inspiration from a recent Rick Ross tweet — in which the rapper joked that Drake looks like he got a Brazilian Butt Lift — to write the lyrics. “I think it’s a misconception that people think AI wrote ‘BBL Drizzy,’” Willonius told Billboard in an interview about the track. “There’s no way AI could write lyrics like ‘I’m thicker than a Snicker and I got the best BBL in history,’” he adds, laughing.
There are a lot of issues — legal, philosophical, cultural and technical — that are still to be sorted out before this kind of sampling hits the mainstream, but it’s not hard to imagine a future where producers turn to AI to create vintage-sounding samples to chop up and use in beats given that sample clearances are notoriously complicated and can drag on for months or years, even for big name producers like Metro Boomin.
“If people on the other side [of sample clearance negotiations] know they’re probably going to make money on the new song, like with a Metro Boomin-level artist, they will make it a priority to clear a sample quickly, but that’s not how it is for everyone,” says Todd Rubenstein, a music attorney and founder of Todd Rubenstein Law. Grammy-winning writer/producer Oak Felder says clearing a sample for even a high-profile track is still a challenge for him. “I’ll be honest, I’m dealing with a tough clearance right now, and I’ve dealt with it before,” he says. “I had trouble clearing an Annie Lennox sample for a Nicki Minaj record once… It’s hard.”
Many smaller producers are not able to sample established songs because they know that it could get them into legal trouble. Others go ahead without permission, causing massive legal headaches, like when bedroom producer Young Kio sampled an undisclosed Nine Inch Nails song in an instrumental he licensed out on BeatStars. The beat was used by then-unknown Lil Nas X and resulted in the Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 “Old Town Road.” When the sample was discovered, Nas was forced to give up a large portion of his publishing and master royalties to the band.
Udio’s co-founder, David Ding, tells Billboard that he believes AI samples “could simplify a lot of the rights management” issues inherent to sampling and explains that Udio’s model is particularly adept at making realistic songs in the vein of “Motown ‘70s soul,” perhaps the most common style of music sampled in hip-hop today, as well as classical, electronic and more. “It’s a wide-ranging model,” Ding says.
Willonius believes AI samples also offer a solution for musicians in today’s relentless online news cycle. While he has made plenty of songs from scratch before, Willonius says AI offered him the chance to respond in real-time to the breakneck pace of the feud between Drake and Kendrick. “I never could’ve done that without AI tools,” he says. Evan Bogart, a Grammy-winning songwriter and founder of Seeker Music, likens it to a form of digital crate digging. “I think it’s super cool to use AI in this way,” he says. “It’s good for when you dig and can’t find the right fit. Now, you can also try to just generate new ideas that sound like old soul samples.”
There’s a significant financial impact incurred from traditional sampling that could also be avoided with AI. To use the melody of “My Favorite Things” in her hit song “7 Rings,” for example, Ariana Grande famously had to cede 90% of her publishing income for the song to “My Favorite Things” writers Rodgers and Hammerstein — and that was just an interpolation rather than a full sample, which entails both the use of compositional elements, like melody, and a portion of the sound recording.
“It certainly could help you having to avoid paying other people and avoid the hassle,” says Rubenstein, who has often dealt with the complications of clearing songs that use samples and beats from marketplaces like BeatStars. But he adds that any user of these AI models must use caution, saying it won’t always make clearances easier: “You really need to know what the terms of service are whenever you use an AI model, and you should know how they train their AI.”
Often, music-making AI models train on copyrighted material without the consent or compensation of its rights holders, a practice that is largely condemned by the music business — even those who are excited about the future of AI tools. Though these AI companies argue this is “fair use,” the legality of this practice is still being determined in the United States. The New York Times has launched a lawsuit against OpenAI for training on its copyrighted archives without consent, credit or compensation, and UMG, Concord, ABKCO and other music publishers have also filed a lawsuit against Anthropic for using their lyrics to train the company’s large language model. Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) has also introduced a new bill called the Generative AI Copyright Disclosure Act to require transparency on this matter.
Udio’s terms of service puts the risk of sharing its AI songs on users, saying that users “shall defend, indemnify, and hold the company entities harmless from and against any and all claims, costs, damages, losses, liabilities and expenses” that come from using whatever works are generated on the platform. In an interview with Billboard, Udio co-founder Ding was unable to answer what works were specifically used in its training data. “We can’t reveal the exact source of our training data. We train our model on publicly available data that we obtained from the internet. It’s basically, like, we train the model on good music just like how human musicians would listen to music,” says Ding. When pressed about copyrights in particular, he replies, “We can’t really comment on that.”
“I think if it’s done right, AI could make things so much easier in this area. It’s extremely fun and exciting but only with the proper license,” says Diaa El All, CEO/founder of Soundful, another AI music company that generates instrumentals specifically. His company is certified by Fairly Trained, a non-profit that ensures certified companies do not use copyrighted materials in training data without consent. El All says that creating novel forms of AI sampling “is a huge focus” for his company, adding that Soundful is working with an artist right now to develop a fine-tuned model to create AI samples based on pre-existing works.
“I can’t tell you who it is, but it’s a big rapper,” he says. “His favorite producer passed away. The rapper wants to leverage a specific album from that producer to sample. So we got a clearance from the producer’s team to now build a private generative AI model for the rapper to use to come up with beats that are inspired by that producer’s specific album.”
While this will certainly have an impact on the way producers work in the future, Felder and Bogart say that AI sampling will never totally replace the original practice. “People love nostalgia; that’s what a sample can bring,” says Felder. With the success of sample-driven pop songs at the top of the Hot 100 and the number of movie sequels hitting box office highs, it’s clear that there is an appetite for familiarity, and AI originals cannot feed that same craving.
“BBL Drizzy” might’ve been made as a joke, but Felder believes the beat has serious consequences. “I think this is very important,” he says. “This is one of the first successful uses [AI sampling] on a commercial level, but in a year’s time, there’s going to be 1,000 of these. Well, I bet there’s already a thousand of these now.”
This story is included in Billboard‘s new music technology newsletter, Machine Learnings. To subscribe to this and other Billboard newsletters, click here.
Kevin Parker of Tame Impala has sold his complete song catalog to Sony Music Publishing. The deal expands Parker’s longstanding relationship with SMP, which has published him since 2009, and includes all of his works released as Tame Impala as well as his writing credits for other songs, including his contributions to Dua Lipa‘s new album Radical Optimism, which debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 this week.
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Parker has also expanded his publishing deal with Sony to include the administration of the full catalog as well as future works.
The Australian mutli-hyphenate musician has made an indelible impact on music since he began his psychedelic rock band in 2008. Through the project, Parker has released four albums — InnerSpeaker (2010), Lonerism (2012),Currents (2015) and The Slow Rush (2020) — all of which were solely written, produced, recorded and mixed by Parker.
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Along with Tame Impala, Parker has also written and produced for a number of top acts, including Travis Scott, Dua Lipa, Mick Jagger, Kendrick Lamar, SZA, The Gorillaz, Mark Ronson, The Weeknd, Lady Gaga, Kid Cudi, Flaming Lips, A$AP Rocky, Lil Yachty, Don Toliver, Daft Punk, Miguel, and Australian children’s group The Wiggles. Rihanna also covered his Tame Impala-released single “New Person, Same Old Mistakes” (which she retitled “Same Ol’ Mistakes”) on her acclaimed 2016 album ANTI.
Parker says of the deal: “The idea of passing on ownership of my songs is one that I don’t think about very lightly, at all. They are the fruit of my blood, sweat and creativity over all the years I’ve been a recording artist and songwriter so far. I have a lot of love and trust for the Sony publishing family and have only had great experiences with Damian Trotter and the rest of the gang worldwide. I don’t think my songs could be in any safer hands than Sony’s, and I’m excited for the future and happy I can keep working with them on whatever the future brings…”
“I have always admired Kevin Parker and I believe he is one of the most versatile songwriters of our time,” says Jon Platt, chairman and CEO of SMP. “Kevin has built a catalog of songs with incredible range and enduring power, and he has always stayed true to his vision. It is a privilege to represent his music, and we are committed to broadening his legacy of success.”
Damian Trotter, managing director of Australia for Sony Music Publishing said: “Kevin is a singular talent whose creativity and dedication to his art has enthralled fans and artists since he arrived on the music scene. Having worked with Kevin since before the release of the first Tame Impala album, it has been thrilling to witness his rise to success worldwide, which is so well deserved. We are proud and humbled to be taking custodianship of this iconic catalogue of songs and to be continuing our relationship with Kevin in this exciting phase of his music making career.”
The National Music Publishers Association (NMPA) has sent a cease and desist letter to Spotify for allegedly hosting lyrics, music videos and podcast content that contain their members’ copyrighted musical works without proper licenses. The organization, which represents music publishers in the U.S., says that it “demands” that these alleged unlicensed works “be removed from the platform or Spotify will face copyright liability for continued use of these works.”
The letter comes a week after Billboard released an estimate, claiming that Spotify will pay about $150 million less in U.S. mechanical royalties to music publishers and songwriters in the next year than what publishers and songwriters were previously expecting. This is because Spotify added audiobooks into its premium, family and duo plans, and the company claims that the move now qualifies them as a bundle, which pays a discounted royalty rate from normal standalone subscriptions, given Spotify now has to pay for books and music from the same subscription price.
The cease and desist letter, obtained by Billboard, covers a separate issue to last week’s announcement, but the timing suggests the NMPA is hoping to push back against Spotify’s practices on several fronts. The letter continues: “Spotify appears to be engaged in direct infringement by hosting unlicensed musical works in its lyrics, videos and podcasts and by distributing unauthorized reproductions, synchronizations, displays and derivative sues of these musical works to its users. Making matters worse, Spotify profits from such infringement.”
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Written by NMPA’s executive vp and general counsel Danielle Aguirre, the letter did not cite any specific unlicensed works or say how many instances there are of unlicensed works on Spotify and warned about both unlicensed works as well as works that “will soon become unlicensed” by its members. When asked for a list or a ballpark number of the unlicensed works, NMPA declined to comment. If the NMPA ever gets to the point of filing a lawsuit against Spotify for these alleged offenses, however, the organization would then provide more detail.
Many music publishers currently have licenses in place with Spotify for their lyrics and video content. Unlike the government-regulated process of setting U.S. mechanical royalty rates, lyric and video licenses are direct deals between the publisher and the streaming service, and each negotiation is unique, but for lyrics specifically, some publishers will license through third party aggregators like Lyric Find. These deals are not considered to be major money makers for publishers or streamers, and although their duration can vary, the licenses typically run for 1-2 years, according to a source close to the matter.
The NMPA also cites a recent Wall Street Journal article that claimed Spotify is working on tools that would allow subscribers to “speed up, mash up and otherwise edit songs from their favorite artists” in its letter to Spotify, warning the streaming platform that if “any such feature” is released by Spotify “without the proper licenses in place from our members” it “may constitute additional direct infringement.”
Spotify and the NMPA have a history of not getting along, but since late 2022, it appeared the two were on relatively good terms. After a contentious five years of back-and-forth over how to set the U.S. mechanical royalty rate for streaming for 2018-2022, the NMPA, Nashville Songwriters Association International (NSAI) and streaming services, like Spotify, came together to collectively settle the next rate period together (2023-2027), hoping to avoid another lengthy and costly fight. The result was something David Israelite, president and CEO of the NMPA, touted at the time as the “highest streaming rates in the history of digital streaming,” due to a raise in the headline rate.
Part of the compromise for that settlement, however, included an update to how bundles were treated, which was considered a potential benefit to streaming services. As the Association of Independent Music Publishers (AIMP) put it in their statement against Spotify’s bundling practices, music publishers believe Spotify used a “loophole” to “circumvent the [Copyright Royalty Board] settlement.” Israelite went further, calling the bundle reclassification a “potentially unlawful move” when it was first announced, even though Spotify believes it rightfully qualifies. Recently, the NMPA admitted a lawsuit against Spotify for bundling was “likely.”
Read the full letter below:
Dear Mr. Kaefer [vp and global head, music and audiobook business] and Ms. Konstan [general counsel of Spotify]:
I write on behalf of the National Music Publishers’ Association (“NMPA”) regarding copyright infringement of our members’ musical works on the Spotify platform. As the voice of our members, NMPA protects, promotes, and advances the interests of music creators and enforces the rights of publishers, and their songwriter partners, who own and/or control musical work copyrights.
Music is essential to Spotify’s service; it is the reason subscribers utilize the Spotify platform every day. Spotify’s primary use of musical works via interactive streams and downloads is subject to the antiquated compulsory license under 17 U.S.C. § 115 and consent decree-governed public performance licenses.
Regardless of the mechanical and public performance licenses Spotify may have, however, the use of lyrics and music in videos and podcasts on its platform requires rights that must be negotiated directly with rightsholders in a free market.
It has come to our attention that Spotify displays lyrics and reproduces and distributes music videos and podcasts using musical works without the consent of or compensation to the respective publishers and/or administrators (our members) who control the copyrights in the musical compositions. As such, these uses of musical works on the Spotify platform are not licensed or will soon become unlicensed.
U.S. copyright law generally grants copyright owners the exclusive right to, among other things, reproduce, distribute, display, perform publicly, and create derivative works from their copyrighted works under 17 U.S.C. § 106. Violation of these exclusive rights constitutes copyright infringement under 17 U.S.C. § 501.
Spotify thus appears to be engaged in direct infringement by hosting unlicensed musical works in its lyrics, videos, and podcasts, and by distributing unauthorized reproductions, synchronizations, displays, and derivative uses of these musical works to its users. Making matters worse, Spotify profits from such infringement.
Accordingly, on behalf of our members, NMPA demands that unlicensed lyrics, music videos, and podcasts be removed from the platform or Spotify will face copyright liability for continued use of these works.
We also understand that Spotify wishes to offer a “remix” feature allowing Spotify subscribers to “speed up, mash up, and otherwise edit” their favorite songs to create derivative works. Spotify is on notice that release of any such feature without the proper licenses in place from our members may constitute additional direct infringement.
NMPA further demands that Spotify preserve all electronically stored information (“ESI”), as defined by Rule 34 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, along with any paper files, in Spotify’s possession, custody, or control that is relevant to use of our members’ unlicensed works. Spotify must also cease any auto-deletion operations affecting ESI relevant to this matter.
This letter is not intended as a full recitation of the facts or claims that may be made against Spotify by NMPA, its members, and/or other copyright owners, and is made without prejudice to all rights or remedies against Spotify and all others acting in concert with Spotify, including without limitation, monetary damages and attorneys’ fees as provided under 17 U.S.C. §§ 502-505.
Sincerely,
Danielle Aguierre
IMPEL has added The Administration MP, Drive Publishing, Red Brick Songs and Lofi Chill & Lofi Jazz to its membership. Now, IMPEL, a international collective representing digital publishing rights, will help its new members with licensing their catalogs.
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They join other independent music publishers like Bucks Music Group, Beggars Music, Reservoir Music, Kassner Music, CTM, ABKCO, Truelove Music, Faber Music, Mute Song, Budde UK, Phrased Differently, Legs Music, Reach Music Publishing and Regard Music who are all already members of IMPEL.
IMPEL CEO Sarah Williams said of the new additions: “It feels as though we have reached a tipping point as an organization when it comes to awareness around what we do, how we do it and the unique benefits we bring to our members. The number of independent publishers that want to become part of our collective family is increasing all the time, and it’s great to be able to add such a diverse group of US operators to our ranks at once. We continue to make real in-roads into the biggest music market on the planet, which will benefit our membership as a whole.”
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The Administration MP
This publisher, founded in 2013, boasts over 1,300 clients and 60,000 copyrights. It’s repertoire primarily focuses on hip-hop/rap, and its clients have written songs for Drake, MGK, the Notorious B.I.G., Migos, Nicki Minaj, 2Pac, Snoop Dogg, Dr. Dre, Kanye West, 50 Cent, Tyga, and Chris Brown.
Drive Publishing
Founded in 2013 by Ana Ruiz, Drive Music Publishing offers global administration, creative consulting, royalty collection, and sound recording services, emphasizing expertise, transparency, and clarity. The company represents Grammy-winning and nominated writers, including Jackson Browne, jazz saxophone legend Benny Carter, and ‘the Poet of Havana’ Carlos Varela.
Red Brick Songs
Red Brick Songs supports songwriters through multimedia song placement, royalty administration, and career development. Their catalog includes works by Toni Braxton, Bootsy Collins, Alison Krauss, Paula Cole, and Ronnie Spector, among others. Notable hits in their collection include Julie Gold’s Grammy-winning “From A Distance,” Herbie Hancock’s “Rockit,” and jazz standards like “Bemsha Swing,” “Moanin’,” and “Joy Spring.”
Lofi Chill & Lofi Jazz
The publishing counterpart of a label by the same name, Lofi Chill and Lofi Jazz represent a catalog of top ambient and lofi artists, including Dontcry, Phlocalyst, Casiio, SwuM, and Mujo.
Nonprofit foundation Live Music Society has announced the recipients of its second annual Music in Action grant.
The Music In Action grant provides funding for venues to program events that build community and promote accessibility for marginalized groups, create opportunities for both local talent and touring acts to grow and find new audiences, and increase their revenue and customer base. The number of small music venues benefitting from the program is up from 17 in 2023, while the funds have grown from $500,000 last year to $710,000 this year.
This year, 24 small performance venues across the United States have been granted a total of $710,000 to program events that build community and boost revenue. The 24 venue grantees include Maple Leaf Bar in New Orleans, Nocturne Jazz & Supper Club in Denver, Cole’s Bar in Chicago, Drkmtter Collective in Nashville, The Lost Church in San Francisco, The Royal Room in Seattle and Chris’ Jazz Cafe in Philadelphia.
The 2024 recipients will use their funds over the next year to launch concert series, put on family-friendly festivals, build out membership programs, develop spaces for LGBTQ+ musicians to gather, create educational programming and host monthly Latinx dance parties.
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“People are trying to open their stages to new voices: women, BIPOC, LGBTQ and even just different styles of music that they are not used to presenting,” says Live Music Society executive director Cat Henry. “It’s really exciting for people to take a philosophical risk to make sure that they’re not just staying in one lane the whole time and providing opportunities for more voices at the table.”
For Live Music Society founder Pete Muller, the Music In Action grant is about giving people who love and know their business the ability to take a swing at something new and help build a more sustainable business for the long term. “If you have a 200-seat venue, you are not going to make a lot of money. Even if you run it well. The best shot you have is to figure out how to raise a lot of philanthropic local dollars,” says Muller. “Most of the time, it’s going to be shoestring and we can help.”
While Live Music Society does not intend to fully fund any venues, Muller says the nonprofit created the grant for them to take risks on new musicians, pay their musicians and staff reasonable wages and remain an integral part of the live music ecosystem.
“200-seat venues or 100-seat venues are an amazing place to start your musical career,” says Muller, who is also a touring musician. “I actually prefer smaller venues. You can really connect with the crowd. The only problem is, it’s very hard to make a good living.”
Live Music Society, which began handing out grants in 2020, hopes to continue growing the number of venues that receive funding through the Music In Action grant, with the amount of funds reflecting the need. With the 2024 Music In Action grant and its annual Toolbox grant, the foundation has now disbursed $3.7 million in funding to small venues.
To further its mission to recognize and protect small venues and listening rooms across the United States, Live Music Society is also looking to help venues by developing and sharing best practices. In partnership with its venue grantees and involvement with organizations like the National Independent Venue Association (NIVA) — Live Music Society will host a panel at this year’s NIVA conference in June — the foundation plans to collect expertise that it can share with small venues to help them succeed in a tough live music economy.
“One of the goals of gathering in New Orleans [for NIVA ‘24] is to help create an informal network of companies and club owners because they aren’t really competing with each other. They are in different markets,” Muller says. “If one of them finds a great musician, sharing it with a different club is helpful to both. The more you interact, the more you create community.”
Full list of 2024 Music In Action grantees:
118 North – Wayne, PAB Side Lounge – Cleveland Heights, OHBlue Jay Listening Room – Jacksonville Beach, FLBossa Bistro – Washington, D.C.Chris’ Jazz Cafe – Philadelphia, PACole’s Bar – Chicago, ILDevil’s Backbone Tavern – Fischer, TXDrkmttr Collective – Nashville, TNFogartyville Community Media and Arts Center – Sarasota, FLGrand Annex Music Hall – San Pedro, CAJilly’s Music Room – Akron, OHLa Peña Cultural Center – Berkeley, CAMaple Leaf Bar – New Orleans, LAMOTR Pub – Cincinnati, OHNocturne Jazz & Supper Club – Denver, COOne Longfellow Square – Portland, MERebel Rebel Studio & Lounge – Berea, KYRoots Music Project – Boulder, COThe Acorn Center for the Performing Arts – Three Oaks, MIThe Jalopy Theatre – Brooklyn, NYThe Lost Church – San Francisco, CAThe Parlor Room – Northampton, MAThe Royal Room – Seattle, WAThe Spot on Kirk – Roanoke, VA
Universal Music Group (UMG) and CEO Lucian Grainge have been dismissed from a lawsuit claiming they “aided and abetted” Sean “Diddy” Combs in his alleged sexual abuse — a move that came after the lawyer who filed the case admitted there had been “no legal basis for the claims.”
The sudden reversal came two months after attorneys for the music giant argued that the accusations were so “offensively false” that they planned to take the unusual step of seeking legal penalties directly against the accuser’s lawyer, Tyrone Blackburn, over his decision to name them in the lawsuit.
In a sworn declaration filed in court Monday (May 13), Blackburn said that after reading UMG’s objections, he had “concluded that there is no legal basis for the claims and allegations that were made against the UMG defendants.” He asked that they be dismissed immediately and “with prejudice” — meaning he cannot refile them later.
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In his own court filing on Tuesday, UMG’s lead attorney, Donald Zakarin, agreed that the accusations against his clients should be dropped. But he once again sharply criticized Blackburn for bringing those claims in the first place.
“As we have repeatedly said from our very first communication with counsel for the plaintiff on March 4, 2024, there was no basis, not legal and not factual, for the claims and accusations that were alleged,” Zakarin wrote. “The UMG defendants should never have been named in any of these complaints and we should never have been required to make motions to dismiss the complaints in this action.”
When reached for comment by Billboard, Blackburn declined to answer specific questions about what had led him to drop the case: “I would strongly advise you not to reach out to me for any comment on any case that I have. I have no respect for you as a journalist. You are a mouth piece for [Combs’ attorney] Shawn Holley, and UMG. You should reach out to them for comment.”
Filed in late February, the lawsuit against Diddy claims that he sexually assaulted and harassed a producer named Rodney “Lil Rod” Jones while he was working as a producer on the rapper’s 2023 The Love Album. The lawsuit is one of several abuse cases filed against Combs over the past six months, in addition to an apparent federal criminal investigation. Combs has strongly denied all allegations of wrongdoing.
But the case filed by Jones went far beyond a simple sexual assault claim against Diddy. Naming Grainge, UMG and numerous others as defendants, the case alleged that they operated a sweeping conspiracy that violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act — the federal RICO statute that’s more often used in criminal cases against mobsters and drug cartels. He also accused the various defendants of violating federal sex trafficking laws.
In a scathing response to those allegations in March, attorneys for UMG and Grainge said that those claims were “entirely invented by Mr. Blackburn.”
“The [complaint] hurls accusations of criminal racketeering and criminal sex trafficking against the UMG defendants, respected individuals and companies having utterly nothing to do with plaintiff’s claims,” Zakarin wrote at the time. “These accusations are recklessly false and, but for the fact that they are embodied in a complaint, would be libelous.”
In addition to seeking to have the claims dismissed, UMG’s lawyers also took aim directly at Blackburn. They accused him of filing “knowingly false allegations” and said they would ask the judge to punish him for doing so.
“A license to practice law is a privilege,” Zakarin wrote at the time. “Mr. Blackburn, plaintiff’s lawyer, has misused that license to self-promote, gratuitously, falsely and recklessly accusing the UMG defendants of criminal behavior.”
Earth, Wind & Fire has reached a settlement with a tribute act that used the R&B group’s name without permission, avoiding a looming trial over how much the unauthorized group would have to pay in damages.
The settlement, filed in court on Tuesday (May 14), came two months after a judge ruled that the tribute group had infringed Earth, Wind & Fire’s trademark rights by calling themselves “Earth, Wind & Fire Legacy Reunion” — a name the judge called “deceptive and misleading.”
Following that ruling, a trial had been scheduled for later this month over how much Legacy Reunion would be required to pay in damages. But in a joint filing this week, attorneys for both sides said those proceedings would no longer be necessary.
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“The parties have reached a settlement in principle related to the damages issues that remain to be tried before the court in the referenced action,” the lawyers wrote. “The parties are in the process of preparing documents that reflect their agreement on the damages issues and that should fully dispose of the damages issues that remained unresolved in this action.”
The terms of the agreement, including how much Legacy Reunion will pay to Earth Wind & Fire, were not disclosed in court filings. Neither side immediately returned requests for comment.
Earth, Wind & Fire has continued to tour since founder Maurice White died in 2016, led by longtime members Philip Bailey, Ralph Johnson and White’s brother, Verdine White. The band operates under a license from an entity called Earth Wind & Fire IP, a holding company controlled by Maurice White’s sons that formally owns the rights to the name.
Last year, that company filed the current lawsuit, accusing Legacy Reunion of trying to trick consumers into thinking it was the real Earth, Wind & Fire. Though it called itself a “Reunion,” the lawsuit said the tribute band contained only a few “side musicians” who had briefly played with Earth, Wind & Fire many years ago.
“Defendants did this to benefit from the commercial magnetism and immense goodwill the public has for plaintiff’s ‘Earth, Wind & Fire’ marks and logos, thereby misleading consumers and selling more tickets at higher prices,” the group’s lawyers wrote at the time.
Tribute acts — groups that exclusively cover the music of a particular band — are legally allowed to operate, and they often adopt names that allude to the original. But they must make clear that they are only a tribute band, and they can get into legal hot water if they make it appear that they are affiliated with or endorsed by the original.
Ruling on the case last month, Judge Federico A. Moreno said the evidence pointed “overwhelmingly” in the band’s favor. In particular, the judge cited angry social media posts and emails from fans who attended the “Reunion” shows because they thought it was the original band — proof of the kind of “actual confusion” that’s crucial evidence in a trademark lawsuit.
“It is not a far cry to think that an average consumer looking for an Earth, Wind & Fire concert would believe that they could acquire that experience from either plaintiff or defendants,” the judge wrote.