Business
Page: 320
If it’s Friday that means another spin around the Executive Turntable, Billboard’s comprehensive(ish) compendium of promotions, hirings, exits and firings — and all things in between — across the music industry.
Hard 8 Working Group is now live in La La Land. The Nashville-based music management company promoted Aimee Beren to lead its brand-new Los Angeles office, alongside artist manager Michael Duda. With an office in New York as well, H8WG can now boast of bi-coastal bonafides as it continues to build a client roster that includes hardcore elder statesmen Jawbreaker, hard edged Daughtry and alt-rockers All Time Low, All-American Rejects and Boys Like Girls, among others. The company also recently launched a record label with Big Machine. Both Beren and Duda came most recently from Prodigy Artists Management, where Beren was vp of operations and Duda managed artists. Beren got her start at Three Six Zero, where she worked with deadmau5, R3HAB and others. “Aimee has been an absolute stellar part of the H8WG team which alone more than qualified her for this job, but being from LA and having the desire to move back there just made this work out perfectly for all of us,” said Dirk Hemsath, H8WG co-CEO and co-founder.
Atlantic Records promoted Bianca Ortega to vice president of marketing and digital, effective immediately. Based in LA, Bianca recently celebrated 10 years at Atlantic, where she has worked on key projects including Charlie Puth, BRELAND, Oliver Tree, Barbie The Album and more. Following an internship there, Ortega officially joined the label in September 2013 working supporting roles in marketing and video production before rising the ranks — most recently as senior director of marketing and digital. Ortega reports directly to Brian Dackowski, executive vp of viral marketing & analytics.
Warner Music Nashville executive vp of artist development Shane Tarleton announced his departure from the label, concluding a 13-year run. He plans to unveil his next move in early 2024. Tarleton got his start in music in 1998 in the creative department of RCA Records, where he worked under the wing of vp of creative services Mary Hamilton. After leaving RCA in 2004, he dabbled in writing, artist management and event production before joining WMN in 2010, eventually rising to overseeing marketing, brand sponsorships, digital interactive and creative services for the label.
Dinesh Ratnam has been appointed managing director of Warner Music Malaysia, where he will oversee the company’s operations out of Kuala Lumpur, and will report to Warner Music Asia co-presidents Chris Gobalakrishna and Jonathan Serbin. He joins WMG from VOD streaming service iQiyi, where he served as senior director in the international business department and was country manager for Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei. Before that, he held key roles at iflix, another prominent VOD service in the region, and tech company the Catcha Group. The WMM roster of local talent includes Adam Lee, Masdo, Janna Nick and Bunga, among others. “With its vibrant diversity and immense talent, the Malaysian music scene serves as a vital hub for cultural exchange and artistic expression,” said Gobalakrishna. “Dinesh’s appointment signifies our dedication to nurturing this thriving ecosystem.”
BrickHouse Entertainment CEO and founder Scott Brickell and SMP Consulting leader Ron Smith have entered a joint partnership, with SMP Consulting operating cohesively under the BrickHouse Entertainment name. Brickell and Smith, along with Chase Swayze, are managing partners in the company, while Kim Davis has been promoted to chief operating officer. Also rounding out the organization are Caleb Gauntt and Jared Johnson. The combined artist roster includes hit CCM group MercyMe (whose “To Not Worship You” is currently in its fifth week atop the Billboard Christian Airplay chart) as well as CAIN, Micah Tyler, Caleb & John, Iveth Luna, Micah Christopher, Christian Paul and Bay Turner. –Jessica Nicholson
Neil Jacobson’s writer-producer management company Hallwood Media promoted Quinn McGinley to general manager of its recording division. In the new role, Chavez will focus on day-to-day operations of Hallwood Recordings, including publishing, distribution and (of course) recordings. McGinley joined Hallwood in October 2020 and was most recently a project coordinator. Jacobson, formerly president of Geffen, described McGinley’s musical instincts “unparalleled” and said his “incredible charm and kindness have won the hearts of everyone he encounters.”
Indie booking agency Sound Talent Group added Steve Kaul as an agent out of its newly established Nashville office. Kaul is a veteran of APA and CAA and brings along a roster of clients including Built to Spill, Vanessa Carlton and Citizen Cope, among others. LA-based STG opened its new Music City outpost in the Berry Hill nabe, with agents Beth Keith, Jonathan Wilson, Kaul and four others. STG co-founder Tim Borror calls Kaul ” one of my favorite people in the business” with “incredible success over the years. We’ve wanted him to be part of what we are doing from the beginning.”
ICYMI: Warner Music Group announced former Google executive Carletta Higginson as its new chief digital officer, replacing outgoing CDO Oana Ruxandra … and Francisco Granados was named svp of A&R at Warner Music Latina.
Venue management company ASM Global elevated Will Beekman to vice president of theater operations and content development. In addition to his current duties as booking director for ASM’s arenas in the Northeast, Beekman will now also be tasked with overseeing the day-to-day operations of the firm’s theater division, with focuses on branding, bookings and wider event planning. Beekman’s previous experience includes a 10-year tour as executive director at the F.M. Kirby Center for the Performing Arts.
Jess Partridge is the new executive director of the European Music Manager Alliance, or EMMA. She’ll spearhead policy, advocacy, partnerships and day-to-day management of the advocacy organization, which represents over 2,000 music managers across Europe and another 600 worldwide. “Managers and artists are at the heart of this industry and advocating for them, means advocating for a better music ecosystem for all,” said Partridge, who previously had a major part in launching PRS Foundation’s Keychange initiative for gender equality and is founder of the In Stereo music platform. You can reach Partridge at jess@emma.community.
Warner Chappell-backed publishing company Jody Williams Songs promoted Tenasie Courtright to creative manager. The Belmont grad joined the company in December and worked under senior director of creative Nina Jenkins on a roster that includes Vince Gill, Ashley McBride, Driver Williams and Jason Nix, among others. Reach Courtright at tenasie@jodywilliamssongs.co.
Last Week’s Turntable: WMG Flips the Script in Finland
Mariah The Scientist is the newest signee to Epic Records. The singer/songwriter joins a roster that boasts Future, Travis Scott, 21 Savage, Giveon and more. To celebrate, the singer released her newest single, “From a Woman,” released early Friday morning (Oct. 13). “I was reluctant to signing any new deal, “Mariah tells Billboard. “But I was […]
BMI has released its annual report for its fiscal year and, for the first time ever, it hardly contains any financial information.
Such information as how much it collected or distributed in the recently completed year is not revealed in the annual report, even though BMI has historically revealed detailed financial information every year. The report also doesn’t show how much collection and distribution amounts changed from the prior year’s $1.573 billion and $1.471 billion, respectively.
The only information indicating BMI’s financial performance in the year is an observation by BMI president and CEO Mike O’Neill that “every distribution we issued in our last fiscal year was higher than the corresponding one from the previous year.” No further specifics were provided.
The only numbers in the entire annual report that give any indication of how much activity BMI tracked in the year was a note that the performance rights organization processed 2.61 trillion performances, while its membership grew 7% to 1.4 million affiliates, and that it licenses and collects on behalf of 22.4 million works. Dollar amounts only appear once in the 24-page report, when O’Neill states in the opening note that BMI’s November distribution is forecast to be $400 million — which he labeled another record “that would make BMI the first ever PRO to ever distribute this high an amount in a single quarter.” The November quarter is in its current fiscal year, and not a part of the completed year covered in the annual report.
Last October, BMI announced it was switching from a not-for-profit model to a for-profit one. Now, in an opening note to this latest report, O’Neill disclosed the organization’s goal is to distribute 85% of the licensing revenue it collects to songwriters and publishers. The other 15% of collections, he wrote, will cover overhead and allow BMI to achieve a modest profit margin, noting that expenses typically comprise about 10% of revenue. In recent years, BMI’s distribution has been about $90% of revenue.
If BMI creates new M&A opportunities, however, or enters new businesses or offers expanded services, O’Neill said that BMI “will look to take a higher margin on any revenue generated, though always with the goal of sharing that new growth with our affiliates.” In other words, for those business, BMI may not limit itself to a 5% profit margin.
O’Neill also noted that “if BMI decides to seek outside capital or borrow money to invest in new services and opportunities, any repayments will come out of our retained profits and not distributions.”
In the current fiscal year, O’Neill reported that under the new business model BMI’s February distribution was its largest ever, up 6% over the previous year. That was then surpassed by the May distribution, which was up 15% over the corresponding year-earlier period. O’Neill predicted that the next two distributions for the remaining calendar year will follow that trend. For the full calendar year, distributions are projected to be 11% above calendar 2023, the report noted.
Going forward, O’Neill said BMI will announce percentage increases, but apparently will continue to withhold all other financial information.
Seemingly responding to immense pressure from the songwriter community and music publishers who have publicly expressed their unhappiness about BMI’s switch to profitability and its evasion of the many questions they asked, after disclosing the 85% distribution goal, O’Neill’s opening note repeats many of the thoughts he has already shared through open letters on the issue. “We changed our business model last year to invest in our company and position BMI for continued success in our rapidly evolving industry,” he wrote. “Our mission remains the same, to serve our songwriters, composers and publishers and continue to grow our overall distributions as BMI has done each year that I have been CEO. In order to continue this trajectory, we need to think more commercially, explore new sources of revenue and invest in our platforms to improve the quality of service we provide to you. I’m pleased to say that we have already made great progress on delivering these goals.”
He also reiterated that BMI changed its business model to better position the company for success in a rapidly evolving industry. “Our mission remains the same, to serve our songwriters, composers and publishers and continue to grow our overall distributions as BMI has done each year that I have been CEO,” O’Neill wrote. “In order to continue this trajectory, we need to think more commercially, explore new sources of revenue and invest in our platforms to improve the quality of service we provide to you.”
While BMI can accomplish its plans and goals on its own, O’Neill wrote, “We also recognize the opportunity to substantially accelerate our growth by partnering with a like-minded, growth-oriented investor with a successful history of building businesses. Of course, that partner would need to share our vision that driving value for our affiliates goes hand-in-hand with growing our business and building a stronger BMI.”
As Billboard previously reported, BMI is in an exclusive period with New Mountain Capital in a deal to sell the PRO — which is currently owned by radio and television broadcasters — at a $1.7 billion valuation. The valuation, however, sources say, is under downward pressure as negotiations continue.
While stating nothing has yet been signed, O’Neill wrote that the for-profit business model and the strategy outlined “will hold true for BMI whether or not we move forward with a sale.” In other words, BMI will continue to be a for-profit business, regardless of whether it sells or not.
When music attorney Don Passman was starting his career five decades ago, he talked his first client out of signing a 15-year contract that would have paid her manager half her earnings. Today, that same artist could get the same career-saving advice from Passman’s revered guide, All You Need to Know About the Music Business, for just $35 retail.
A partner at Los Angeles-based Gang, Tyre, Ramer, Brown & Passman, Inc., Passman is hesitant to discuss his high-wattage clients — he is said to represent Taylor Swift and Adele, among others — but is always eager to share the lessons he has learned from five decades of representing them. The 11th edition of All You Need to Know About the Music Business, to be released by Simon & Schuster on Oct. 24, arrives at a critical time for many musicians. Increasingly, artists are deciding to remain independent and use the high-powered tools at their disposal — everything from recording applications to digital distribution to social media apps like TikTok — to build a fan base. Both opportunity and the ability to make poor decisions have never been greater.
To Passman — who doesn’t take major record labels as clients, although his firm “occasionally” represents an independent label, he says — the proliferation of do-it-yourself marketing tools has brought equity to a business long marred by power imbalances. Unlike the early years in Passman’s career, when record labels, retailers and radio stations acted as powerful gatekeepers, today’s artists go directly to fans using digital distributors and powerful tools such as TikTok and YouTube. With such low barriers to entry, more than 100,000 tracks are uploaded to digital service providers every day. Being a professional musician is easy. Being a successful professional musician is far more difficult.
“Now the game has become [about] how do you break through the noise?” says Passman in a recent Zoom call. “The record labels have made a conscious decision to wait and see what artists can get traction on their own. And then when they get enough heat, the record company starts to chase them.”
As the tools of the trade have changed, so too has the path to success. With the exception of K-pop labels, companies rarely pluck unknown artists from obscurity and spend years developing their careers. Artists are expected to build their own careers and develop enough momentum to warrant a record label’s commitment. That often requires building a team — manager, agent, attorney and an army of consultants — and taking more of a CEO role. For a generation of aspiring artists, Passman’s advice has never been more important.
This interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.
In the new version of All You Need to Know About the Music Business, you write that the music business has become far more democratic since the last edition of your book. What do you mean by that?
Now it’s about how you connect with your fans. I have a section that I’ve expanded this time about how to go about doing that. Whether you want to do it yourself completely, or whether you want to go to a label, you’ve got to start a buzz on your own and you’ve got to make things happen. The companies get the same data, they’re all chasing the same artists and you’re getting bidding wars. And artists are able to get deals that in history they could have never gotten for their first record deal.
The downside is that you get people who have a billion streams but have never played in front of a live audience. I’m exaggerating, but they don’t have years on the road of developing their chops and don’t have a show. Maybe they’ve only got a few songs. If you look at the statistics from Billboard, there are less new artists in the top 100 over the last few years. It’s been declining. And there’s a concern that we’re in we’re in the hip-building business rather than the career-building business and no one’s quite sure why or what to do about it other than feed the short attention span and the virality of some of these things. But it’s challenging in that sense to build a long-term career.
From where you sit as an attorney, are things working out for these artists that have some do-it-yourself success and then get signed? How’s that next step going for them?
The reality is I don’t do a lot of those kinds of deals, just because we’re a small firm and I don’t take a lot of business. And so, I don’t take as many shots with brand new artists. I do here and there, but not a lot.
It also depends on the smartness of your manager and the innate talent of the artists to follow it up. But the ones that are real artists, and the ones that are well managed, can launch a good career off of it. The ones that are one-shot wonders don’t do so well. They can’t follow it up. I don’t know what the statistics are on the ones that get these massive deals, but I’m going to guess there’s a pretty good rate of failure beyond the first record.
But the companies have gotten more sophisticated. They’re not just looking for something that’s got hundreds of millions of streams. They’re also looking for fan engagement. They’re looking to see whether there’s a real connection with the artists because today it’s all about connecting with fans. And the artists that do that well and maintain it and build their connections and their image and their buzz, are going to have much healthier careers than the ones who just happen to catch a moment.
The front of the new edition of your book says artists have more power than ever in the history of the business. Where’s that power coming from?
From what we’ve discussed about how the labels are chasing people who already have a buzz. What happens is that two or three labels start to chase the same artist and if the artist is trending upward during the fox hunt, the numbers get bigger and bigger, and the labels are bidding against each other out of FOMO. And so, the artists now have a lot of power to demand things that they’ve never gotten before in history, like a share of the profits, like ownership of their masters that revert after a period of time. It used to be that you had had to be massive to get those things, but not anymore.
What about artists who are already established? Do they have more power? Is there a ceiling to how powerful a Taylor Swift or somebody can be in her negotiations?
Well, there’s a ceiling. But the ceiling in any negotiation is just simply the pain tolerance of the other side. My personal philosophy is that you there’s such a thing as making too good a deal — if you leave the other side so battered that they have no incentive to do anything, in particular with the artist if something goes wrong, because they just can’t make enough of a return on it. I think there’s such a thing as going over the line. Now, I’m happy to go up to the line and maybe an inch or two over. In fact, I’m probably not doing my job if I don’t. But when you get to the massive superstars, you get to figure out where the lines are, and you get to do something that’s never been done before. And that, to me, is the most fun part of the business.
The 360-degree multi-rights contract was dominant for a time. Artists pushed back. They didn’t want to share other revenue streams other than recorded music. And is that still a starting point for contracts is the 360 and then you carve out exceptions?
Yes, and yes. Most of all, labels will ask for something. If there’s any kind of bidding war, it goes away pretty quickly. A few labels are stubborn and think they’re entitled to it no matter what. But most labels, if there’s any kind of bidding, it’ll go away. Or at worst, it gets reduced radically to relatively small amounts.
So that’s a sign of artists having more power is getting better terms in these recording contracts.
Correct.
What things still exist in recording contracts that have had a bad reputation? I’m thinking of reserves for returns or control composition clauses or ways that labels would keep a little money for themselves at the expense of artists. Do these things still exist?
They do but they’re becoming much less relevant. Certainly, the returns reserve if the item is physical goods still applies. Although vinyl is surging, it’s still less than 10% of the business. So, it applies to that. And the same thing with the control composition clause. It doesn’t really apply to digital. It only applies to physical product in any relatively recent deals. And so, it’s become less relevant and easier for the artists to get better terms on it.
What would you like to completely rid from contracts?
The contracts have gotten reasonably artist-friendly over time. I mean, obviously, they’re still going to want to take an edge and a corner. I will tell you that re-recording restrictions have gotten tougher in recent years for reasons you can probably figure out. And those used to be much broader than they are now.
What’s a typical restriction?
They don’t want you to duplicate your recordings — like ever — and then they will limit the other types of recordings you can do. So, it’s gotten tougher as the labels get more concerned about artists re-recording or catalogs.
There’s a lot of concern about artificial intelligence these days — about properly harnessing the technology, concerns about getting paid, concerns about unauthorized use of artists, voice or songwriters’ compositions from a legal perspective. How challenging is this new generation of AI technologies?
We’re not going to put AI back in the bottle. It’s here. The real problem with AI, apart from the fact that artists may not like it, is that it can dilute the money that’s paid out to real artists. If I got 1,000 plays, and there’s 10,000 in a month, I’m gonna get 10% of the money, right? The problem is that if part of those plays are AI, and the streamer isn’t paying anybody, because there’s no copyright in AI, and there’s no ability to get paid for it, then they’re taking a chunk of money that’s not going out to the real artists. So, the challenge is to make sure that they can’t use AI to dilute what’s going to the record companies and artists. And obviously, the companies are all over this and I think will be successful if they aren’t already — it’s not public — in making sure that doesn’t happen. But that’s a major concern coming out of AI that we need to be careful about.
But there’s also potential, too. I can imagine estates using AI to bring to life deceased artists.
Yes, of course, all of those things are possible. Interestingly, there’s no copyright in AI. So, if you use it to create something, it may be that anything you create, anybody else can use for free, and you can’t necessarily get paid for it. So, I do think AI has a place in helping artists and helping enhance materials and so forth, but the law gets a little tricky because you can only get a copyright on what’s created by a human is pretty well settled. And so, the part created by the AI doesn’t have a copyright, so you don’t end up owning 100% of your material.
If something is created with AI, would part of that be copyrighted and then some portion would not, based on whatever the AI created?
Yes, that’s correct.
And then how is the split determined?
It depends on how much creativity the human put into it. If I go to an AI machine, and I say, “Write spa music,” and it knocks out a bunch of spa-sounding music, I haven’t done anything creative. I’ve just said, “Go make spa music”. If, on the other hand, I say, “Draw a picture of Kim Jong Un and Abraham Lincoln in a wrestling match on a roof in Mumbai,” maybe I’ve got enough creativity to get something of the copyright — but not in the drawing.
There’s a recent case with the Copyright Office about Zarya of the Dawn, where the author wrote a story and then had AI create the pictures for a graphic novel. The copyright office said there’s no copyright in the individual images. There is [copyright] on the story. But there’s interestingly what’s called a compilation copyright in the novel, meaning the way you arrange the pictures. The law in copyright says if I arrange un-copyrighted material in a particular way, I can get a copyright in the arrangement even though the underlying materials aren’t copyrighted, like a phone book, for example, the names aren’t copyrightable, but you can get a copyright in the way they’re arranged in the phonebook. And so that same principle applies here when you’ve got a number of copyrightable drawings in a particular way. But anybody could copy one of the drawings separately.
In your book, you give artists some advice: “All the superstars I’ve known have a clear vision of who they are and what their music is.” But there are also countless stories of artists, perhaps with clear visions, running into record labels’ A&R teams and sometimes that vision changes. What separates the superstar artists that you’ve known from the artists that didn’t reach that status?
I think the simple answer is their drive and their passion. The superstars have an unlimited amount of drive and are willing to walk through walls and they don’t get discouraged, and they keep getting up when they get knocked down and they just keep going. I think that’s what separates them. I think it could arguably be more important than talent. I mean, you and I could both name some moderately talented superstars just as we can name amazingly talented people who’ve never had much of a career. And the difference, I think, is their drive and their ability to want to do the work. It’s just a lot of work to have to have a serious career in any field really, but particularly in entertainment when you there’s no set path to get on. You just have to do it yourself.
Are the superstars equally demanding of their attorneys? Do they have high expectations for you as well?
I hope so. You know, it depends on the artist, and it depends on the situation. A lot of them are not that interested in business, or they may be interested but they want to spend their time being creative, which is a smart decision. So, they have people around them. But I think they deserve the utmost time and attention.
Your book details quite well how the music business can get really complicated and have a lot of pitfalls. What are some mistakes you see artists and their attorneys still making that they shouldn’t?
Well, in the early stages, the biggest mistakes artists make are signing long-term deals and not having any kind of an out if things aren’t working and they can get hung up with a manager that can really impact your career. They can get hung up on a record deal that’s not very good or a publishing deal that’s not very good, and no ability to ever get out of it. I think those are the things to watch for in the beginning.
That recalls your first client. I believe a manager was trying to get 50% out of your first entertainment client?
Yeah, for 15 years.
So, there would have been an out at some point, but 15 years is a long time.
Yeah, it was a completely stupid deal, but I was so young I was scared to death. But I did talk her out of it.
Artists and songwriters can sell their catalogs for pretty large sums these days. It seems to me that those deals haven’t changed the balance of power much because they go to artists who are already the most successful. Would you agree or disagree with that?
Catalog sales are happening at every level; the ones who get the headlines are the most successful. At almost every level somebody is selling their catalogs. I’ll give you my philosophy on it: For most people, I think it’s a mistake, and I try to talk them out of it. And I can give you the reasons if you’re interested. There’s a section in the book on this as well.
Yes, please do.
Historically, everybody who sold their catalog has regretted it. The Beatles catalog sold a Michael Jackson for $47 million; it’s probably worth $1 billion today. There’s people over the years who have sold their royalty stream and with the changes in technology, they now make almost as much every year it would have made them as what they sold it for, or at least two or three years’ worth. And the other exercise is a pretty simple one: Take the money that you get from the sale, deduct your expenses of selling, pay your taxes, and when you look at what’s leftover can you invest it and get the same amount of money you were getting before? And do you have the same upside potential your catalogue has? A lot of time the answer is no. And prices are definitely at a historic high. I’ve never seen them this high.
On the other hand, these are pretty smart financial people on the other side, and they’re betting that the market is going to grow and subscription prices will go up and there’ll be more people subscribing as an industry matures, and they think that the income is going to go up.
So, now having said all that, I do think it makes sense in the following circumstance: If you’re an older artist, if your heirs don’t know how to handle your catalog, or will kill each other trying to handle it, it could make sense to sell it. It could also make sense if you don’t have enough cash to pay estate tax on the value of your catalog when it comes around, and they have to do a fire sale, and you’re worried about that for your heirs. Or if you desperately need money at any level. I think it should be one of the last assets to go. It’s a place to get money, but you could also borrow against it to some degree depending on what you’re looking to do. I’ve obviously done a number of these because not everybody agrees with me and a lot of them are in the circumstances I’ve described. But for the most part, and certainly for younger artists, I think it’s something to be very careful about
How often are you able to dissuade people of selling? Do you make a convincing argument?
I have a pretty good track record of it, yeah. By the way, it’s not in my personal interest. I’d love to get it large fee for selling a catalog, but I always try and do what’s best for the artists.
A bipartisan group of U.S. senators released draft legislation Thursday (Oct. 12) aimed at protecting musical artists and others from artificial intelligence-generated deepfakes and other replicas of their likeness, like this year’s infamous “Fake Drake” song.
The draft bill – labelled the “Nurture Originals, Foster Art, and Keep Entertainment Safe Act, or 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.
In announcing the bill, Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) specifically cited the April release of “Heart On My Sleeve,” an unauthorized song that featured AI-generated fake vocals from Drake and The Weeknd.
“Generative AI has opened doors to exciting new artistic possibilities, but it also presents unique challenges that make it easier than ever to use someone’s voice, image, or likeness without their consent,” Coons said in a statement. “Creators around the nation are calling on Congress to lay out clear policies regulating the use and impact of generative AI.”
The draft bill quickly drew applause from music industry groups. The RIAA said it would push for a final version that “effectively protects against this illegal and immoral misappropriation of fundamental rights that protect human achievement.”
“Our industry has long embraced technology and innovation, including AI, but many of the recent generative AI models infringe on rights — essentially instruments of theft rather than constructive tools aiding human creativity,” the group wrote in the statement.
The American Association of Independent Music offered similar praise: “Independent record labels and the artists they work with are excited about the promise of AI to transform how music is made and how consumers enjoy art, but there must be guardrails to ensure that artists can make a living and that labels can recoup their investments.” The group said it would push to make sure that the final bill’s provisions were “accessible to small labels and working-class musicians, not just the megastars.”
A person’s name and likeness — including their distinctive voice — are already protected in most states by the so-called right of publicity, which allows control how your individual identity is commercially exploited by others. But those rights are currently governed by a patchwork of state statutes and common law systems.
The NO FAKES Act would create a nationwide property right in your image, voice, or visual likeness, allowing an individual to sue anyone the produced a “newly-created, computer-generated, electronic representation” of it. Unlike many state-law systems, that right would not expire at death and could be controlled by a person’s heirs for 70 years after their passing.
A tricky balancing act for any publicity rights legislation is the First Amendment and its protections for free speech. In Thursday’s announcementthe NO FAKES Act’s authors said the bill would include specific carveouts for replicas used in news coverage, parody, historical works or criticism.
“Congress must strike the right balance to defend individual rights, abide by the First Amendment, and foster AI innovation and creativity,” Coons said.
The draft was co-authored by Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), and Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.).
Dominican rapper and dembow star El Alfa has signed a multi-million deal in the eight figures with music industry finance firm Sound Royalties.
After evaluating El Alfa’s revenue streams, Sound Royalties will advance El Alfa the sum of money ahead of his upcoming tour and album, El Rey Del Dembow — set for release Oct. 19 on his own El Jefe Records. The advance contemplates the full range of El Alfa’s income, including his catalog, his upcoming recordings, his streaming numbers and his tour income.
“I’ve been speaking with Sound Royalties for years, and the time finally made sense for us to work together. The best advice I ever received was from [Sound Royalties CEO/founder] Alex Heiche and his team, telling me to register and organize my royalty streams and that whatever I do – don’t sell,” El Alfa said in a statement. “It was because I didn’t sell that I am now able to leverage my back catalog to invest in my future. This multi-million-dollar funding will be instrumental in continuing to build my legacy and cement my influence in the Latin music space.”
Explore
See latest videos, charts and news
See latest videos, charts and news
Founded in 2014, Sound Royalties specializes in royalty financing for music creatives, independent labels, publishers and distributors. The company is a subsidiary of GoDigital Media Group, the company founded by Jason Peterson that also includes indie label and distributor Cinq Music Group and social media rights manager AdShare.
Sound Royalties’ business model isn’t predicated on projections of revenue, but rather, based on what an artist already has generated. The company gives creatives an advance and sets a set fee to be paid back in addition to the original advance. That set fee, says Heiche, does not change.
“There is no penalty and we don’t take copyright or ownership,” he says. “At first it [some thought it] was too good to be true, and now they realize it is true. It is a good model.”
Currently, the company works with music creatives in 16 countries across all genres, and has partnered or worked with artists like Pitbull, Alejandra Guzman and DJ Khaled.
In El Alfa’s case, Sound Royalties is financing what Heiche describes as “existing income streams. It’s not a projection. It’s what he’s already doing. We did an analysis of what his revenue streams are generating and they’re very impressive. His numbers justify the advance we’re giving him.”
“Alfa has carved out a legacy of his own in the Latin music community, pioneering his own style of Dembow music[…] It’s an honor to be the financial partner that he has chosen to fund his continued growth for years to come.”
Five months after an Instagram account first accused New York City radio host DJ Envy of being complicit in a multi-million dollar real estate investment scam in New Jersey, the situation has turned into a sprawling web of lawsuits, countersuits, bankruptcies and media coverage.
Explore
Explore
See latest videos, charts and news
See latest videos, charts and news
In at least 20 civil cases filed in recent months, dozens of investors claim that Cesar Pina and wife Jennifer Pina, New Jersey developers with famous friends, ripped them off — either through failed house flipping, a stalled apartment development project, or a startup they said would empower small investments in real estate.
Many of those lawsuits, including one filed by music industry veteran Anthony Martini, name DJ Envy (RaaShaun Casey) as a co-defendant, citing close ties to Pina. They claim Envy helped to promote the alleged schemers, including through appearances on The Breakfast Club, his nationally-syndicated hip hop radio show. One case says Envy “aided and abetted” the fraudsters by “using his public likeness as a well-known radio disc jockey to promote their real estate scheme.”
Firing back, Envy says those kinds of allegations are not only false — he says he himself is also a victim of Pina’s alleged scheme — but also defamatory. He’s suing the social media influencer who first publicized the allegations, claiming he “spewed” lies to promote his own real estate business, and he’s demanding to be dismissed from the investor lawsuits.
“They’re sensationalizing this situation,” said Envy’s lawyer, Massimo F. D’Angelo of the law firm Blank Rome, in a phone interview with Billboard. “Envy had no involvement whatsoever. The only reason he’s being dragged into this is because he’s a public figure.”
How did we get here? What exactly are the accusations? And what comes next? Here’s everything you need to know about the growing scandal.
Who is Cesar Pina?
Pina has long pitched himself a real estate guru, frequently posting about his work to a star-studded Instagram page featuring shots of Pina with Snoop Dogg, 50 Cent, Post Malone and Meek Mill. On his website, he says he’s been rehabbing and flipping homes in the Garden State for over a decade; he claims to own 1,100 rental properties in Paterson, N.J., alone.
One of the celebs frequently pictured with Pina was DJ Envy, who for more than a decade has co-hosted The Breakfast Club, a popular hip hop-focused radio talk show on New York’s Power 105.1. And the two had a close public relationship beyond social media: Over the years, Pina has repeatedly appeared on the show as a guest, and he and Envy co-hosted a series of seminars on real estate investing from 2018 onward.
As recently as June 2022, Pina made an appearance on The Breakfast Club to plug an investment platform he was launching called Flip 2 Dao, which would allow users to make small, fractional investments in real estate projects. Throughout the interview, Envy repeatedly touted his relationship with the developer and the value of the new investment tool.
“People always ask, how can I invest with you guys? And we never take anybody’s money,” Envy told listeners. “Now there will be a way where people can actually invest to be a part owner on some of the projects that we actually buy.”
What are the accusations?
Back in May, an Instagram account called TonyTheCloser (real name Tony Robinson) began making serious allegations of wrongdoing against Pina. In a series of videos and live streams, Robinson claimed that Pina had used his celebrity status to defraud numerous people, taking their money to invest in flipping properties with the promise of big profits, but ultimately returning little or nothing.
He also claimed that Envy had played a key role in the fraud by promoting Pina to his listeners. At various times, Robinson called the radio host a “thief,” “criminal,” and “scammer,” claiming he had “stolen millions” from investors and aided a “Ponzi scheme” — an infamous form of fraud in which the perpetrator creates the façade of a real business by paying earlier victims with funds from later victims.
Those social media allegations quickly turned into a wave of civil lawsuits filed in New Jersey state courts.
In a May complaint, a company called Amy Flips claimed it had provided Pena with $500,000 to invest in properties and lost all but $30,000. A month later, attorneys for a New York man named Trevor Roman alleged he was owed $280,000 by Pina and his companies, saying their client was “one of many who fell prey to these fraudulent and deceptive tactics.” In July, a New Jersey man named Paul Peralta claimed that he had given Pina $600,000 in four payments as part of a “Ponzi scheme and investment scam” — and he specifically claimed the scheme had been promoted by “a radio show called The Breakfast Club.”
Martini, the music executive, also filed his case in July. Joined by another spurned investor named Anthony Barone, their lawyers claimed they had lost $1.5 million after Pina duped them into investing in a massive, 50-unit apartment project in Paterson that was never completed, as well as another $300,000 that they invested in the Flip 2 Dao platform.
But they also went a step further, naming DJ Envy as an actual defendant in the lawsuit. They claimed the DJ had not only plugged Pina on the air, but that he had personally attended a pitch meeting with Barone, and that he had joined Pina in leading a guided tour for big-wig investors around his New Jersey properties. Martini and Barone’s lawyers also specifically cited Pina’s June 2022 appearance on The Breakfast Club, in which he plugged Flip 2 Dao.
“But for Casey’s role in lending legitimacy to the real estate investments and portraying himself as a partner to the Pinas, plaintiffs would not have invested their money,” wrote Sean Mack, an attorney at the law firm Pashman Stein Walder Hayden and lead counsel for Martini and Barone.
All told, Pina is currently facing 20 lawsuits, almost half of which have been filed just since the beginning of August; Envy is named as a defendant in nine of those cases. It’s unclear exactly how much money Pina is alleged to owe his investors, but in an August filing, Martini’s lawyers claimed that more than 30 victims had come forward seeking over $40 million.
Pina’s lawyer, Steven Griegel of the firm Roselli Griegel Lozier & Lazzaro, did not return a request for comment from Billboard. But in at least one case against his client, he has argued that Pina’s investor did get their initial investment back — and that by demanding the huge profits they say they were promised, they are actually the ones violating New Jersey law.
“The plaintiff in this case is boldly seeking the court’s assistance to recover [triple] damages and attorneys’ fees for loansharking, even after it has been paid amounts in excess of New Jersey’s criminal usurious laws,” Griegel wrote in one case. “Obviously, the court should not be a part of validating this.”
Despite TonyTheCloser’s claims, there have been no allegations of criminal wrongdoing against either Pina or Envy.
What has DJ Envy said?
Since immediately after the allegations first cropped up in May, DJ Envy has denied that he did anything wrong, including during an interview with TonyTheCloser on an Instagram livestream. He says that he was not directly involved with any of Pina’s deals mentioned in the lawsuits, that he never solicited money from anyone during their seminars, and that he was not aware of any fraudulent activity.
But that hasn’t quieted the growing scandal. On Tuesday, New York’s local NBC affiliate ran an investigative piece under the headline “Real estate rip-off? Radio DJ promoted alleged NJ scheme leaving investors out of millions.” The story included interviews with numerous alleged victims, including a couple who say they invested with Pina “after seeing him on social media with DJ Envy.”
“He’s advertising this all over radio and television, so I thought this was legit,” the victim said in the NBC report. “We invested $200,000 and it looks like we won’t ever get it back.”
On Wednesday, Envy directly addressed the allegations on The Breakfast Club: “Cesar, if he took money, I wasn’t privy to it, nor did I even know. But I do understand how people feel if they did give him money, because I gave him a lot of money [and] I didn’t see a dollar of return. But for anybody to say that I was involved, that’s totally not true.”
In legal filings, Envy’s lawyers have made similar arguments. They say the DJ was also “lured” to invest $500,000 in separate project, meaning he “may be a victim of the Pina’s alleged fraudulent conduct” just like the plaintiffs. And they say that he was not involved in any Pina’s deals with spurned investors, nor made any direct “representations” to anyone regarding those transactions.
“Plaintiffs’ real targets are clearly the Pinas given Mr. Casey’s lack of involvement,” wrote D’Angelo, in a filing on Friday aimed at getting Envy dismissed from Martini’s case. “In an attempt to sensationalize this case, however, plaintiffs included Mr. Casey … as a defendant in this case. Plaintiffs’ conduct is wrongful and has caused, and continues to cause, significant damage to Mr. Casey’s reputation and businesses.”
But what about the fact that Envy repeatedly made public appearances with Pina and invited him onto The Breakfast Club? That’s been a common refrain from victims and other critics, who say the DJ used his sizable public platform to lend legitimacy to a scammer.
Legally speaking, Envy’s lawyers say that behavior simply does not rise to the level of active endorsement or direct involvement that would put their client on the hook for Pina’s alleged scheme. They say the DJ and his show were “used” by Pina, just like other media outlets and celebrities.
“Plaintiffs cannot plausibly or convincingly allege that Mr. Casey’s radio and social media interviews were the sole and principle reason for their investments, rather than the specific misrepresentations made by the Pinas directly to the plaintiffs,” D’Angelo wrote in that same court filing. “Mr. Casey has interviewed thousands of guests on The Breakfast Club, including celebrities and entrepreneurs, who have discussed various topics including their life experiences and businesses.”
DJ Envy has also quietly moved from defense to offense. In a federal lawsuit filed in August, he sued TonyTheCloser for defamation, interference with his business, and invasion of privacy. He claims that Robinson’s allegations against him are false — and that they’re part of money-making scheme to drive attention toward his own real estate business.
“Defendant, knowingly and intentionally, spewed false slanderous and defamatory misinformation about the plaintiff, which has, and continues to severely damage plaintiff,” wrote D’Angelo, who is also repping Envy in that case. “Defendant engaged in this wrongful conduct for the purposes of increasing traffic on his social media sites for his own personal gain in the form of paid advertisements.”
Robinson did not return a request for comment on the allegations.
What comes next?
Two of Pina’s companies, Whairhouse Real Estate Investments LLC and Taylor Court Apartments LLC (the company that administered the 50-unit apartment project in Paterson), have filed for federal bankruptcy since start of August. His wife Jennifer, who is named in many of the civil lawsuits, has repeatedly attempted to file for personal bankruptcy, but has been rejected for procedural defects. Pina himself does not yet appear to have sought bankruptcy protection.
Fearing that they’ll never have a chance to recover their money, some of Pina’s aggrieved investors have already jumped into those bankruptcy cases, demanding that the court appoint a trustee — an independent attorney chosen by the U.S. Department of Justice to oversee the case and make sure that any remaining money is fairly allocated to creditors. And those arguments worked: Last week, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Rosemary Gambardella ruled in both bankruptcy cases that a Chapter 11 trustee was needed to sort out the messy web of alleged debts and wrongdoing.
That ruling came after attorneys for Pina’s creditors argued that a single combined bankruptcy case, administered by one trustee, would be better than dozens of separate lawsuits at “unraveling of this wide-ranging fraud and the marshalling of assets to satisfy the scores of victims.”
“This will soon become the proverbial race to the courthouse to seize whatever assets remain of the Pinas and their entities,” wrote attorney Mack, the lawyer who represents Barone and Martini in their case against Pina and Envy. “A trustee is needed in this case, and in the cases of the related debtor parties, to organize and efficiently marshal and distribute the remaining assets to the Pinas’ many victims.”
Universal Music Publishing Group (UMPG) has announced a worldwide publishing agreement with Sabrina Carpenter, Billboard can announce exclusively. The news comes in between international stadium dates for Carpenter, who is opening for Taylor Swift‘s Eras tour through the remainder of the year. “I am so thrilled to have joined the UMPG family and to be […]
Interscope has a signed a partnership with Los CT, the record label launched by new regional Mexican music star Natanael Cano, a pioneer of the corrido tumbado movement. The deal will bring in Los CT artists Gabito Ballesteros, Alejandro Buelna, Tyan G, Amillkar Galaviz, Luis Castillo, Nueva Era, Cocho, Herencia LP and Delilah under the […]
Warner Music Latina has named Francisco Granados the label’s new senior vice president of A&R, Billboard has learned. Granados, who previously served as director of A&R at Warner Music México, will be responsible for spearheading Warner Latina’s artistic discovery and nurturing musical talents in the U.S., according to a press release issued Thursday (Oct. 12). […]