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Banned Books Week is here, and while book lovers everywhere rally against the censorship of our cherished stories, musicians like Ariana Grande, Idina Menzel and Yola have added their names to the chorus of celebrities and activists in an open letter condemning the ominous threat of book bans. This impassioned message — led by the iconic LeVar Burton of Reading Rainbow fame and propelled by moveon.org — boldly declares about book bans that “It’s only a matter of time before they target other forms of art, expression, and entertainment.”
This point is exactly what I was afraid of as I began working on my latest album, FREADOM: Songs Inspired by Banned Picture Books, and the reason why I want to get more musicians on board to join the movement against book bans.
As a Manhattanite, I wear many hats: touring musician, recording artist, early childhood music educator and mom to an eight-year-old bookworm. Over the past year, I’ve taken a dive deep into the disheartening world of book bans, especially books removed from school and library shelves. My connection to this issue deepened when I discovered that some of my daughter’s beloved books, including Sulwe by Lupita Nyong’o and Alma and How She Got her Name by Juana Martinez-Neal, had been taken away in my own home state of Florida by Governor Ron DeSantis and spearheaded by his supporters in the right-wing group Moms for Liberty.
In the 2021-22 school year, First Amendment advocates PEN America reported that a shocking 317 children’s picture books were banned. Most of these silenced stories belong to BIPOC authors, LGBTQIA+ individuals, books with Jewish themes or stories representing diverse cultural backgrounds. The fact that even our youngest readers aren’t spared is truly devastating. Picture books and children’s music go hand-in-hand for young kids to learn about the world around them and build empathy for others.
When I set out to create songs for FREADOM, I naively thought that only books were under threat from modern censorship, though I vaguely knew about the mid-20th century “banning of immoral music” as it pertained to censorship of jazz and rock & roll due to “provocative” dancing or promoting social change. Growing up in the 1980s, while devouring the shelves of CDs at my local Miami music store, I recall the infamous black and white Parental Advisory labels placed on the plastic because of explicit content. I honestly thought music censorship was a thing of the past and we were collectively cool when it came to free music (and I’m not talking about the Napster kind.)
When I recently visited the PEN America offices, I was shocked to learn about an elementary school in Waukesha, Wis., where they banned a performance of the song “Rainbowland” by Dolly Parton and Miley Cyrus for violating their “controversial content policy.” Over the summer, the school board controversially dismissed first-grade teacher Melissa Tempel for daring to speak out against the musical ban — exercising her First Amendment rights outside of school hours on social media. Teachers in that district are also barred from wearing rainbows, discussing gender pronouns or even mentioning the word “anti-racist.”
As a lyricist, educator, and mother, I can confidently say that there’s nothing controversial about “Rainbowland” and its removal may be seen as an actionable blueprint from the right and a glimpse of what’s coming our way in the land of the “free.”
Book bans are just one piece of a larger plan to dismantle our education system and undermine the core of our democracy one art form at a time, all under the guise of “protecting children.” By standing idle and failing to protect our First Amendment rights now, we are heading on a bleak path forward. It’s only a matter of time before they come after our music, just as they’ve come after our bodily autonomy and voting rights.
Musicians, I urge you to join me in the fight against book bans, defending our First Amendment rights and safeguarding the personal freedoms of all Americans. Come stir up good trouble and take a stand! “We will not be banned!”
Singer/songwriter Joanie Leeds won a 2020 Grammy Award for best children’s album and in her new album, FREADOM, released Sept. 15, she and her band take on book banning through eight original songs that amplify love and inclusion.
Ed Sheeran’s years-long copyright battle — over whether he copied “Thinking Out Loud” from Marvin Gaye’s iconic “Let’s Get It On” — isn’t over just yet.
Although one of Sheeran’s accusers dropped their case last month, a separate set of plaintiffs filed their opening salvo at a federal appeals court on Friday (Sept. 29), setting the stage for years more litigation and a ruling that could revive the case against the pop star.
“The district court’s erroneous decisions should be reversed, and appellant’s case restored so that it can proceed to trial,” Sheeran’s accusers wrote in their opening brief to the appeals court.
Sheeran was first sued over “Thinking Out Loud” by the daughter of Ed Townsend, who co-wrote the famed 1973 tune with Gaye. It was that long-running case that culminated in a May jury verdict that cleared Sheeran of any wrongdoing. Last week, Kathryn Griffin Townsend’s lawyers dropped their efforts to overturn that verdict, ending that leg of the legal battle.
But Sheeran has long faced a separate, closely related case filed by an entity called Structured Asset Sales (owned by industry executive David Pullman) that controls a different one-third stake in Townsend’s copyrights. In May, weeks after the big jury verdict, a federal judge tossed out that case, too, ruling that it was seeking an “impermissible monopoly over a basic musical building block.”
Unlike Griffin, however, Structured Asset Sales seems ready for a long appellate battle.
In their opening brief Friday at the U.S. Court of Appeal for the Second Circuit, Structure Asset Sales’ lawyers cited a wide range of supposed errors by Judge Louis Stanton in that May ruling dismissing the case, including his decision about “musical building blocks.”
But they mostly focused on what they said was a far more basic error: that Judge Stanton refused to let them cite the famous recorded version of “Let’s Get It On” in making their case. Instead, the judge ruled that Structured Asset Sales owned only the rights to a “deposit copy” — the basic notation filed at the Copyright Office decades ago to secure a copyright registration. That erroneous holding, the company’s lawyers said, “severely” limited their rights and unfairly hurt their ability to win the case.
“Musical notation is a way of trying to capture the ephemeral in the physical, but it is and has always been limited in its ability to capture every nuance of the work,” Structured Asset Sales’ lawyers wrote. “Deposit copies do not, and were never meant to be, a limitation on the scope of the copyright they represent.”
Structure Asset Sales’ lawyers also called into question the timing of Judge Stanton’s ruling, which came just weeks after the jury verdict in the Griffin case and seemingly reversed his own previous decision that the case would need to go to trial. In an unusual flourish, the company’s lawyers said the judge’s logic was “a mystery.”
An attorney for Sheeran did not immediately return a request for comment. Sheeran’s legal team will file their own appellate brief in the months to come.
Latin music consumption is growing almost twice as fast as the overall music consumption in the U.S., driven largely by Latin music super fans and by the growth of regional Mexican music, according to Luminate’s most recent research on Latin music.
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Unveiled at a Monday morning (Oct. 2) session during Latin Music Week 2023 presented by Luminate CEO Rob Jonas, Luminate’s research also found an unlikely discovery platform for Latin music: WhatsApp. A whooping 73% of Hispanic listeners use WhatsApp, 265% more than the general population.
Luminate’s numbers once again underscored the impressive growth of Latin music consumption. For example, in the first 34 weeks of 2022, there were 47.4 billion on demand audio streams. For the first 34 weeks of 2023, that number had jumped to 57.9 billion streams, a 22.2% upward change that far surpasses the 13.3% growth registered for the industry overall. All told, Latin is now the 5th largest major music genre in the U.S., behind only the big four core genres: R&B and Hip-Hop, pop, rock and country.
Latin music is also seeing consumption growth outside Latin pockets. A stunning 40% of all U.S. listeners report listening to music in languages other than English; and among those languages, the most listened to — after English — is Spanish. While 93% listen to music in English, roughly 23% of listeners will listen to music in Spanish.
Likewise, while the English language share of streaming in the U.S. –- as measured by the top 10,000 most streamed tracks of the past 12 months — has dipped slightly by 4% in the past year, streaming of Spanish language tracks has increased by 3.5%.
A key driver to the growth are Latin super fans. According to Luminate’s data, they spend 120% more per month on music related activities than other fans, and 30% more than U.S. super fans.
“The trends we saw starting in 2022 have accelerated and developed the growth of Latin music,” says Jonas. “We initially saw a lot of growth in streaming, but now, that growth translated to revenue. In 2023, it’s definitely been exceeding expectations.”
You can access Luminate’s full report here.
The Japanese entertainment company that has acknowledged its founder sexually assaulted hundreds of boys over the span of half a century, took a new name on Monday: Smile-Up. It also vowed to focus on compensation for victims of the abuse.
Tokyo-based Johnny & Associates, founded in 1975, will eventually fold, but its performers can join an independent company that is being set up, said Noriyuki Higashiyama, the company’s new leader and a former star at Johnny’s, as the company is known.
Higashiyama, tapped last month to head the old Johnny’s, will now be president of both Smile-Up and the new company. The new company’s name will be put to public vote by Johnny’s fans.
“All things with the Johnny’s name will have to go,” Higashiyama told reporters at a Tokyo hotel. “A wounded heart isn’t easy to heal. Compensation on its own will never be enough.”
In recent months, dozens of men who were performers and backup dancers as teens and children at Johnny’s have come forward, saying they were sexually assaulted by Johnny Kitagawa.
Kitagawa, who died in 2019, was never charged.
So far, 325 people have applied to the company’s compensation program, and that number may grow. Payments will begin next month, Higashiyama said. How the monetary amount will be decided was not yet clear.
Last month, Kitagawa’s niece Julie Keiko Fujishima resigned as chief executive at Johnny’s and apologized for his past. She still owns 100% of the unlisted company but will not be part of the new unnamed company, whose capital structure is still being worked out.
Fujishima did not appear at Monday’s news conference and had a letter read aloud. The letter said she was “brainwashed” by her mother Mary, who insisted Kitagawa was innocent, even after the Japanese Supreme Court ruled two decades ago that the sexual allegations against him were accurate.
“I want to erase all that remains of Johnny from this world,” she wrote. “I do not forgive what Johnny has done.”
Some victims say they have suffered for decades in silence, unable to confide in family or friends, while experiencing flashbacks.
Most of the attacks took place at Kitagawa’s luxury apartment, where several youngsters were handpicked to spend the night. The following morning, he would thrust 10,000 yen ($100) bills into their hands, according to various testimony.
Rumors about Kitagawa were rampant over the years, with several tell-it-all books published. A recent U.N. investigation has said that the number of victims is at least several hundred, and called on the Japanese government to act. When BBC did a special on Kitagawa earlier this year, the scandal jumped into the spotlight.
Mainstream Japanese media have come under serious scrutiny for having remained mum about Kitagawa, apparently afraid of his influence and ability to deny access to his stars.
Now, some TV broadcasters and programming have done an about-face to shun Johnny’s stars. Major companies have also recently announced they will stop using them in advertising.
In a related development, several victims met with lawyers, feminists and Johnny’s fans to work together in pushing for legal changes so civil damages can be pursued after the current limit of 20 years. The criminal statute of limitations is now 15 years.
Attorney Yoshihito Kawakami said children often don’t understand what happened, and the changes will allow victims to seek damages from Johnny & Associates.
Japan raised the age of sexual consent from 13 to 16 only this year. Japanese media reports say Kitagawa often purposely picked on 13-year-olds, although his victims have been as young as 8.
The company has promised it will compensate victims “beyond the scope of the law. ”
“Some perpetrators are living their lives as though nothing happened. That causes great pain to the victims,” said Junya Hiramoto, who heads a group of Johnny’s victims.
The Associated Press does not usually identify victims of alleged sexual assault, but Hiramoto and others in the case have chosen to identify themselves in the media.
“By coming together, we can grow into a bigger force and move toward hope,” he said.
Nine months before Live Nation made the headline-grabbing decision to cut merch fees at 77 of its clubs and theaters across the country, Ineffable Music Group did it first. Now, the company’s CEO, Thomas Cussins, has a piece of advice for other independent venue owners and operators concerned that the concert giant is using this tactic to curry favor with artists and agents and squeeze out their businesses: Everything will be OK.
“Merch money is not what is going to keep us in business,” says Cussins, whose company oversees 10 venues across California, including The Catalyst Club in Santa Cruz, the Ventura Music Hall in Ventura and the Golden State Theatre in Monterey. “What causes independent venues to go out of business is the one in 10 shows where venues pay way too much relative to the draw and end up losing everything they made on the previous nine shows.”
Cussins made the decision to stop charging acts performing at his venues a cut of their merch sales — a standard industry practice — while watching a Jan. 24 Senate Judiciary Committee hearing about Ticketmaster. Cussins says it was members of the band Lawrence’s testimony about how much bands rely on merch money for touring that moved him to change the company’s policy: “It is money that most directly gets into the band’s pocket and the idea that we were taking away from that did not sit right with me.”
Since then, he says the decision has not hurt his business “at all.”
Still, independent venues remain concerned about what Live Nation’s new “On the Road Again” program will mean for them — how can they compete with the deals Live Nation is offering? The National Independent Venue Association (NIVA) released a statement on Wednesday (Sept. 27) following the news, saying, “Temporary measures may appear to help artists in the short run but actually can squeeze out independent venues which provide the lifeblood of many artists on thin margins.”
Thomas Cussins
Daniel Swan
The statement continued, “The initiative announced yesterday may seem like a move to follow the lead of some independent venues. It is not that. Instead, it appears to be a calculated attempt to use a publicly-traded conglomerate’s immeasurable resources to divert artists from independent venues and further consolidate control over the live entertainment sector. Such tactics threaten the vitality of small and medium-sized venues under 3,000 capacity, many of which still struggle to keep their doors open.”
A NIVA member since 2020, Cussins says he understands why some NIVA members may be upset that Live Nation’s policy might put pressure on their businesses. But, he adds, eliminating merch fees is a net positive for the entire live music ecosystem — one where everyone is benefiting.
“It’s difficult to operate a single venue in a market against Live Nation,” says Cussins. “Venues are low-margin businesses. I’m not here to say that no one should charge merch fees. What I am here to say is that it is my opinion that if you waive those fees, it is an overall healthier ecosystem and you will actually do better in business because you are doing something that makes the process easier.”
What was your reaction when you heard the news that Live Nation was going to waive merch fees for artists?
I was ecstatic. It’s something I’m very passionate about because it fosters a healthier concert ecosystem.
Were you worried about the financial hit Ineffable would take when you decided to eliminate merch fees at Ineffable venues?
No, because merch money is not what is going to keep us in business. What causes independent venues to go out of business is the one in 10 shows where venues pay way too much relative to the draw and end up losing everything they made on the previous nine shows. I think it’s more productive spending one’s time fostering a healthier ecosystem where everybody has a chance to make money. To me, that means not taking artists’ merch money and artists taking more door deals, where the artist has an opportunity to make the most money.
But is that realistic? For many artists, taking a door deal with no guarantee is too risky.
Correct. Some can’t take that risk. But many other artists understand they can make more money on a door deal and lower the risk the venue faces. For independent venues to be healthy, we need volume, which means we need bands to be healthy and touring and making enough money to support themselves. And the money made from merch most directly affects their ability to be out on the road and do well.
What is your reaction to the statement NIVA issued, saying the On the Road Again program is just an attempt to squeeze out indie venues?
They’re doing what they think is in the best interests of their members. We’re members of NIVA and they have done an incredible job for our business. I’m a huge fan. But my take is that merch money is not what’s going to keep these independent venues in business. What’s going to keep them in business is a healthy concert ecosystem, where we’re keeping the bands healthy and keeping them on the road with deals that are fair so that everyone can make a few bucks and eat at the table together and nobody is gouging the other person.
What is the biggest challenge facing artists on the road right now?
It is the travel costs — the price of gas, vehicle rentals, the price to pay crews. If you are going out there and you are doing the same business and your costs have increased 30%, how can you possibly make that up? You might just not tour. I know a lot of bands that have told me they were doing 80 dates a year and now they just want to do 40. They just want to pick the 40 best markets. That hurts independent small businesses. I’m seeing that firsthand. Artists that are in the prime of their career saying, “I want to work less, but each one has more meaning.” And I can’t blame them. But if they can do a longer tour and amortize those costs and play those small secondary markets, then I can be their partner on the ground in markets where I operate venues and keep my hands out of their merch money.
What advice do you have to other venues considering dropping their merch fees?
It’s not one-size-fits-all and it might not be the right solution for everyone. But I am so happy that we made that move — not only from an ethos standpoint, financially as well. It has not hurt me at all.
SiriusXM shares rose 11.1% to $4.52 this week following an offer from Liberty Media on Tuesday (Sept. 26) to combine its tracking stock, The Liberty SiriusXM Group, with SiriusXM’s stock to form a new public company.
Liberty Media, which owns 83% of SiriusXM’s outstanding shares, proposed a complicated transaction that would “provide value to all shareholders with a more flexible and attractive currency” in the newly formed SiriusXM stock, Liberty Media president/CEO Greg Maffei said in a statement. SiriusXM said in a statement that a special committee of its board of directors is evaluating the proposal and provided no assurance a deal would eventually happen.
The effect appeared to be a short squeeze — albeit one smaller than the instance that inflated SiriusXM’s share price by 49% in one week in July. Because SiriusXM shares are heavily shorted and have a small float, sudden demand for the stock can create large price fluctuations. SiriusXM shares rose 15% on Thursday (Sept. 28) alone, while shares of The Liberty SiriusXM Group tracking stock finished the week up 13.4%.
While overall stocks were mixed this week, music stocks performed well. The 21-stock Billboard Global Music Index improved 1.1% to 1,344.99, better than the 0.1% gain eked out by the tech-heavy Nasdaq composite and easily besting the S&P 500’s 1.3% loss. In the United Kingdom, the FTSE 100 fell 1%, while South Korea’s KOSPI composite index dropped 1.7%. Eleven of the Billboard Global Music Index’s 21 stocks finished the week in positive territory, eight lost ground and two were unchanged.
Helped by Deezer’s double-digit improvement, streaming stocks had an average gain of 3.1%. Chinese music streamers Cloud Music and Tencent Music Entertainment gained 6.5% and 1.3%, respectively. Spotify shares dropped 2.1% to $154.63 but have gained 95.9% year to date. LiveOne shares fell 8.6% to $0.96, marking its third successive weekly loss since spinning off its PodcastOne division. This week, Billboard reported that LiveOne took out a high-interest loan to lure UFC fighter-turned-podcaster Brendan Schaub after Kast Media failed to pay him advertising money. LiveOne agreed to acquire Kast Media in May and offered Schaub and other podcasters settlements that included a mix of cash, promissory notes and PodcastOne stock.
Music’s greatest gainer this week was French streaming company Deezer. Despite there being no news — neither a press release nor a regulatory filing — that normally leads to such a substantial change, Deezer shares rose 21.8% to 2.735 euros ($2.90), including a 14.8% gain on Thursday with one of the highest trading volumes since the company went public in September 2022. Nothing indicated the company has substantially improved its earnings outlook in recent days, but Deezer had been in the news prior to this week. Three weeks ago, Deezer announced a partnership with Universal Music Group to create a new system for calculating artist royalties; and last week, the company revealed plans to increase subscription prices for new individual and family plans in the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands and its largest market, France.
Live Nation shares rose 4.1% to $83.05 following news the company will help developing artists by providing a financial stipend and eliminating fees charged on merchandise sales at a number of its owned and operated clubs in the United States. Although the move will cost Live Nation money, it also comes with some strategic advantages, according to LightShed Partners analyst Brandon Ross. The decision is “great for Live Nation because it actually throws up another barrier to entry,” Ross said in the Friday (Sept. 29) episode of the LightShed podcast. “Artists are going to want to play your venue where the economics for them are better rather than somebody else’s venue.”
It’s been nearly 20 months since Neil Young pulled his music off Spotify and, according to Billboard’s estimate, the move has cost him about $300,000 so far in lost recorded music and publishing royalties.
On Jan. 24, 2022, the singer-songwriter gave the streaming company an ultimatum: “You can have Rogan or Young. Not both.” Young blamed Rogan and his Spotify-exclusive podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience, for spreading “fake information about vaccines” and putting the public’s health at risk. Spotify acquiesced a few days later and removed Young’s catalog from its platform.
Other artists in Young’s circle of friends, such as Joni Mitchell and Nils Lofgren, also requested that Spotify remove their music from the platform — and remain off to this day. But Young’s absence leaves the largest hole in Spotify’s catalog: 45 studio albums, two EPs and 12 live albums as a solo artist and with his band Crazy Horse, plus compilations and soundtracks, that includes such rock classics as “Cinnamon Girl,” “Heart of Gold” and “Rockin’ in a Free World.”
Young’s open letter and demand for removal from Spotify attracted worldwide media attention and caused a brief spike in streams, but his departure from the platform at the end of January 2022 created an immediate decline in his average stream rate — and it hasn’t rebounded since, according to Luminate data. From 2021 to Sept. 21, 2023, Young’s average weekly global on-demand audio streams declined 32% from 10.5 million to 7.1 million. The actual loss is deeper considering that weekly on-demand audio streams in the U.S., Young’s largest market, increased 25% over that period.
The impact of Young’s Spotify pullout isn’t much for an artist of his stature and net worth, but it’s not nothing, either. Each month Young is away from Spotify, he loses about $16,000 in royalties from both his record label and his music publishing, according to Billboard analysis of Luminate data.
In nearly 20 months, Young’s absence has cost him about 273 million on-demand audio streams. The gross amount of lost royalties during Young’s Spotify absence totals roughly $1.3 million. Billboard estimates that Young’s labels, Warner Music Group’s Reprise Records and Universal Music Group’s Geffen Records, have lost approximately $1 million in gross revenues, from which Young receives a royalty. Young’s gross publishing revenue has fallen about $270,000. Young sold 50% of his publishing rights to Hipgnosis Songs Fund in 2021.
Sales of Young’s music in the U.S. have dropped, too, although whether his absence from Spotify played a role is unknown. So far in 2023, Young has sold about 25% fewer albums per week than compared to 2021; 2022’s weekly average was 9% below 2021 levels. Physical album sales, which outnumber digital album sales nearly eight-to-one for Young, are down 24% from 2021 to 2023. This year, weekly digital album sales are off 29% from 2021 (they increased 3% in 2022). Young’s weekly digital track sales have fallen by 35% from 2021 to 2023.
The cumulative effect of the sales slowdowns amounted to 59,000 fewer album sales and 54,000 fewer track sales over nearly 20 months. (Luminate does not track the Neil Young Archive, an online subscription service that provides access to a vast catalog of Young’s audio and video, but in October 2019 Wired reported it had 25,000 subscribers with a goal to reach 40,000 paying $1.99 a month.)
There’s much more to Young’s career than Spotify, though, and plenty of other ways for him and his rights holders to earn off his music. In the last 18 months, for example, Young’s music has been used in over 75 TV and film synchs, according to a person with knowledge of the songwriter’s business. These have included the NBC series “This Is Us” (Jill Andrews’ cover of “Only Love Can Break Your Heart”), the AMC series “Dark Winds” (Young’s recording of “Birds”), the Hulu series “Poker Face” (Young’s recording of “Walk On”), “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” (the band’s performance of “Old Man”) and “Sunday Night Football” (Beck’s cover of “Old Man”).
One place you won’t see Young’s music is advertisements. Young is famously opposed to using his music to sell products and advertise corporate brands. Young encapsulated his distaste for putting music in advertisements in his 1989 song “This Note’s For You” — a take on a Budweiser ad slogan from the era, “This Bud’s For You.” “Ain’t singing’ for Pepsi, ain’t singing for Coke,” Young sang in the album’s title track. “I don’t sing for nobody, makes me look like a joke.” The song’s video stirred up controversy — and was initially banned from MTV — for its mocking depiction of a 1984 Pepsi commercial shoot during which pyrotechnics set Michael Jackson’s hair caught fire.
Surely, Young has lost untold millions of dollars over his career in potential ad sales and endorsement deals. But as an artist who’s always clearly voiced his principals and stood by them, he’s long made it clear money is not his first priority.
As Sphere, the innovative new Las Vegas venue, opens its doors to the public with the debut of U2‘s 25-date residency on Friday (Sept. 29) and the premiere of the Darren Aronofsky film Postcard From Earth on Oct. 6, it’s doing so with an array of cutting-edge technology — much of which hadn’t been developed when the project broke ground in 2018.
“A lot of this stuff didn’t exist — it just didn’t,” says MSG Ventures CEO David Dibble, who oversees Sphere’s technology and content teams. “Necessity is the mother of invention, and by God, we had necessity.”
Plenty of Sphere’s advancements feel unique to the facility itself, including the geometry of its bowl-shaped theater and its 4D multisensory technology, which can generate effects like vibration, wind, scent and temperature fluctuations. But two key components — the venue’s audio and visual capabilities — could soon have a ripple effect across the concert business and broader live entertainment industry.
Sphere audiences will hear audio via Sphere Immersive Sound, a system created in tandem with the Berlin-based audio company Holoplot. “The problem that we tried to tackle from the beginning was not to build another sound system — because the world has enough sound systems,” says Holoplot CEO Roman Sick, who founded the company in 2011 with the goal of creating “a realistic, authentic audio experience that is not mainly determined by the room you’re having that audio experience in.”
Sphere executives discovered Holoplot after the company deployed its 3D Audio-Beamforming technology in Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof, Germany’s largest train station, in late 2016, allowing multiple audio messages at the same frequency to be sent simultaneously to different parts of the facility.
Holoplot’s X1 Matrix array.
HOLOPLOT
“If you boil it down, we have two core capabilities,” Sick explains. “The functional level, from our perspective, is you can determine where you want to have sound and where you don’t want to have sound. … And the creative bit is the ability to now move audio objects three-dimensionally across that whole volume [of space in a venue] — from left to right and up and down, but also into the audience back and forth.”
Holoplot dubbed the former aspect 3D Audio-Beamforming technology and the latter one Wave Field Synthesis. With Wave Field Synthesis, Sick explains, Holoplot can make the origins of audio imperceptible to create “a hologram of sound” — an accomplishment he calls “the holy grail of spatial audio.”
To implement these features, Sphere Immersive Sound utilizes advanced hardware and software. Behind Sphere’s 160,000-square-foot LED screen sit hundreds of Holoplot’s X1 Matrix arrays, which combine the functionalities of vertical and horizontal line arrays to allow greater control over the formation and shape of audio waves. Holoplot’s software then utilizes proprietary algorithms and machine learning to synthesize creative input and environmental data, collected by sensors throughout the venue, to further refine the system’s audio output.
Sphere Immersive Sound might sound complicated — and it is — but like many of the venue’s production capabilities, it’s designed to be plug-and-play for visiting artists and their teams.
“You don’t need to be a scientist,” Sick says knowingly. “You just say, ‘Hey, I want sound here and over there, for this configuration.’ And the system says, ‘OK, here it is.’” According to Sick, the system has “a large number of preset formats” — mono, stereo, 5.1, Atmos and so on — for artists to choose from. Once they do, “boom, then it’s the normal workflow,” says Sick, adding that an artist’s audio engineer can even use their normal desk: “From that end, nothing really changes.”
Of course, Sphere’s audio advancements didn’t take place in a vacuum. In implementing Holoplot’s technology, Sick and his team had to consider numerous other stakeholders, chief among them those conceptualizing Sphere’s visual capabilities. “You put something in front of a speaker, it’s going to have an effect — and it’s a negative effect, usually,” says Sick, summarizing the challenge of placing high-end audio equipment behind Sphere’s LED screen. Compared to point source or line array speakers, Holoplot’s matrix array had an advantage — it diffuses energy over a larger surface area, reducing the energy passing through an obstruction, in this case Sphere’s LED screen, at any given point. But Sick’s team still had to find “the best compromise between acoustic transparency and meeting the visual requirements.”
Big Sky, the camera developed by Sphere Studios.
Sphere Entertainment
“It’s such a unique and groundbreaking technology that, maybe for the first time ever in the audio-visual world, the images, as incredible as they are, are almost subordinate to the audio experience,” says Andrew Shulkind, senior vp of capture and innovation at Sphere Studios, the Burbank-based entity Sphere launched to develop technology and content tailored specifically for the venue.
That’s saying something: Shulkind became involved with Sphere several years ago to help it create visual content — like Aronofsky’s Postcard For Earth — suited to its massive, high-resolution screen. Initially, Shulkind and his colleagues shot tests using camera arrays, a common but cumbersome filmmaking technique that stitches together video captured from multiple cameras to generate a more detailed product.
“It became pretty obvious quickly that we really need a single-camera solution, for a variety of reasons, for weight and for mobility and ergonomics, and to be able to take all the difficulty of maneuvering something heavy out of the way,” says Shulkind, who enlisted a colleague, Deanan DaSilva, to help create a new camera fit for Sphere.
The resulting device, Big Sky, pushes the boundaries of modern filmmaking technology with a sensor 40 times the resolution of a 4K camera, lenses with high sharpness thresholds and even new data storage solutions to manage the large volume of information it produces. “This was something that [camera makers] weren’t expecting to do for another 10 years,” DaSilva says. “We had to figure out how to move that timeline up.”
Like Sick, ultimately Shulkind and DaSilva had to ensure that their advanced technology was accessible to the outside creators that Sphere wants to court. “We work with external creatives, they come in, they describe what they want to do, they have their support team and then we fill out the capture side,” Shulkind says. “We take the complications of any of these technologies out of the mix, and it becomes about, you know, what story are you trying to tell?”
Filmed by Aronofsky on every continent in conjunction with Sphere Studios, Postcard From Earth, Shulkind explains, was “really designed to take people to another place that they may not have been, or places that they may not have seen in that way before. Darren has been able to marshal all of the different aspects of the venue in service of that goal.”
Shulkind acknowledges Sphere Studios’ myriad technical accomplishments but has a broader view of their implications that transcends the wider implementation of any one of its technologies. For him, Sphere’s format could finally allow filmmakers to “break the rectangle,” or go beyond the rectangular framing of visual storytelling that emerged from rectangular film strips.
“Now that we have all the technology of the minute, whether it’s data storage, whether it’s the fidelity that we’re able to achieve with this high resolution, whether it’s the ability of creating glass that is able to be as sharp as it is, all the different aspects come together to create this greater-than-the-sum-of-its-parts [product], radically rethinking how stories are told and how we experience content,” he says. “You’re looking at all these little composite technologies and all the growing currents of where technology has gone over the last 10 years. How do you apply that all for some creative purpose? I think that’s the real experiential success story.”
And that story isn’t over yet. While Sphere’s teams worked diligently to design and implement new technologies for the venue’s opening, Sick, DaSilva, and Shulkin all note that they’ll continue to iterate and improve their tools going forward.
As creatives “start to really discover how to tell stories in the venue … that’ll very clearly drive the technology evolution,” DaSilva says. “We’ve got a to-do list of all the things to try that we’ve not even scratched the surface on.”
“We constantly keep updating our technology,” Sick adds. “There’s new features that we will deploy over time, even after the venue has opened, that will give new capabilities to Sphere.”
It seems likely that at least some of these technologies will eventually move beyond the walls of Sphere’s Las Vegas facility to other venues — but what shape that proliferation will take remains unclear. After all, the Sphere team has already filed more than 60 patents. “One of the reasons we’ve been so aggressive on our patents is imitation is the sincerest form of flattery,” Dibble says. “But we’d just as soon not be imitated, because we own it.”
This content was created in partnership with Kara Major. Kara Major is an ambassador of GLOW Beverages.
Emerging from the dazzle of neon lights and the infectious rhythm of electronic beats in Miami, EDM sensation Kara Major is taking 2023 by storm. Her recent track “Everything Works Out,” fuses soulful lyrics with pulsating melodies. Featured in publications like SweetnSour Magazine and Earmilk, its success spoke volumes to her core fanbase’s zeal and the weight of the message she bore.
Major’s previous professional settings— a mix of offices, board rooms and sports teams— plays a pivotal role in her approach to music. Writing songs and constructing beats has been second nature to her for as long as she can remember. Major used music as an outlet to combat the day’s monotony and satisfy her urge to release her pent-up emotions. Drawing on both celebratory moments and heart-wrenching experiences, Major’s music offers not just entertainment but comfort and hope for her fans. With a sizzling new music video that dips in the abstract, Kara’s larger than life message is reaching listeners across the country.
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Kara Major’s latest single “Glow”
Her latest track, “Glow,” is the third in her homage to mantric principles and has garnered significant attention from both media and brands. The single piqued the interest of GLOW Beverages, an electrolyte beverage company that is quickly gaining popularity. Partly owned by Kylie Jenner and Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott, the drink is a cult favorite for clubgoers and a guilty pleasure for techies. Now, Major is a member of a group of key influencers who are partnering with GLOW to connect with consumers, hooking onto both Kara’s song and the drink’s radiating personality.
Challenges and adversities have been part and parcel of Major’s journey. Every artist faces hurdles, but it’s these challenges that give music an edge and a rawness that listeners connect with deeply. Major’s ethos, which she shared with POP CULTUR, is clear: “Believe it to see it. Knowledge is the precursor to experience. Keep reaching for new information; new inspiration and new futures will find you.”
Kara Major in her music video for “Glow”
Łukasz Rucinski, Black Parrot Media
Beyond her music, Major has a greater vision. She is eager to collaborate with giants in the self-care and motivational speaking communities like Esther Hicks and Tony Robbins. What stands out is her belief that everyone has their own “inner music.” Major’s message to her fans and the world at large is rooted in the philosophy of finding one’s inner light and letting it “glow.”
With her unique blend of musical talent, introspective lyrics and a vision that transcends the boundaries of EDM, Kara Major is making her place in the industry and setting her Major message in motion.
Las Vegas police made an arrest on Friday morning (Sept. 29) in one of the most vexing high-profile cold cases in the city’s history. According to the Associated Press, Las Vegas PD arrested Duane “Keffe D” Davis in connection with the unsolved drive-by shooting of Tupac Shakur on the Las Vegas strip on Sept. 7, 1996.
The unsolved murder of the legendary rapper in a brazen nighttime assault on the city’s most famous boulevard had vexed authorities and fascinated the public for nearly 30 years, spawning a number of documentaries, investigative TV series, books and theories about who gunned down the then-25-year-old MC.
Davis was reportedly arrested early Friday morning, with the exact charges he was taken in on not announced at press time; two officials with first-hand knowledge of the arrest said Davis was expected to be indicted later in the day.
The 60-year-old alleged member of the South Side Compton Crips street gang was the uncle of gang member Orlando “Baby Lane” Anderson, long considered the prime suspect in Shakur’s killing. Anderson was beaten by the rapper and his entourage on the night of the murder, allegedly in retaliation for Anderson’s role in snatching a Death Row chain at a Los Angeles Mall in July 1996; Anderson, 23, who denied involvement in the Shakur murder, was shot and killed in 1998 in a gang shooting and was never charged with the killing.
Las Vegas PD announced in July that they had searched Davis’ Henderson, Nevada home in connection with the Shakur murder investigation, though they did not give any additional information at the time about what they found or what spurred the search.
NBC News reported at the time that a copy of the warrant it obtained noted that authorities were looking at computers and other electronic devices, as well as audio recordings and that they took away a Pokeball USB drive, a black iPhone, two iPads and a purple Toshiba laptop, among other items.
Shakur was gunned down inside a black BMW driven by Death Row Records founder Marion “Suge” Knight when it was stopped at a red light near the Las Vegas Strip on the night of a Mike Tyson fight. A white Cadillac pulled up next to the passenger side of Tupac’s car and someone inside fired 14 rounds. Hit four times, Shakur was rushed to a nearby hospital, where he died a week later. The unsolved case has spawned a number of conspiracy theories about the murder, including allegations that it was tied to the similarly unsolved murder of the Notorious B.I.G. in Los Angeles on March 9, 1997 as part of a media-whipped East Coast-West Coast rap rivalry.
In 2018, Davis claimed in an episode of BET’s Death Row Chronicles that he knew the name of Shakur’s killer, though he did not supply one at the time, even as he said Anderson could have been the gunman. Davis also claimed in his 2019 memoir, Compton Street Legend, that he was in the Cadillac on the night of the shooting and has described himself as the last living witness to the incident. No arrests had previously been made in the decadeslong investigation and Nevada does not have a statute of limitations for prosecuting homicide cases.
Retired LAPD detective Greg Kading — who spent years investigating the Shakur murder and wrote a book about it — interviewed Davis in 2008 and 2009 during the LAPD ‘s investigation into the Shakur and Smalls killings. He told the AP that he thought the Shakur investigation gained momentum recently after Davis’ description of his role in his memoir.
“It’s those events that have given Las Vegas the ammunition and the leverage to move forward,” Kading told the AP before Davis’ arrest. “Prior to Keefe D’s public declarations, the cases were unprosecutable as they stood… He put himself squarely in the middle of the conspiracy,” Kading said of Davis. “He had acquired the gun, he had given the gun to the shooter and he had been present in the vehicle when they hunted down and located both Tupac and Suge (Knight).”