State Champ Radio

by DJ Frosty

Current track

Title

Artist

Current show
blank

State Champ Radio Mix

12:00 am 12:00 pm

Current show
blank

State Champ Radio Mix

12:00 am 12:00 pm


Business

Page: 36

Ye (formerly Kanye West) is facing a lawsuit from a former employee who says the rapper compared himself to Hitler and threatened her because she is Jewish.

The case, filed Tuesday (Feb. 11) in Los Angeles court, claims he subjected the unnamed woman to “antisemitic vitriol,” including texting her “Hail Hitler” and calling her “ugly” and a “bitch.” And the woman says she was “swiftly terminated” when she complained.

“Ye carried out a calculated campaign to threaten and psychologically torment Jewish people around him, specifically plaintiff,” the woman’s lawyers wrote. “There can be little doubt that Ye treats those around him, especially Jewish people and women, much worse than just a bully. He is a self-proclaimed ‘Nazi’.”

The Jane Doe accuses Ye and his Yeezy LLC of religious and gender discrimination, wrongful termination, breach of contract, and a variety of other legal wrongdoing.

The new lawsuit, one of many filed by former employees against Ye, came days after he went on an offensive tirade on X (formerly Twitter) that included antisemitic comments (“I’m a Nazi” and praise for Adolf Hitler) as well as a bizarre demand to free Sean “Diddy” Combs, who is currently in custody awaiting trial on sex crime charges. On Sunday, Ye ran a TV ad during the Super Bowl that directed viewers to an online store where they could purchase a shirt emblazoned with a swastika.

It was hardly the first time the rapper has made such statements. After a string of similar antisemitic rhetoric and other erratic behavior in October 2022, the star lost much of what was a once-formidable business empire, including fashion partnerships with Adidas, The Gap and Balenciaga, as well as his representation by Creative Artists Agency and many of his lawyers.

In Tuesday’s lawsuit, the Jane Doe plaintiff says she was hired at Ye’s Yeezy LLC as a marketing specialist in December 2023, shortly before he issued an apology (written in Hebrew) for those earlier antisemitic statements. But she says the apologetic sentiment was “short lived.”

A month later, amid renewed controversy over the cover art of his Vultures Vol. 1, the woman claims she suggested that Ye issue a statement condemning Nazism. When the message was relayed to the star himself, he allegedly responded with a text message (included in the lawsuit) reading “I Am A Nazi.”

“This not only deeply offended Doe but the loud and proud antisemitism also made her feel endangered,” her attorneys wrote.

Months later, the rapper allegedly texted her and another Jewish employee “What the fuck is everyone here getting paid?” In another screenshotted text, he allegedly followed up: “Welcome to the first day of working for Hitler.”

The abuse allegedly escalated from there, the lawsuit says, including a series of texts in June 2024 in which Ye allegedly said “Shut the f— up b—-” called her “ugly as f—” and texted “Hail Hitler.” Later, he also allegedly texted, “You what’s left after I said deathcon” — a message that Jane Doe says was intended to reference his previous antisemitic rants and meant as a threat based on her religion.

Just hours after she complained about the text messages to her manager, the lawsuit says she was sent an email from an attorney representing Yeezy terminating her employment.

A spokesman for Ye did not immediately return a request for comment on Tuesday (Feb. 11).

Ye — formerly known as Kanye West — has been dropped by his talent agency 33 & West after the Vultures rapper went on another anti-semitic rant on X. Ye had been with the independent talent agency for about a year before his agent Daniel McCartney took to Instagram Stories on Monday (Feb. 10) to […]

K-pop company SM Entertainment used a healthy concert business to compensate for a slow new release schedule in posting revenue of 273.8 billion won ($189 million) in the fourth quarter of 2024, up 9% year over year, according to the company’s latest earnings report. Operating profit nearly tripled to 33.9 billion won ($23 million) and net loss was more than halved to 24.1 billion won ($17 million).
Recorded music revenue dropped 5.1% to 86.0 billion won ($59 million) due to a decrease in new album sales, which came in at 3.78 million units versus 5.51 million units in the prior-year period. NCT Dream sold 1.56 million units while Aespa had 1.1 million album sales in the quarter. Elsewhere, WayV sold 400,000 units and Irene sold 360,000 units.

Concert revenue grew 11.9% to 22.5 billion won ($15.5 million) thanks to an expanded tour schedule during the quarter. Exo’s Chanyeol performed 14 solo shows across Southeast Asia, Japan and China. NCT Wish performed 12 in Asia. NCT Dream, which began its world tour in the second quarter, played nine concerts in the fourth quarter. The higher number of concerts, as well as an increase in special events such as pop-up stores, helped merchandise and licensing revenue jump 33.7% to 51.2 billion won ($35.3 million).

Trending on Billboard

In the first quarter, music releases include SMTOWN’s 30th anniversary album, SMTOWN, THE CULTURE, THE FUTURE, on Friday (Feb. 14). Red Velvet’s Seulgi and WayV’s Ten are also both due to release EPs, and a new girl group, Hearts2Hearts, will debut on Feb. 24 with the single “The Chase.”

This year, SM Entertainment is celebrating its 30th anniversary with a new slogan (“The Culture, The Future”), new films, new broadcast programs and SMTOWN LIVE 2025 World Tour concerts around the globe. “’THE CULTURE’ represents the legacy and cultural heritage that SM has built over the past three decades,” CEO Jang Cheol-hyuk said during the earnings call. “‘THE FUTURE’ embodies our ambition to drive innovation in the global music industry and lead the next era of K-pop. At SM, music is at the heart of everything we do. Through our music and cultural influence, we strive to remain a meaningful part of people’s daily lives. This slogan underscores our commitment to pioneering the future of K-pop while honoring the foundation we’ve built.”

In addition to announcing fourth-quarter results, SM Entertainment revealed that its board of directors approved the retirement of the remaining treasury shares, which are shares the company has repurchased from shareholders and holds on its books. The remaining treasury shares equal 2% of outstanding shares and are valued at 40.3 billion won ($27.8 million). Last February and August, the company retired more than 35 billion won ($24.1 million) worth of treasury shares.

SM Entertainment shares rose 2.9% to 95,000 won ($65.42) on Tuesday (Feb. 11) following the earnings release and announcement of the share retirement. Year-to-date, SM Entertainment stock has risen 25.7%.

This is The Legal Beat, a weekly newsletter about music law from Billboard Pro, offering you a one-stop cheat sheet of big new cases, important rulings and all the fun stuff in between.
This week: Kendrick Lamar plays “Not Like Us” during his Super Bowl halftime show despite Drake’s defamation lawsuit; an appeals court sends a case over Jimi Hendrix’s music to trial; the estate of Notorious B.I.G. sues over a famed photo; and much more.

THE BIG STORY: Say, Drake…

If a team of lawyers tried to dissuade Kendrick Lamar from performing “Not Like Us” during Sunday night’s Super Bowl halftime show, they didn’t do a great job.

Trending on Billboard

After much speculation about whether or not the rapper would play his chart-topping, Grammy-sweeping hit at the Superdome – a performance that came weeks after Drake sued Universal Music Group over allegations that the song defamed him by calling him a pedophile — Kendrick really didn’t hold back much.

With a trolling grin, he looked directly into camera and made eye contact with 120 million viewers when he rapped “Say, Drake, I hear you like ’em young” – a lyric he then followed up with lines like “You better not ever go to cell block one” and “Just make sure you hide your lil’ sister from him.” If anyone was expecting him to avoid the controversy entirely, think again.

Lamar did avoid saying the actual word “pedophile,” but that hardly made a difference when thousands in the crowd sang it for him — and millions more at home knew exactly what was missing. And no such omission spared Drake from the song’s comedic punchline: “Tryna strike a chord and it’s probably A minnnnorrrrr.”

The very structure of Kendrick’s set seemed designed to mock the idea that a lawsuit might stop him. Early in the show, he explicitly referenced the case, saying “I wanna do their favorite song, but they love to sue” before teasing the song’s infectious four-note riff. When Lamar quickly moved on to another song, it seemed like he wanted the fans to think that might be it. Maybe it was a happy compromise? A quick nod that wouldn’t give the lawyers heartburn?

Lol, nope: Minutes later, Kendrick launched into a full-blown rendition of “Not Like Us” on the world’s biggest stage. “They tried to rig the game,” he said right before he started, “but you can’t fake influence.” For good measure, Lamar brought out Serena Williams – rumored to be a one-time romantic partner of Drake – to crip walk on his metaphorical grave.

What does it all mean for the lawsuit? For Kendrick, probably not much. Don’t forget: he isn’t actually named as a defendant, and Drake’s lawyers have taken great pains to stress that their client is only suing a malevolent record label that boosted a defamatory song, not the rival rapper who created it: “UMG may spin this complaint as a rap beef gone legal,” they wrote in the original complaint, “but this lawsuit is not about a war of words between artists.”That stance doesn’t appear to be changing. Just hours before Kendrick took the stage in New Orleans, Drake’s lawyers released a new statement on the case that harshly attacked UMG – but they never mentioned the man himself. It would be hard to reverse course now, even after that stare into the camera.

Perhaps Drake’s legal team will try to add Fox or the NFL or even Apple (the show’s sponsor) as defendants, claiming they gave Kendrick a platform to republish lyrics they knew were defamatory. Or maybe they’ll cite the performance as more ammo against UMG — the latest example of how the popularity of the “Not Like Us” is harming Drake’s reputation. As CNN wrote after the game, in which the Philadelphia Eagles thrashed the Kansas City Chiefs: “Drake lost worse than the Chiefs at the Super Bowl.”

At the end of the day, those secondary moves won’t matter much unless a federal judge eventually rules that “Not Like Us” is actually defamatory in the first place. And as I wrote last week, legal experts are skeptical that’s going to happen.

Stay tuned at Billboard for more as Drake’s case moves forward – we’ll keep you updated on any major (or minnnnorrrrr) developments.

Other top stories this week…

JIMI HENDRIX TRIAL – A long-running legal battle over the rights to Jimi Hendrix’s music is headed to trial after a U.K. appeals court ruled against Sony Music. The case was filed by the estates of his two Jimi Hendrix Experience bandmates (bassist Noel Redding and drummer Mitch Mitchell), who say they own part of the copyrights to the trio’s albums and that Sony owes them millions. After the appeals court refused Sony’s renewed bid to dismiss the case, a trial is tentatively set for December in London.

BIGGIE BIGGIE BIGGIE – The estate of legendary rapper Notorious B.I.G. filed an infringement lawsuit against Target, Home Depot and others over allegations that they sold unauthorized canvas prints of a famed photo called the “King of New York.” Joined by the photographer who snapped the image, the estate accused a company called iCanvas of showing a “disdain for intellectual property law” by creating the prints sold by the big box stores: “Defendants specifically chose to use Mr. Wallace’s persona, name, image, likeness … in an attempt to capitalize on their fame and extraordinary financial value.”

A “WILD” COPYCAT? – MTV owner Viacom filed a lawsuit claiming that Nick Cannon’s new comedy battle rap game show (Bad vs. Wild) is a “flagrant” copycat of his long-running series Wild ’N Out. Notably, the lawsuit targeted only the streaming service that produces the show, Zeus Network, and not Cannon himself – claiming that the streamer effectively poached the star and is now “cosplaying” as successor to MTV’s Wild: “Zeus has chosen the path of least resistance: stealing the fruits of Viacom’s goodwill and decades of labor and innovation, and pawning it off as its own original idea.”

SUCH A LOVELY MESS – A year after the spectacular implosion of a criminal trial over the Eagles legendary 1976 album Hotel California, one of the accused men filed a civil lawsuit against Don Henley and longtime manager Irving Azoff over accusations they engaged in a “malicious prosecution.” The new case, filed by rare-books dealer Glenn Horowitz, says Henley knew the handwritten notes at the center of the trial were not stolen but misled authorities into bringing the charges. The trial ended abruptly last spring after new evidence cast doubt on whether Henley’s materials were stolen in the first place, prompting a judge to suggest prosecutors had been “manipulated” into filing the case.

MEGAN THEE PLAINTIFF – A federal judge ruled that Megan Thee Stallion can proceed with a defamation lawsuit accusing social media personality Milagro Gramz of waging a “campaign of harassment” against the star on behalf of Tory Lanez, who was convicted in 2022 of shooting the star rapper during an argument. The judge said Megan had made a “compelling case” that the blogger had defamed her with her posts, including those that suggested the star lied in her testimony during Lanez’s trial: “Plaintiff’s claims extend far beyond mere negligence — they paint a picture of an intentional campaign to destroy her reputation.”

OZZY SUED OVER OZZY PIC – Ozzy Osbourne was hit with a copyright lawsuit for allegedly posting images of himself to Instagram and other social media platforms, filed by a veteran rock photographer who snapped the pictures. The legendary rocker is just the latest to celeb to face that kind of bizarre-sounding lawsuit, joining the ranks of Miley Cyrus, Dua Lipa, Justin Bieber and many others. Once again for those in the back: the copyrights to a photo are almost always retained by the person who took it, and simply appearing in an image does not give a celebrity the right to repost it.

POP SMOKE PLEA DEAL – Corey Walker, a man charged with murder over the killing of Pop Smoke (Bashar Jackson), reached a deal with prosecutors to avoid a looming trial, pleading guilty to lesser charges of voluntary manslaughter and home invasion robbery that will see him serve 29 years in prison. The actual triggerman in the 2020 shooting, an unnamed 15 year old, admitted to the killing in 2023 and was sentenced as a juvenile to detention until is 25.

Warner Music Group announced changes to its division overseeing Argentina and Chile on Tuesday (Feb. 11), bringing in Tomás Talarico as the new managing director of Warner Music Southern Cone (née Cono Sur), effective immediately. He succeeds Guillermo Castellani, who will stay on as a consultant during the transition. Talarico will report to Alejandro Duque, president of Warner Music Latin America.
Talarico brings extensive industry experience, having founded MOJO, an independent record label and digital distributor, in 2014. Under his leadership, MOJO expanded across Argentina, Chile and Peru, becoming a key player in the tropical and urban music markets. The company has collaborated with approximately 150 artists and labels, managing audiovisual production and music publishing. According to the hiring announcement, MOJO’s success includes more than 50 Gold and Platinum certified singles and multiple industry awards, including eight Gardel Awards and two Pulsar Awards.

Throughout his career, Talarico has played a significant role in developing emerging artists such as ECKO, Grupo Zumbale Primo, Kaleb Di Masi, Papichamp and Uriel Lozano, among others. He was also a key contributor to the collaborative project Un Poco de Ruido. He’s also a musician, having released five rock and pop albums as a guitarist and singer-songwriter.

Trending on Billboard

Before founding MOJO, Talarico was a pioneer in digital music distribution, working with companies focused on MP3 and ringtone sales. His early career included a role as a supervisor at Tower Records.

Duque praised Talarico’s entrepreneurial mindset and ability to bridge music and technology “to the service of artists,” also praising Castellani role in developing the careers of major Warner artists such as Maria Becerra and Tiago PZK.

Talarico expressed excitement about joining WMG, highlighting the opportunity to utilize the resources of an international label to support the region. 

“To be able to tap into the resources of a major label to superserve the exceptional talent in this region is an incredible opportunity,” he said. “I also want to pay tribute to the remarkable Guillermo Castellani who has nurtured such a strong team and played a huge role in the wider music industry. He leaves big shoes to fill, and I’m looking forward to building on his legacy!”

Castellani reflected on his time at Warner Music, which dates back to early 2002, and lauded the support of Duque and the Warner Music Southern Cone team.

“I am grateful to the family of Warner Music Southern Cone for allowing me to enjoy my work every day: without them it would have been impossible to reach the goals we achieved,” he said. “I wish Tomás success in writing the following chapter in the Southern Cone. I am sure that he will lead Warner Music in its continuous growth so that it will remain a magnet for new music talent in this part of the world.”

Winter Music Conference 2025 has announced a long phase one list of speakers for its March event in Miami.
The dance industry conference, returning to Miami Music Week for the first time since 2019, will feature input from artists including Aluna, LP Giobbi, Hayla, Sydney Blu and more.

Additionally, programming will include more than 60 industry representatives from a wide range of labels, management companies, agencies, publications, streaming services and more. See the complete list of phase one names and companies below.

Panels themes, keynote speakers and more will be announced in the coming weeks, with the event also set to feature mixers, a pool party and workshops, along with the inaugural hybrid awards show from the EDMAs and IDMAs. The Conference and tangential events will happen at Eden Roc Miami Beach Resort on March 26-28. Tickets are on sale now.

Trending on Billboard

Winter Music Conference is owned by Ultra Music Festival, which kicks off in Miami the same day the conference ends, Friday, March 28. Launched in 1985, Winter Music Conference was held every March in Miami (prior to the pandemic) and is part of the larger event known as Miami Music Week, a marathon of dance music performances and parties. Drawing an estimated 100,000 attendees and 3,500 music professionals from more than 70 countries at its height, WMC hosts a schedule of events, parties, seminars and workshops and serves as one of the largest industry networking events in the dance/electronic music genre.

Though the Ultra Music Festival was originally spawned by the conference, it eventually surpassed it in terms of influence, and its parent company went on to acquire WMC in 2018.

Winter Music Conference 2025 Industry Speakers:

Alex Greenberg – Falcon PRAlex Jukes – Jukebox PR/The TribesAndy Daniell – Defected RecordsAnna Horowitz – WMEBina Fronda – Ultra RecordsBlake Coppelson – Proximity II Kompass Music GroupCameron Sunkel – EDM.comCandace Silva-Torres (p/k/a SiLVA) – KCRWaCarly Peterson – CircaCelena Fields – EVENChris Johnson – SoundCloudChuck Fishman – Soul Clap RecordsConnie Chow – FUGA II shesaid.so AMSCristiana Votta – Alegria AgencyDani Chavez – Good Girl ManagementDani Deahl – BandLabDanny Klein – SPIN Magazine II Robot SunriseDavid Waxman – Ultra RecordsDeron Delgado – EMPIRE Dance/DirtybirdDilini Weerasooriya – Merrill Wealth Management (Bank of America)Dorothy Caccavale – FM Artists/Three Six ZeroEddie Sears – Republic RecordsElyn Kazarian – Women In Visuals/dublabEmma Hoser – Liaison ArtistsEric Silver – Red Light ManagementEryk Puczek – FriendsOfFriends.AgencyGavin Ryan – Big Beat Records/Atlantic RecordsGeorge Hess – G5 EntertainmentGina Tucci – 146 RecordsHallie Halpern – SeriouslyHallie StudiosHarmony Soleil – c895 SeattleHilary Gleason – BacklineJason Adamchak – Calculated Creative AgencyJaye Hamel – 1of1 CustomJeroen te Rehorst – BEAT Music Fund/ArmadaJess Page – RareformJordyn Reese – Do Better For ArtistsKat Bein – Super Kat WorldKatie Bain – BillboardKatie Knight – Can U Put Me On Guestlist PodcastKyle Jones – EDM.comLauren Anderson – LabelWorxLewis Kunstler – 2 + 2 Management II Young Art RecordsLorne Padman – Dim Mak RecordsMatt Sherman – Sherm In The Booth Podcast II Hood Politics RecordsMegan Venzin – DJ MagNicholas Saady – Pryor Cashman LLPOlivia Mancuso – Elevated Frequencies PodcastOllie Zhang – 88risingPaula Quijano – Little Empire MusicPete Anderson – ETP AgencyPeter Slayton – Slayton CreativeSam Mobarek – Major Recordings (Warner Records)Seth Shapiro – Shapiro Legal, PLLCShannon Herber – Wise River ConsultingSilvia Montello – Voicebox ConsultingSimon Scott – Cirkay LTDSonya Okon – Helix Records/Ultra PublishingSteph Conlon – Easier SaidTaryn Haight – WassermanTom Williams – L’Affaire MusicaleVivian Belzaguy Hunter – Ultra Music Festival II Ascendance Sustainable EventsWatse de Jong – Manager, Martin GarrixWill Scott – Helix Records / Ultra Publishing

02/11/2025

Check out all the answers from this year’s honorees, including Usher, WNBA star Angel Reese and football legend Shannon Sharpe.

02/11/2025

South by Southwest has announced new keynotes and its latest round of featured speakers for its 39th edition, taking place March 7-15 across Austin.
Newly announced keynotes include Issa Rae, the creative force behind HBO’s Insecure; Meredith Whittaker, president of Signal; and Ben Lamm, CEO of Colossal Biosciences, who’ll be joined by actor Joe Manganiello to discuss advancements in… cloning. They join previously announced keynotes such as Creedence Clearwater Revival icon John Fogerty, Bluesky CEO Jay Graber, and IBM chairman and CEO Arvind Krishna.

The featured speakers lineup includes the cast and creators of HBO’s The Last of Us, game designer Hideo Kojima, Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe, comedian and podcaster Conan O’Brien, actor and musician Kevin Bacon, and Something Corporate singer-songwriter Andrew McMahon. Additional speakers include comedian Taylor Tomlinson food critic Keith Lee and social health expert Kasley Killam.

Trending on Billboard

This new slate of speakers complements SXSW’s rounds of announcements, which included Donald Passman, Ghazi, Dr. Peter Attia, Johanna Faries, Douglas Rushkoff, and more.

Highlighted sessions include “Colossal: Technology Company Turning Science Fiction to Science Fact,” where Lamm and Manganiello will explore advancements in gene editing and cloning. “A Conversation with Issa Rae” will cover her career and media company, HOORAE, while “A Conversation About Online Security and Confidentiality” will see Whittaker discussing privacy with Guy Kawasaki. Other panels include “Balloonerism – A Film Based on the Album by Mac Miller,” a discussion on a new film inspired by the late artist’s work, and “Breaking Barriers by Turning Prisoners into Firefighters,” focusing on rehabilitation through firefighting programs.

Entertainment-focused chats will include “Fans Over Fees,” where McMahon will address ticket scalping and fair access to live events; “Claiming the Future of Entertainment,” where O’Brien and gaming exec Johanna Faries will discuss gaming’s influence on media; and “DEATH STRANDING 2: ON THE BEACH,” where Kojima will reveal details about the video game.

Other notable discussions include “Fireside with Arm CEO Rene Haas,” covering AI’s impact on technology, and “Funny AF Comedy Showrunners,” where Universal Television’s top creators will share insights into comedy production. Business-oriented panels include “How America’s 33M Small Businesses Can Grow and Prosper,” featuring Mark Cuban; and “How Technology Is Transforming Urban Spaces,” examining AI’s role in city infrastructure.

Additional sessions will feature discussions on AI in media with Paramount CTO Phil Wiser, immersive storytelling with ILM Immersive, and influencer entrepreneurship with Keith Lee and Jennifer Quigley-Jones.

“Every year, SXSW assembles a group of speakers who are doing extraordinary and often surprising things, such as breaking boundaries in storytelling and representation, advocating for secure communication, and bringing back the woolly mammoth,” said Hugh Forrest, president and chief programming officer of SXSW. “Issa Rae, Meredith Whittaker, Ben Lamm, and Joe Manganiello make up a stellar group of changemakers who are a perfect fit for the SXSW community.”

SXSW will take place from March 7-15 in Austin, Texas, with full details regarding their newly-announced speakers and sessions available via their website.

Ronald Day, president of entertainment and chief content officer at NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises, is stepping down from his position, the company announced. His departure, scheduled for this Thursday (Feb. 13), follows a recent contract renewal and comes at a time when Telemundo is experiencing unprecedented success in the ratings.
Day’s resignation coincides with Telemundo’s remarkable achievement of leading the prime time slot among Spanish-language networks in the U.S., sparking industry speculation about the timing and reasons behind this decision. “Today, at the peak of this great success, I am making another equally significant decision,” Day, who has been at the helm of the company for seven years, also announced on social media on Monday (Feb. 10).

In his post on Instagram, Day revealed his future plans, which include writing a book and embarking on a speaking tour across universities in the U.S., Latin America, and Spain. “[It] will bring me closer to my purpose: to inspire and train a new generation of executives and entrepreneurs ready to transform history, just as I can proudly say I did as I close this cycle,” he wrote.

Trending on Billboard

Day added, “Thanks to a brilliant team of creatives and leaders that I hold close to my heart, and to a Hispanic audience that has been key in my career as an immigrant in the U.S.”

Since joining Telemundo in 2018, Day has been instrumental in defining the network’s content direction. “A media executive with more than three decades of experience in Hispanic entertainment, he led the development and production of multiple seasons of our successful reality shows La Casa de los Famosos, Los 50, Exatlón, and Top Chef VIP, as well as our highly rated live specials including the Billboard Latin Music Awards and Miss Universe,” Luis Fernández, chairman of NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises, said in a statement shared with Billboard. “Most recently, he helped me reorganize Telemundo Studios and position them for future growth under Javier Pons leadership.”

Last June, Day was Billboard Español‘s executive of the month. In its second annual edition, Billboard‘s Latin Women in Music 2024 significantly boosted its viewership on Telemundo, shattering previous records. The event witnessed a staggering 541% increase in audience interactions across TV, digital platforms, Peacock, and social media compared to the 2023 show. The gala, which honored stars such as Karol G and Gloria Estefan, not only attracted 109.6 million minutes of video views — a 20% increase from 2023 — but also dominated its prime time slot, outperforming Univision by significant margins in key demographic groups.

Read his full Instagram statement here.

It’s an early evening in late September, and San Francisco is gleaming. The back patio at EMPIRE’s recording studios near the city’s Mission District is all white marble, reflecting the last rays of the setting sun as dozens of YouTube executives mill about, holding mixed drinks and picking at passed trays of beef skewers, falafel, lamb dumplings, and ham and chicken croquettes. At the moment, the companies’ top executives — EMPIRE founder and CEO Ghazi, COO Nima Etminan and president Tina Davis, as well as YouTube global head of music Lyor Cohen, among others — are sequestered in the studio’s live room for a quarterly business review, discussing the platform’s new tools, the label’s upcoming projects and how the two can best work together. A cake is adorned with YouTube’s latest milestone: 100 million members of its music subscription service.

Inside, the aesthetic is flipped: Black walls, dark wood floors and a black marble bar set the tone, while a projection screen in the main lounge area shows photos of Nigerian superstar and recent EMPIRE signee Tiwa Savage, who is in town finishing her new album. As Ghazi, Cohen and the others wrap their meeting and begin to filter into the party, everyone is ushered inside to hear her play some of her new music.

Trending on Billboard

“This is my first project at EMPIRE, and it’s really emotional for me because I’ve never had a label be this invested; most labels are not in the studio with you from morning until night,” Savage says before introducing her first single from the album, “Forgiveness,” which she will release a couple of weeks later. “They made me feel so welcome. I’ve been signed several times, but I’ve never been in a situation where it felt like home.”

The next day, at a barbecue restaurant near the studio, Ghazi is reflecting on the event — and what the connection with YouTube’s Cohen means to him. “I used an analogy with Lyor: ‘This is not a full-circle moment; this is the Olympic rings of full-circle moments,’ ” he says. “This brings so many circles of my life into place. I started as an engineer; I’m in a state-of-the-art studio that I could only dream about that I built with my bare hands. I used to listen to Run-D.M.C. — he found Run-D.M.C. The first tape I ever bought was Raising Hell — now I’m raising hell in the music business.” He laughs. “I prefer to call it ‘raising angels,’ but it’s cool. And then you have a giant like him in the record business that people used to blueprint their careers after, and now he’s telling me that he’s proud of the success I’ve had and that he watched me build a legacy. That’s validation.”

For Ghazi, 48, validation has seemingly been everywhere of late. The company that he founded in 2010 as a digital distributor for his friends in the Bay Area hip-hop scene has grown into one of the most formidable and powerful companies in the global music business. It has a record label, publishing and content divisions, a merchandise operation and 250 employees around the world, with a presence on six continents and deep connections to the local culture, politics and sports, including the Golden State Warriors and the San Francisco 49ers.

And now, as EMPIRE turns 15, it’s coming off its best year yet: For 19 nonconsecutive weeks, spanning from mid-July to the end of November, EMPIRE artist Shaboozey held the top slot on the Billboard Hot 100 with “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” tying the record for the chart’s longest-running No. 1 — an enviable achievement for any label, but particularly for an independent without any outside investment or corporate overlords. Shaboozey landed five nominations at the 2025 Grammy Awards, including best new artist and song of the year, redefining what is possible for an indie act and company in the modern music business.

Even more notably, that success arrived during a year when all three major labels experienced a painful and layoff-heavy molting process, reorganizing themselves to emphasize speed, technology, artist services and distribution — or, to put it another way, to try to look a lot more like EMPIRE. (“I think the battleship has been observing the speedboat for quite some time,” Ghazi says.) Amid those changes in the business, a new school of thought has emerged: that success is often found in cultural niches that gain mainstream acceptance from the bottom up, not the top down. Ghazi embodies that change: He may not have the mainstream name recognition of his peers in New York or L.A., but in his force of personality — humble yet emphatic, as many successful founders are — and his tireless, globe-­trotting pace, he fits right in among the elite movers and shakers of the business.

“This industry used to be full of super-colorful entrepreneurs that were focused on their art, and when you talked to them, they had a certain excitement and shine in their eyes. Unfortunately, there’s not that many of them [left],” Cohen says about Ghazi. “I would call him one of the few. A person that is committed to excellence, cares about the details, shows up, has continuity and he’s positive and enthusiastic.”

Hermès coat and shirt

Austin Hargrave

There’s another reason why the YouTube party held such significance for Ghazi: The video streaming service is another company born, bred and based in the Bay Area that grew into a music industry behemoth after being built on tech foundations. Ghazi worked in Silicon Valley, including at an ad-supported video streaming service half a decade before YouTube, prior to dedicating his life to music, first as a recording engineer and then at digital distributor Ingrooves. He then founded EMPIRE — and sees his company as part of that lineage. “I’ve never met a music exec that has such a grip on the three verticals — creative, business and technology — and is fluent in all of it and active in all of it,” says Peter Kadin, a major-label veteran who is now executive vp of marketing at EMPIRE. “Someone who can go from meeting with an engineering team about building out the future of our systems, to sitting with finance and going through our deal structures with all the major DSPs [digital service providers], to going to the studio at night and mixing a Money Man album. There is no other executive doing that.”

Ghazi’s tech background and San Francisco’s reputation as the center of the tech industry are among the many reasons why he has always maintained that EMPIRE will never leave the Bay. The area has been part of him since he grew up in San Francisco’s Potrero Hill neighborhood, during his days at San Francisco State, throughout his time in the trenches of the local hip-hop scene and even now, when he has the ear of the new mayor of San Francisco, Daniel Lurie, whom he’s advising on cultural matters, and is working hand in hand with the NBA and the Golden State Warriors to produce events and release projects surrounding the upcoming NBA All-Star Weekend, which will be held in the Bay Area in February for the first time in 25 years.

But for a city that has had its share of big music moments and in which several major companies got their start, San Francisco’s music, and music tech, scenes have receded over the last two decades, with many companies lured away by the brighter lights and easier connections that exist in New York or Los Angeles. It’s a fate Ghazi is determined to avoid for EMPIRE — and a trend he’s actively working to reverse.

Ghazi likes to tell a story about when he was in his 20s in the early 2000s and mixed The Game’s first mixtape at San Francisco’s Hyde Street Studios. The project, which came out in 2004, ultimately helped Game get signed to Dr. Dre’s Aftermath Records, and when Dre and one of his executives heard the tape, they wondered who had mixed it because it sounded much more professional than the typical lo-fi promotional tapes making the rounds among underground hip-hop heads at the time. The guys invited Ghazi down to L.A. and encouraged him to move to the city and start working with them.

“I was flattered by it, but I was also furious — mad that I had to leave the Bay to build a music career,” he recalls. “I remember driving past the Capitol Tower like, people drive past this building and think, ‘I’m going to work there one day.’ And we don’t have that in the Bay. And I was like, ‘That sucks! I’m going to figure this s–t out!’

“It took me a long time — a really long time — but I figured it out.”

Prada coat, shirt, pants and shoes.

Austin Hargrave

“This might be the most mellow day I’ve had in three months.”

A few weeks later, Ghazi is driving through the streets of San Francisco, giving the signature tour of the city that he offers to anyone new in town — or anyone who may have only heard of its downtown blight and violence as depicted by the national news. It’s another beautiful fall day in the Bay, the first vintage weather after an extended heat wave, and he has cleared his schedule for the afternoon. For the next four hours, he unspools the history of the city neighborhood by neighborhood, street by street.

From the EMPIRE office in the Financial District, he drives into Chinatown, then to the Marina District and the picturesque Palace of Fine Arts. After that it’s into the Presidio, where Lucasfilm is headquartered, then over the Golden Gate Bridge into Sausalito, stopping at an overlook for a view of the city. Then it’s back across the bridge into San Francisco, along Baker Beach into Sea Cliff and then Richmond District, the neighborhood where Ghazi lived in a 350-square-foot apartment when he was first dreaming up what would become EMPIRE. (“I had like four f–king jobs,” he says. “Some of the happiest times of my life, though. Some of the most stressful, but some of the happiest.”)

Along the way — passing through Lands End lookout point, Golden Gate Park, the Haight-­Ashbury district and Billionaires’ Row, down the famously crooked Lombard Street and into the Mission — he calls out the landmarks of his life: the apartment where he was born, his first recording studio, the place he got his first boba milk tea, the theater where he used to watch movies for two dollars, the Haight storefront where he once co-owned a clothing store, the place where he and Etminan built the wiring for the first EMPIRE office through a hole in the wall. After a few hours, he parks near the water and gets out of the car to take it all in.

“They say San Francisco’s a doom loop,” he says, looking across McCovey Cove into Oracle Park, home of the San Francisco Giants, in the late-afternoon sun. “This look like a doom loop to you?”

Louis Vuitton sunglasses and jacket

Austin Hargrave

San Francisco is personal to Ghazi in a way that goes deeper than the typical nostalgia people feel for home. And the recent right-wing news coverage by 24/7 cable networks — which has portrayed the city as crime-­ridden and drug-addled, overrun by a persistent homelessness problem that the city has not been able to handle — that has proliferated in recent years has spurred him and other music leaders in the city into action.

“San Francisco had such a heyday up until the pandemic, and it’s been really hard to watch the world s–t on our city,” says Bryan Duquette, founder of Another Planet Management and a member of the core executive team at Another Planet Entertainment, the San Francisco-based independent promoter that puts on the Outside Lands music festival and operates Bay Area venues including Berkeley’s Greek Theatre and San Francisco’s Bill Graham Civic Auditorium. Duquette, who has lived in the Bay for over 20 years, met Ghazi in 2023 and found a kindred spirit determined to rectify the negative perceptions held by outsiders. Last year, Another Planet teamed with Ghazi, EMPIRE and artist management company Brilliant Corners to assemble 100 members of the Bay Area music scene to meet with Lurie, then a mayoral candidate, to discuss his plan to reinvest in the artistic community. “Daniel really was trying to get to the people who were creating culture and helping the city become, again, what it was seen as globally,” Duquette says. “And Ghazi is a really big piece of that.”

Lurie’s outreach ultimately won him much of the creative community’s support, and in turn helped win him the election; he was sworn in as the 46th mayor of San Francisco in January. “The arts and culture have always defined us, and I firmly believe that EMPIRE and Ghazi are going to be part of the revitalization of our city,” Lurie says. “He knows what’s going on in the music world better than just about anybody, and I’ll be listening carefully to his guidance and his counsel.”

San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie and Ghazi in 2025.

Courtesy of EMPIRE

EMPIRE’s fierce independence, too, is an expression of the Bay’s ethos. “He’s a representative of the independent grind and the culture here; that’s something that everyone in the Bay can resonate with, just coming from the ground up and being the underdog,” says P-Lo, the Bay Area rapper who has been with EMPIRE since 2017. (P-Lo is spearheading a project with the Golden State Warriors’ content division, Golden State Entertainment, that will be released ahead of NBA All-Star Week and distributed by EMPIRE and will feature more than a dozen Bay Area artists.)

But that independence, and particularly the eye-opening success that EMPIRE has experienced over the past few years, has also brought scrutiny — and tests of Ghazi’s commitment, particularly during a time of intense consolidation in the music business. When a media report circulated in November 2023 positing that LionTree was lining up a $1.5 billion bid to buy EMPIRE — “Most believe Ghazi is not a seller, but big checks have changed other people’s minds,” the report needled — Ghazi was furious and sent a staffwide email emphatically denying it, according to multiple employees. A week after EMPIRE’s YouTube event, he was even more publicly defiant, insisting while onstage in October at the industry conference Trapital Summit in Los Angeles: “I’m not for sale. Period. I am dead serious. I am living my purpose. There’s no price on that.”

It’s a frustrating topic for Ghazi, not least because it implies a fundamental misunderstanding of who he is and why he does what he does. “You don’t understand — I just don’t care about money,” he says. “It’s not my motivation.” Instead he talks about the principles instilled in him by his father, a Palestinian refugee who brought his family to America to put them in a position to control their own paths if they were willing to work for it. “I don’t see myself ever working for somebody else,” Ghazi continues. “I’d rather retire. There’s no price for my autonomy. It’s the greatest gift to a leader.”

Still, his insistence on sole ownership — and the sheer force of personality that he exudes in binding the company together — has left enough of an opening for industry analysts to wonder about succession planning, about what might happen to the company when, or if, Ghazi decides to hang it up. He freely admits he won’t stick around as a hands-on CEO forever, but also that EMPIRE is about legacy for him and that he values legacy and autonomy — the freedom to chart his destiny — more than anything else. In that sense, he’ll never truly leave EMPIRE, even as the rumor mill keeps churning. “I always admired athletes who retired when they were on top. I want to be at the top of my executive game when I quit,” he says. “I don’t want to be the guy who hung on for too long. I’m already the owner, so I could still hang around as a chairman, but I don’t need to hang around as the guy running s–t day to day.”

Austin Hargrave

But that’s not happening anytime soon. In the past six months alone, EMPIRE has expanded into Australia, East Asia and South Africa and completed the acquisition of Top Drawer Merch to bring another monetization vertical into the fold for its artists. Ghazi is engaged in the industrywide debates surrounding superfandom revenue and is constantly seeking new opportunities; the two weeks prior to this driving tour, he had been in Tokyo, Seoul, Beijing, Cambodia, Singapore, Bali, San Francisco, Paris, Marrakesh, Singapore again, Seoul again, Las Vegas, Seattle and back to San Francisco: taking label meetings, shooting music videos, meeting with DSP partners, attending conferences and awards shows and directing work on the EMPIRE studios here, with the goal of expanding the company’s reach step by step — taking the stairs rather than the elevator, as he puts it.

“The goal is to be in all the places that make sense for us culturally,” he says. “Is the music interesting? Is the culture interesting? Holistically, how does it play with our DNA? What’s the cost of acquisition and retention? Do I like the music here? But the initial fuel is the passion; then, from there, start to figure it out.”

Joice Street is mobbed. The Nob Hill alley, around the corner from the Bruce Lee mural that adorns the wall next to the Chinese Historical Society of America Museum, is the location this afternoon for P-Lo’s “Player’s Holiday ’25” video shoot, and dozens of people, including some of the Bay’s biggest rappers — Saweetie, G-Eazy and Larry June among them — are filming on a basketball court on the roof of a building overlooking the city. Ghazi is there, not just because EMPIRE is distributing the song, which will appear on P-Lo’s album with Golden State Entertainment, but because he’s scheduled to make a cameo in the video.

Ghazi spends more than an hour on the rooftop, where he seemingly knows everyone — and everyone wants a minute of his time. But soon he heads back to the studio to return to work. The vibe there is low-key, but a typical cross section of artists and creatives are at work: Nai Barghouti, an Israeli-born Palestinian singer, flautist and composer, is in Studio C, working on songs for her new album before heading back out on tour; two producers from dance label dirtybird, which EMPIRE acquired in 2022, are in the live room, “ideating the next big hit of 2025”; a regional Mexican group sits on the patio outside, figuring out songs on a guitar; YS Baby from EMPIRE-owned viral content aggregator HoodClips (which has over 11 million followers) is talking about the podcasts he has lined up. Later, Japanese rapper-singer Yuki Chiba — whose 2024 collaboration with Megan Thee Stallion, “Mamushi,” reached No. 36 on the Hot 100 — takes over Studio A, where he plays a slew of songs slated for upcoming projects and discusses rollout plans.

EMPIRE may have gotten its start in Bay Area hip-hop and made waves on the front lines of West African Afrobeats, but these days it embodies the global outlook that Ghazi always envisioned; Shaboozey’s “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” after all, is a country crossover hit out of Nashville that reached No. 1 in 10 countries. EMPIRE partnered with Nashville-based indie promotion company Magnolia Music to handle its country radio campaign, and from there the single branched out to other formats, ultimately becoming the first song in history to go top 10 on four different Billboard airplay charts: country, top 40, adult top 40 and rhythmic. And Ghazi sees himself as a global citizen helping people around the world — “creating microeconomies” within the territories EMPIRE operates, he says — not just within the confines of the Bay Area.

Shaboozey and Ghazi at the 2024 CMA After Party.

Becca Mitchell

He is also the highest-profile Palestinian executive in the music business and has openly condemned the humanitarian crisis that has erupted during Israel’s war in Gaza. His Instagram profile picture is the Palestinian flag; he regularly shares videos and photos decrying the violence against civilians; he helped facilitate the remix to Macklemore’s track dedicated to Palestine, “Hind’s Hall,” and went to Seattle in October to support the rapper at a Palestinian benefit concert, despite Macklemore not being an EMPIRE artist. He stresses that he does this on a personal level, explicitly not to politicize the company. When asked if he feels a responsibility of sorts, given his profile, to help raise awareness about that humanitarian crisis, he simply says, “I feel like I want to be proud of the man in the mirror.” (“He’s Palestinian and I’m Israeli; we shared our great pain and anxiety over what’s happening in the Middle East,” says Cohen, who also calls Ghazi “a genuinely good guy.”)

But despite its global activities, EMPIRE has stayed focused on its local roots — and is continuing to strengthen them, too. In 2020, it started putting on the cultural festival 415 Day (which takes its name from a San Francisco area code) and has gotten further into live events through its deepening relationship with Another Planet. The San Francisco studio has become not just the creative center of EMPIRE’s operations but also an event venue for the city’s music and civic communities. And in a massive move in January, EMPIRE purchased the 100,000-square-foot historic Financial District building One Montgomery, built in 1908, for $24.5 million, according to The San Francisco Business Times; Ghazi plans to move the company headquarters there after renovating it. Eventually, One Montgomery could become the San Francisco version of the Capitol Tower that Ghazi envisioned all those years ago.

“There have been so many times that people have told him he couldn’t do something, and then he was able to do it, that it gave him all the fire and was the catalyst for him to be the person he is today,” says Moody Jones, GM of EMPIRE Dance, who has been with the company since 2018. “They told him he was crazy to have a music company in San Francisco; that he would never compete with a major; that he would never get out of hip-hop; that he would never open up a studio. They told him San Francisco would never be cool again. And every single time he was able to show them that, ‘No, I’m right.’ ”

That all builds into the larger cultural role Ghazi is playing in his city and beyond. Lurie just announced the inaugural San Francisco Music Week, a celebration of the city’s local music industry culminating in an industry summit with a keynote conversation with Ghazi. And while he says he’s not interested in San Francisco politics, he wants to be consulted from an advisory perspective on cultural events in the city and try to bring in more events beyond just music — Art Basel San Francisco is one that he has begun to advise on, though that project is currently on pause. He has worked with the city and the NBA on a slew of events around NBA All-Star Week and discusses the Super Bowl and World Cup in 2026 as further opportunities to showcase all that San Francisco has to offer. “For events like the NBA All-Star Game, Super Bowl LX, the World Cup, we get to show off all the greatness here, and Ghazi and EMPIRE and the artists they represent are part and parcel to what makes San Francisco so great,” Lurie says. “We need more Ghazis.”

Ahead of All-Star Week, he has made a series of moves and partnerships with the NBA and the Golden State Warriors, including with the game NBA 2K25, with which EMPIRE partnered for a first-of-its-kind deal that includes a limited-edition vinyl box set with 13 tracks by EMPIRE artists; EMPIRE artists on the game soundtrack; and Ghazi and some of EMPIRE’s artists scanned into the game itself. At the studio in September, he sat for an interview with NBA 2KTV host Alexis Morgan — who, to Ghazi’s delight, is also from the Bay Area — that will be part of NBA 2K25’s bonus features.

Ghazi (right) with NBA 2KTV’s Alexis Morgan.

Courtesy of 2K

But ultimately, it is all about the music. Shaboozey’s career is now in a superstar arc, and “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” will soon become EMPIRE’s fifth record with more than 10 million equivalent units in the United States according to Luminate, with over 1 billion on-­demand streams. A few years ago, EMPIRE was flying largely under the radar, but Ghazi now has it at the top of its game, with a track record that speaks volumes in an industry based just as much on history as on what’s coming next.

“You always learn, all the time; you’re always adapting to what’s going on around you,” he says. “And sometimes you can’t believe how far you’ve come. But that only inspires you to go further.”

This story appears in the Feb. 8, 2025, issue of Billboard.