Business
Page: 441
Warner Records is stepping further onto the dancefloor.
On Monday (March 13), the label announced the launch of its first-ever flagship dance label, Major Recordings. The label is led by executive Sam Mobarek, a longtime figure in the global dance music scene.
The label’s first signing, in partnership with Parlophone’s FFRR, is PARISI. The duo’s recent work includes behind-the-scenes production with Fred again.. and Swedish House Mafia and an official collaboration with Buy Now, the project from Swedish House Mafia’s Steve Angello and Sebastian Ingrosso. PARISI’s signing to Major Recording marks the launch of their artist project. (“They’re the producer’s producers,” says Mobarek.)
The launch of Major Recordings expand on Warner’s recent marquee successes in the dance realm, with label trio RÜFÜS DU SOL winning the best dance/electronic recording Grammy in 2022, producer Illenium earning a Grammy nomination that same year and David Guetta and Bebe Rexha‘s “I’m Good (Blue)” becoming a major 2022 hit, with the song reaching No. 4 on the Hot 100, where it’s currently in its 27th week.
With Major Recordings, Mobarek will take this momentum and focus it on the ground level of the dance music scene by discovering, signing and developing talent that reflects the breadth, depth, diversity and roots of the sonically sprawling genre.
“I don’t want to sign a bunch of things just because they’re going to give us streams,” she says. “I want to create something focused on community and good music.” Mobarek plans to achieve this goal by creating an artist-friendly label with personality and emotion, one that’s strongly tied to the underground, which has a strong network of artists and fans, and that’s not simply driven by bottom lines.
“Term-wise,” Mobarek says, “that means being fair and exploring how to be inventive about how we do our deals. We want everyone to make money, but because it’s dance music we’re not just gunning for hits; we’re gunning for cultural importance.” Additional signings will be announced in the coming months, with these to include both full artist signings and one-off singles, in order to create flexibility. Music signed to the label will represent the wide spectrum of dance music — a genre that offers a subgenre to fit every conceivable emotion or time of day.
“It will definitely be all over the place in that someone can come to us and be like, ‘What am I in the mood to do? Am I in the mood to sleep? Am I in the mood to rage? There’s [going to be] something here for all of those moods,” says Mobarek.
The label’s focus on authenticity aligns well for Mobarek, who’s been in dance music for nearly two decades. Her previous experience includes Ultra Music — where she led the marketing department and helped propel artists like Calvin Harris and Steve Aoki during the height of the EDM boom — the digital download store Beatport and her own marketing agency, Mob Creative, where clients included house music legend MK.
This on-the-ground experience, combined with Mobarek’s genuine love for the genre, have given her a deep understanding of sounds, trends and how to break artists and tracks not just across radio and streaming, but into the furthest corners of clubland.
“It’s not just about hiring a DJ servicing company and pushing music out via them,” Mobarek says of her strategy. “It’s about using the relationships I have with artists directly, timing things correctly, knowing who would care about [new music], knowing the difference between what Diplo’s Revolution and BPM would play [on Sirius] and which DJs are playing what.” In addition to signing acts and music, she’ll also work with Warner Music Group’s director of global strategy for electronic music, Anton Partridge, to identify dance acts signed to Warner in other territories and break them in the States.
“There’s a whole roster of Warner acts that I’ve been able to be like, ‘I know what to do with them here,” she says.
Such a nuanced understanding of the scene was key in making Mobarek the right fit for this new role. “With Major Recordings, we’re doubling down [on our strong presence in the dance music community], putting renewed energy and dedicated focus on supporting even more acts from around the world,” the label’s co-chairman & COO Tom Corson and co-chairman & CEO Aaron Bay-Schuck say in a joint statement. “Sam will be the driving force behind our success, helping us ensure that this music and these artists make a true global and cultural impact.”
“I can feel it in my stomach; we’re on the cusp of something,” Mobarek says of the energy behind dance music in the U.S. at the moment. “There are all these signs that point to it coming like [David Guetta and Bebe Rexha’s success and Skrillex, Four Tet and Fred again..’s sold out Madison Square Garden show].”
“I’m not going to try and predict what it looks like,” she continues, “but I’m going make sure people see it.”
A year ago, Country Radio Seminar (CRS) gave broadcasters a wakeup call.
With the 2023 edition of the conference, it should become clearer if the industry is facing a new day head on or if it simply hit the Snooze button.
Panelists in 2022 lamented a four-year decline in listenership, a drop that overlaps with a system in which singles often take over 40 weeks — sometimes as much as 60 weeks — to run their course. By contrast, labels are increasingly gearing their marketing plans to streaming platforms that expose wider arrays of music and target individuals’ playlists with greater specificity. On the final day last year, Country’s Radio Coach owner/CEO John Shomby gave a TED Talk-style presentation that chided broadcasters for a nagging sameness and called for a committee of radio and music business executives to figure out a reboot.
As Country Radio Broadcasters revs up CRS again March 13-15, that chat continues to echo in the agenda at the Omni Nashville Hotel. Shomby’s CRS Music Committee — which generated 60-70 respondents in its first hour, according to CRB executive director R.J. Curtis — has been segmented into four overlapping subcommittees that will likely make their first reports in an upcoming CRS360 webinar. Meanwhile, the CRS presentations include several topics that address the issues that have brought the format to a crossroads — “Radio & Records: Redefining the Relationship,” “Just Effing Do It: The Rewards of Taking Risks” and “Fred Jacobs’ Fred Talk: The Future Ain’t What It Used To Be.”
“CRS should be a reality-check moment,” Curtis says. “I don’t believe our purpose is to just shake each other’s hands and high-five and congratulate each other on another great year because not every year is great. We’re facing a lot of different challenges, and I think it’s important for us to own them and figure out how to solve them.”
Country music has a long history with radio. March 2022 marked 100 years since Fiddlin’ John Carson became the first hillbilly act to perform on-air, on WSB Atlanta, and Jan. 4 represented a century since country was introduced on the medium west of the Mississippi River, via The Radio Barn Dance on WBAP Dallas-Fort Worth. Still, the genre never had a full-time station until KDAV Lubbock, Texas, debuted in 1953.
Radio ultimately became the primary method of exposing the genre’s new music. It went largely unchallenged in that position until streaming took hold this century. The new medium operates differently — pressing a Skip button allows a streaming listener to skirt individual titles while still listening to the playlist, whereas skipping a song on the radio requires changing stations. To preserve listenership in this era, programmers generally relied on safe measures that had worked previously, cutting the size of playlists and/or hanging on to proven titles for longer periods of time. Those solutions tend to pay off in the short run, but over the long haul, they can discourage extended listening among the most passionate music fans.
“They’re just afraid of making a mistake,” says Shomby of programmers’ dilemma. “It’s like a football team that just hands the ball off to one guy and he runs up the middle, and then you hope that somebody opens up a hole. There’s no [taking chances] — there’s no throwing any long passes, you’re not doing any double reverses or anything like that. You just run left. And that’s kind of the way I feel like our industry is at this point.”
Actionable Insights Group head of research Billy Ray McKim was among the attendees who signed up for the CRS Music Committee last year after Shomby’s presentation.
“Plenty of people talked about it for days and weeks, and I continue to hear people refer back to it,” McKim says. “He managed to tie a bow on it.”
McKim is now overseeing the subcommittee studying the life cycle of songs, generally aiming to speed the march of singles through national radio charts and energize the format. The issue is complex.
“There was this idea that we would spend a year and find a finite solution and move on,” says McKim. “What’s become even more clear through this process is there isn’t a simple solution. So I think that this committee will continue to live and evolve.”
Changing aspects of the industry will get center stage through much of CRS. Digital streaming, for example, has a full day of convention programming. CRS also offers a panel on “expansive inclusion” and an examination of evolving demographics in “Okay Boomer! A Conversation With Gen Z.”
CRS will continue to offer some familiar elements. Garth Brooks and Kenny Chesney will be the focus of keynote artist Q&As, the annual research panel presents insights from a 700-song auditorium test, and the closing New Faces of Country Music dinner will feature Jackson Dean, Priscilla Block, Jelly Roll, Nate Smith and Frank Ray.
That latter event will include recognition of a new wrinkle in the convention. The last of CRS’ founders, Charlie Monk, died Dec. 19, and this will be the first year he is not at the seminar in some form or fashion. New Faces is expected to honor his influence, which is particularly fitting this year. Monk’s ability to process the past and anticipate the future should provide some inspiration for the industry as it moves forward: the “Mayor of Music Row” counted classic singer Frank Sinatra as his favorite artist, but often said his favorite single was whatever was No. 1 that particular week.
“He didn’t get stuck in one particular era, and that’s very evident by the amount of people much, much younger than him that called him a mentor and a friend,” Curtis says. “He sought out younger leaders in our format. He benefited from their knowledge and their way of doing business, and I think it was really impressive.”
Country music’s relationship with radio predates even Monk’s arrival. Programmers’ goal during CRS will be to create some forward movement for a platform that is still regarded as a key means of exposure for even the newest generation of talent.
“I come across a lot of young artists, and they still have that dream to be heard on the radio,” says Shomby. “I mean, it doesn’t get them as excited to have a song playlisted on Spotify as it does to hear their song on their local radio station. So there’s still something there that creates a passion for the format.”
Subscribe to Billboard Country Update, the industry’s must-have source for news, charts, analysis and features. Sign up for free delivery every weekend.
Lewis Largent, the influential alternative rock radio DJ and MTV VJ that hosted 120 Minutes, died on Feb. 20, a representative confirmed to Billboard.
He passed away after a long illness, Variety first reported.
Explore
Explore
See latest videos, charts and news
See latest videos, charts and news
Largent grew up in Southern California and launched his career in music at L.A.’s KROQ, with an internship that turned into a full-time role in 1985. Four years later, he was named musical director at the alternative radio station.
In 1992, Largent shifted over to MTV, where he landed as a vp of music programming and became the host of 120 Minutes, bringing artists including David Bowie, Bjork, Trent Reznor, Radiohead and PJ Harvey to television screens everywhere on Sunday nights. He was the face of the show through 1995, though he stayed with the company in his programming role until 1999.
His role as host was next appointed to Matt Pinfield, who upon hearing of Largent’s death tweeted Friday, “I am completely gutted. I loved Lewis very much. I am at a loss for words.”
Following his years with MTV, Largent went to Island Def Jam Records, where as svp of A&R he signed artists such as Sum 41 and Andrew WK. He left IDJ in 2004.
Later in life, he went back to college to study creative writing, earning a bachelor’s degree from Sarah Lawrence College and his Master of Fine Arts in 2015.
Largent is survived by wife Julie Greenwald, Atlantic Music Group chairman and CEO, and their two children.
The Cure is taking serious measures to avoid outrageous ticket prices for their upcoming tour dates. The band, which announced a 30-date run of shows earlier this week, took to social media Friday (March 10) to let fans (and scalpers) know that tickets for their Shows of a Lost World Tour dates will be non-transferable.
“We want the tour to be affordable for all fans, and we have a very wide (and we think very fair) range of pricing at every show,” the message said. “Our ticketing partners have agreed to help us stop scalpers from getting in the way; to help minimise resale and keep prices at face value, tickets for this tour will not be transferable.”
By making the tickets non-transferable, scalpers will be unable to purchase tickets and then resell them for a profit since the original owner will have to be present to enter the venue. For fans who purchase tickets but can’t make it to the event, they will be able to resell the ticket on a face-value ticket exchange.
Three states in the U.S. have outlawed non-transferable tickets, making it illegal for The Cure to uphold the practice for shows in New York, Illinois and Colorado. For those dates, the band encourages fans to only purchase tickets from face-value exchange platforms like Twickets and Cash or Trade.
“Fans should avoid buying tickets that are being resold at inflated prices by scalpers, and the sites that host these scalpers should refrain from reselling tickets for our shows,” the message reads.
The band went on to explain that any tickets listed as of today (March 10) on secondary ticketing sites are not legitimate. Scalpers will post tickets onto secondary ticketing platforms prior to a tour’s on-sale via a practice called speculative ticketing. When a fan pays for the “speculative ticket”, the scalper will acquire a ticket at a lower price once tickets actually go on sale and pocket the difference. The Cure has stated that they will work with Ticketmaster to cancel any tickets obtained via this method.
When the band announced the world tour earlier this week, they established that “there will be no ‘Platinum’ or ‘Dynamically Priced’ tickets on this tour,” which includes stops at Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, Moody Center in Austin, Madison Square Garden in New York and State Farm Arena in Atlanta.
Fans looking to secure tickets to The Cure’s 2023 tour should register with Ticketmaster’s Verified Fan program. Registration is open through Monday (March 13). After registering, fans will be entered into a lottery system to try to purchase tickets for their preferred date and location.
The Cure’s efforts to combat resale ticketing comes after a season of in-demand tours facing astronomical price increases due to dynamic ticketing and scalpers. Ticketmaster is currently facing government inquiries into its handling of the disastrous Taylor Swift Eras Tour presale, which left many fans outraged when service delays and website crashes (caused in part by bots) prevented many of them from securing tickets.
The Rolling Stones members Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were hit with a copyright lawsuit on Friday (March 10) claiming their 2020 single “Living in a Ghost Town” — a rare new song from the rock legends — lifted material from a pair of little-known earlier tracks.
In a lawsuit filed in New Orleans federal court, songwriter Sergio Garcia Fernandez (stage name Angelslang) is claiming that Jagger and Richards “misappropriated many of the recognizable and key protected elements” from his 2006 song “So Sorry” as well as his 2007 tune “Seed of God.”
How would members of the iconic band have heard those songs, which have less than 1,000 spins on Spotify? Fernandez claims he gave a demo CD to “an immediate family member” of Jagger.
“The immediate family member … confirmed receipt … to the plaintiff via e-mail, and expressed that the musical works of the plaintiff and its style was a sound The Rolling Stones would be interested in using,” Fernandez’s lawyers wrote in Friday’s complaint.
A copy of the alleged email from Jagger’s relative was not included in public filings.
Released at the peak of the COVID-19 shutdowns in April 2020, “Living in a Ghost Town” was the first original material released by the Stones since 2012. The song, a blues-rock tune with reggae influences accompanied by a COVID-themed video, reached No. 3 on the Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart in May 2020.
But Fernandez says the new song was created by borrowing key features from his songs, including the “vocal melodies, the chord progressions, the drum beat patterns, the harmonica parts, the electric bass line parts, the tempos, and other key signatures” from “So Sorry” and the “harmonic and chord progression and melody” from “Seed of God.”
“Defendants never paid plaintiff, nor secured the authorization for the use of ‘So Sorry’ and ‘Seed of God,’ his lawyers wrote.
A rep for The Rolling Stones did not immediately return a request for comment on Friday evening.
The battle for control of K-pop company SM Entertainment has been a boon for its shareholders. SM’s stock rose 14.4% this week to 147,800 won ($111.95) after Kakao launched a tender offer to seek a 35% stake at 150,000 won ($113.62) per share. Korea’s largest music company, HYBE, previously sought to acquire up to 40% of SM shares at 120,000 won ($90.89) per share. Its tender offer largely failed, however, with HYBE’s stake increasing just 1% — from 14.8% to 15.8% — as investors held out for a better offer.
SM was one of just three stocks in the 20-company Billboard Global Music Index to be in positive territory this week. Abu Dhabi-based music streamer Anghami rose 5.5% and German concert promoter CTS Event rose 1.5%. The overall Global Music Index declined 3.9% to 1,192.56.
Shares of Spotify declined 1.7% to $121.67 this week after it unveiled a slew of new product features at its annual StreamOn event on Wednesday. The company announced it has already surpassed the 500 million monthly active user target for the first quarter with an entire month remaining.
In the U.S., the Dow index fell 1.1% and the S&P 500 declined 1.5%. The big news in the financial markets on Friday (March 10) was the closure of Silicon Valley Bank, the country’s 18th largest bank with assets of nearly $213 billion, according to the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council; it was a major player amongst the region’s tech companies and venture capital firms. It’s the second-biggest bank failure in U.S. history behind Washington Mutual at the height of the 2007-08 financial crisis. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation was appointed SVB’s receiver on Friday and will give insured depositors access to their funds no later than Monday.
The U.K.’s FTSE 100 Index declined 1.7%, Japan’s Nikkei 225 index declined 1.7% and Korea’s KOSPI index declined 1.0%.
This article was written in paid partnership with Triller.
Triller, the U.S.-based answer to foreign social media video sharing services, is poised to have a big 2023. The startup first rose to prominence in 2020, as it made headlines for producing blockbuster pay-per-view boxing matches as well as launching careers for a slew of up and coming combat sports athletes. Beyond its emphasis on sports promotion, the company was also embraced by many creators in 2020 as its China-based competitor faced increasing hostility from Congress and former President Donald Trump. While its competition readies itself for its first-ever testimony before Congress later this month, the future couldn’t look brighter for Triller, who is currently on the cusp of being publicly traded on the NYSE under the ticker symbol “illr.”
For Triller Executive Chairman and Owner Bobby Sarnevesht, the company’s success is due in no small part to the fact that it’s the only big tech company that isn’t owned by big tech. “Our primary stakeholders are the artists and the influencers themselves,” Sarnevesht says. “What people don’t understand is that we aren’t just ‘for the artists,’ we are the artists.” With a string of celebrity endorsements spanning social media, music, sports, and more, Sarnevesht claims that Triller might be “the largest creator owned company ever to exist.”
Explore
Explore
See latest videos, charts and news
See latest videos, charts and news
While Triller does see itself as a bold competitor to other video sharing social media platforms, it does not define itself as such. “A lot of people came rushing onto Triller a few years ago when Trump first brought up the idea of a ban [on the foreign competition],” Sarnevesht says. “We definitely leaned into that…but that is not who we are, that is not how we define ourselves.”
Sarnevesht knows first hand how hard it is to build an audience on social media, and prides himself on Triller’s creator-first positioning. “I hear daily horror stories about hard working artists who spent the last three years building their following – whether it’s to 5,000, 500,000 or 50 million people – only to wake up and find that [their platform] is literally blocking them from marketing to their own audience if they don’t pay [them]. [These platforms] put up a paywall where they actually block you from posting to all your own users without paying for…access [to] them,” Sarnevesht says.
On Triller, Sarnevesht explains, companies are set up to actually give the creator direct ownership of the relationship with their followers and maximize their revenue. “That’s why our products like Cliqz, our SMS app for influencers, get over a 70% open rate and an unheard of over 30% click through rate,” Sarnevesht says. “Creators literally can make 10x or more on Triller [than] they can on any other platform.”
Triller alleges to be majority owned by actual artists, influencers, and talent who in turn can maximize engagement with their followers and take home more revenue versus other platforms where big tech takes the lion’s share. According to Sarnevesht, the company’s “secret sauce” lies in its use of AI. “Triller at its core is an AI company. Its base of AI comes by way of an acquisition approximately two years ago [when Triller bought AI startup] Amplify.AI,” Sarnevesht says. Sarnevesht and team refer to Triller’s Conversational AI system as “ChatGPT for Brands,” claiming that to date, the technology has enabled over 20B conversations with more than half a billion users. “While others are just discovering ‘ChatGPT’ and trying to find some AI angle for valuation purposes, Triller literally is built on AI and always has been,” Sarnevesht says.
Ahead of what could surely be the brand’s biggest year to date, Sarnevesht and team have launched a custom social media converter for creators to transfer their entire video sharing accounts, including usernames, to Triller. “This is our coming out party,” says Sarnevesht. “Transfer your [other accounts] now.”
For Sarnevesht and team, Triller isn’t just a social media app but an entire creator ecosystem unto itself. According to Sarnevesht, Triller has conducted 10 acquisitions since 2020, making it more than a single app but a marketplace setup to allow influencers to, as Sarnevesht puts it, create the best content and share it as broadly as possible across all other social media networks while retaining control of their own users and maximizing what they can make.
Keep your eye on this space for more from Triller and Sarnevesht.
The U.S. recorded music business posted its seventh consecutive year of growth in 2022 as the industry continues to benefit from streaming services such as Spotify, Apple Music and YouTube. After spending most of the last two decades in a painful freefall — piracy devastated CD sales and the download-driven unbundling of the album didn’t make up for it — the recorded music business has enjoyed a great run. Last year, paid subscription revenues surpassed $10 billion for the first time, according to the RIAA, and overall revenues reached $15.9 billion.
Here’s the bad news: Last year’s growth, in terms of both dollar and percentage increases, was the lowest since 2016, when the recorded music business started to recover from a 15-year downturn. Happy days may be here again, but they’re not getting happier like they were.
Total recorded music revenues grew 6.1%, but that’s about a quarter of 2021’s 23.2% gain. Paid streaming revenues improved 7.2% in 2022, a third of the 22.2% growth in 2021. It was the first time that this segment’s growth rate fell into the single digits since 2010. That year paid streaming revenues rose just 2.9% to $212 million. Over the next decade, as annual paid streaming grew to 57.8% of total recorded music revenue in 2022, the segment’s annual growth often exceeded 50% and fell below 20% only twice.
Ad-supported streaming’s revenue growth rate also fell into the single digits, also for the first time in more than a decade. Slowed by an advertising malaise that has also affected companies ranging from Alphabet to iHeartMedia, streaming services’ advertising royalties to record labels grew 5.6% compared to 44.4% in 2021 and 16.8% in 2020. In dollar terms, last year’s revenue growth was the lowest since 2015.
The slowdown shouldn’t catch anybody by surprise given the industry’s reliance on streaming, subscription services’ unwillingness — until recently — to raise prices and a finite number of potential customers. The problem comes down to basic math: Fees from subscription services accounted for 57.9% of recorded music revenues in 2022. At just 2.4% of total revenues, a high-growth segment like synchronization barely moves the needle despite rising 24.8% in 2022. Vinyl sales were strong once again — up 17.2% — but accounted for just 7.7% of total recorded music revenues.
Up-and-coming revenue streams such as TikTok, Facebook and Instagram are just that — not yet ready to deliver meaningful royalties despite their popularity. Their revenues are included in the ad-supported streaming bucket that increased just 5.5% in 2022. TikTok faces high expectations but large uncertainty, too, as it faces pressure from politicians at the state and federal level that could reduce its importance. In addition, the company has installed parental controls that are likely to reduce engagement and further reduce its potential value to artists and labels.
A positive trend is subscription services’ decisions to raise prices on individual and family plan tiers. In 2022, Apple Music, Amazon Music and Deezer raised prices in the U.S. Spotify has not yet announced a price hike for standard subscription plans but has hinted it will follow suit in 2023. Labels are eagerly awaiting Spotify’s move. “We are the lowest (cost) form of entertainment,” Warner Music Group CEO Robert Kyncl said Thursday. “We have the highest …engagement, highest form of affinity and lowest per-hour price. That doesn’t seem right.”
Globally, the situation looks better. The industry in China, the world’s most populous country, is flourishing thanks to streaming companies such as Tencent Music Entertainment and Cloud Music. In Japan, the world’s second-largest recorded music market, streaming revenues increased 125% in 2022, according to the RIAJ. At Spotify, which operates in 184 markets, revenue increased 21.3% in 2022 to 11.7 billion euros ($12.4 billion), with about equal growth rates from paid and ad-supported streaming. Annual revenues of two smaller streaming companies, Europe-focused Deezer and MENA-focused Anghami, grew 13% and 36%, respectively.
In the U.S., a maturing streaming business alone cannot maintain the breakneck pace of the last seven years. Labels will need more than the status quo to return to double-digit growth.
A year after Morris Day accused the Prince estate of trying to “rewrite history” by “taking my name away,” it appears that the ugly dispute over his band name has been worked out. But Day’s attorney tells Billboard that other key issues with the estate remain unresolved.
Last year’s outcry was prompted by a threat letter in which attorneys for the estate complained about Day’s efforts to own the trademark registration “Morris Day and The Time” — the name of the Prince-affiliated band he’s led for years. In it, they told him he had “no right” to use the name “in any form.”
That dispute now appears to be in the rearview mirror. In December, the federal trademark office formally published Day’s application for such a trademark registration. At that point, the Prince estate had 30 days to file an opposition case against him, but records show it did not do so.
The progress is perhaps unsurprising, given the change in the control of the Prince estate that has taken place in the year since Day’s complaints.
Last year’s threat letter came from Comerica, a court-appointed bank that administered the estate during a years-long legal battle. With that case finally closed, the Prince estate is now in the hands of its permanent stewards: industry bigwig Primary Wave on the one hand, and a group of heirs and advisors led by longtime Prince attorney Londell McMillan on the other in what amounts to a 50-50 split. And during last year’s fracas, both Primary Wave and McMillan voiced public support for Day.
Day and Prince were frequent collaborators in the early 1980s. Day was the lead singer of The Time, a group known for their high-octane funk; Prince wrote and produced much of their music under an alias. They toured together, and The Time appeared prominently as Prince’s rival band in the 1984 film Purple Rain. In a 1990 interview, Prince said The Time was “the only band I’ve ever been afraid of.”
In December 2021, attorneys for the estate sent a letter to Day over the trademark registration on “Morris Day and The Time,” a name he had continued to use on tours for decades. They warned him that it violated a 1982 written agreement in which Day allegedly agreed that Prince’s company would retain all rights to the band’s name. Unless Day reached a deal with the estate, the attorneys said they would file a formal case against him at the federal trademark office.
A few months later, Day spoke out publicly about the dispute, saying he had “spent 40 years of my life” building the name and that Prince had had “no problem” with him using it. “Now that Prince is no longer with us, suddenly, the people who control his multi million dollar estate want to rewrite history by taking my name away from me, thus impacting how I feed my family,” Day wrote in a social media post.
Day’s post quickly sparked outrage against Comerica. Former Prince bassist Nik West took to Instagram to complain: “I don’t see how ‘randoms’ can tell you this! Morris Day and the Time forever … we ALL know what time it is!” Primary Wave, which at that point was not yet in control of the estate, quickly joined the chorus of critics, telling Comerica to “do the right thing here.”
Now, a year later, Day’s trademark application is advancing, and his attorney Richard Jefferson tells Billboard that he and his client are optimistic that “things will be amicable moving forward.” But despite the headway on the “Time” name, Jefferson says they’re still working to resolve broader issues with the Prince estate.
“All I can say at this point is that we are making progress,” he said in an email. “The trademark is only one of a few issues at play.”
Case in point: Public records show that Day is also currently seeking to regain his ownership rights to two of The Time’s biggest songs using copyright law’s so-called termination right — a provision that allows creators to win back control of works that they sold away decades earlier.
In June, Day’s attorneys submitted formal notice that he planned to terminate the estate’s control over his songwriting stakes in “Jungle Love,” which hit No. 20 on the Billboard Hot 100, and “The Bird,” which reached No. 36 on the chart. Both songs also appeared prominently in Purple Rain.
If the termination process is completed, Day would recover a 50% share of the “Jungle Love” composition and a 33 percent stake in “The Bird” composition, according to the filings. The remaining shares of those songs, originally owned by Prince, would still be owned by the estate. But in practice, such filings are often simply a starting point, leading to a renegotiation of rights deals rather than an outright termination.
Representatives for both halves of the Prince estate did not return requests for comment.
Julie Adam was named executive vp/general manager at Universal Music Canada, where she will lead frontline operations, overseeing marketing, digital strategy, commercial affairs and brand partnership portfolios. Adam joins from Rogers Sports & Media, where she was most recently president of news & entertainment.
Alison Donald was promoted to head of global creative at Kobalt, where she will be based between London and Los Angeles. She previously oversaw A&R and creative in the U.K. and Europe for Kobalt Music Publishing as well as AWAL’s U.K. and Europe creative team prior to its sale.
Jennifer Blakeman joined Seeker Music as chief rights & royalties officer. She comes from boutique music publisher one77 Music, where she served as president/chief creative officer. In her new role, she will lead and oversee the expansion of Seeker’s rights management, administration and royalty platforms. Blakeman can be reached at blakeman@seekermusic.com.
Michael Allen was named vp of marketing strategy at Republic Records, where he will develop and execute campaigns for artists across pop and K-pop. The New York-based executive joined Republic in 2020 as a digital marketing consultant.
Gabe Fleet joined law firm Latham & Watkins as partner in the connectivity, privacy & information practice. Fleet, a prominent music licensing lawyer, joins from iHeartMedia, where he served as executive vp of business affairs and chief music licensing counsel. He anticipates being part of Latham’s New York office upon admission to the New York Bar; he is currently licensed to practice in Georgia and Alabama. He can be reached at Gabe.Fleet@lw.com.
Merlin announced several promotions. They include Ryan McWhinnie to vp of business and legal affairs, Shrina Patel to senior director of business and legal affairs, Chris Tarbet to senior director of commercial partnerships, Chaida Kapfunde to senior director of business and technology solutions, Pavan Vasdev to director of strategy & growth, Quentin Martins to senior manager of commercial partnerships and Grace Styles to senior finance assistant.
Big Machine Label Group promoted Courtney Daly, Bekah Digby and Marie Wapelhorst to director of streaming and Anna Scott Welch to manager of streaming. Sam Featherstone also joined the company as director of streaming; he was previously at Sony Music Entertainment, where he served as associate director of commercial partnerships. Daly can be reached at courtney.daly@bmlg.net, Digby can be reached at bekah.digby@bmlg.net, Featherstone can be reached at sam.featherstone@bmlg.net, Wapelhorst can be reached at marie.wapelhorst@bmlg.net and Scott Welch can be reached at annascott.welch@bmlg.net.
Red Street Records hired several new team members, including Brooklynn Gould-Bradbury as manager of publicity and communications, Dottie Chamberlain as executive assistant/operations manager and Riley Cooper as digital marketing coordinator. Gould-Bradbury joins from CMT and can be reached at brooklynn.g@redstreetrecords.com. Chamberlain joins from Universal Music Nashville, where she served as executive assistant to chairman/CEO Mike Dungan (for whom she worked for nearly three decades). She can be reached at Dottie.c@redstreetrecords.com. Cooper, who is coming off internships with companies including Sweet Talk Publicity and Triple 8 Management, can be reached at riley.c@redstreetrecords.com.
Universal Music Group senior vp of business and legal affairs Aaron Harrison was appointed to the SoundExchange board of directors; he replaces Sony Music’s Jeff Walker. Harrison also serves on the SoundExchange licensing committee.
Hannah Babitt, CEO/founder of Los Angeles-based boutique management company BABZ, announced the opening of BABZ Nashville. Babitt will oversee BABZ in both Los Angeles and Nashville, with Jacklyn Figueiredo and Eden Lytle based in Los Angeles.
Claudia Russo was named senior vp of corporate communications at UTA. She joins from Verizon Business Markets, where she served as head of communications. Beginning in the role immediately, she will relocate to Los Angeles from New York this summer.
Sweden-based label A-P Records rebranded to Overtone Studios and named producer/songwriter Rami Yacoub as director of music development, North America. Based in Los Angeles, he’ll help spearhead the company’s international expansion.
Adam Sachs was named senior vp of entertainment, comedy and podcasts programming at SiriusXM. The executive first joined the satellite broadcaster following its acquisition of Team Coco, where he served as president.
First Artists Management hired Zoe Hart as agent in its London office and promoted Hailey Flame to agent in Los Angeles. Hart, who joins from Faber Music, can be reached at ZHart@firstartistsmgmt.com. Flame can be reached at Hflame@firstartistsmgmt.com.
Nigel Elderton was named chairman at music technology company Audoo, which is focused on improving accuracy, transparency and reporting in public performance royalty data collection and payment distribution.