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Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) is following up last week’s open letter to Live Nation over “dramatic service failures” during the Taylor Swift presale with a hearing on competition across the ticketing industry. The senator and her across-the-aisle counterpart on the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Competition Policy, Antitrust and Consumer Rights, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), jointly announced the hearing, with a date and witness list forthcoming.
“Last week, the competition problem in ticketing markets was made painfully obvious when Ticketmaster’s website failed hundreds of thousands of fans hoping to purchase concert tickets,” said Klobuchar, without mentioning Swift. “The high fees, site disruptions and cancellations that customers experienced shows how Ticketmaster’s dominant market position means the company does not face any pressure to continually innovate and improve.”
Klobuchar said the hearing will examine the effects of consolidation across ticketing — namely that a lack of competition suppresses the need to improve services and maintain fair pricing.
Lee added that consumers “deserve the benefit of competition in every market, from grocery chains to concert venues. I look forward to exercising our Subcommittee’s oversight authority to ensure that anticompetitive mergers and exclusionary conduct are not crippling an entertainment industry already struggling to recover from pandemic lockdowns.”
Aside from a possible grilling by U.S. senators, Live Nation and Ticketmaster are said to be under investigation by the Justice Department as to whether the company maintains an illegal monopoly over the live event ticketing ecosystem. The probe, according to The New York Times, predates this current debacle involving Swift’s tour presale.
Ticketmaster has apologized for the debacle, which started Nov. 15 when millions of Swift fans overwhelmed a presale for her Eras Tour — causing site crashes and hours-long waits, with many fans left empty-handed and — possibly newly engaged in politics. Ticketmaster went on to cancel the general sale as well.
“I apologize to all our fans. We are working hard on this,” Liberty Media CEO and Live Nation chairman Greg Maffei said in an appearance on CNBC last Thursday. “Building capacity for peak demand is something we attempt to do, but this exceeded every expectation.”
Swift’s tour is actually being promoted by Live Nation competitor AEG, which has told Billboard it “didn’t have a choice” in terms of ticketing sales and distribution because of Ticketmaster’s “exclusive deals with the vast majority of venues on the Eras tour.”
Ticketmaster and Live Nation have long been dogged by accusations that they exert an unfair dominance over the market for live concerts, particularly since they merged in 2010 to create their current structure. The combined entity has operated for its entire existence under a so-called consent decree imposed by the DOJ when it approved the merger. Under the decree, Live Nation is prohibited from retaliating against venues that refuse to use Ticketmaster. Those restrictions were set to expire in 2020 but were extended by five years in 2019 after the DOJ accused Live Nation of repeatedly violating the decree.
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: Live Nation faces potential legal fallout from Ticketmaster’s Taylor Swift fiasco, Journey bandmates sue each other over an American Express account, Mariah Carey loses a bid for ‘Queen of Christmas’ trademarks, and much more.
THE BIG STORY: Taylor Swift … Trust Buster?
A week removed from Ticketmaster’s disastrous presale for Taylor Swift’s upcoming Eras Tour, criticism of parent company Live Nation isn’t getting any quieter – and the threat of legal repercussions is growing.Live Nation has apologized to fans and pinned the blame on a “staggering number of bot attacks” and “unprecedented traffic.” And whether or not the star really was forced to use Ticketmaster is a complicated question, as Billboard’s Dave Brooks writes.But the debacle, which saw widespread service delays and website crashes as millions of fans tried (and many failed) to buy tickets for Swift’s 2023 Eras Tour, has nonetheless resurfaced some uncomfortable legal questions for the all-powerful concert giant.Since they merged in 2010, Ticketmaster and Live Nation have been dogged by accusations that they form a near-monopoly in the market for live concerts, potentially violating federal antitrust laws. Federal regulators at the U.S. Department of Justice approved that deal, but only after Live Nation signed a so-called consent decree that aimed to allay fears that they might abuse their dominant position. Among other things, the agreement prohibits the company from retaliating against venues or acts that refuse to use Ticketmaster. Those rules were set to expire in 2020, but were extended by five years in 2019 after the DOJ accused Live Nation of repeatedly violating the decree.In the wake of the Swift fiasco, those same monopoly questions are back in the spotlight – and some lawmakers want more than just another extension of the consent decree.On Tuesday, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) blasted Live Nation as a “monopoly” and called for regulators to “break them up.” Two days later, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), the chair of the Senate subcommittee for antitrust issues, warned that the company’s market share “insulates it from the competitive pressures that typically push companies to innovate and improve their services.”Then on Friday, the New York Times reported that DOJ had already been investigating Live Nation for months over potential antitrust violations, reaching out to venues across the country to ask about the company’s conduct. Reacting to that news, Klobuchar and two other Democratic senators on Monday urged the Justice Department to take hard action if they discover more violations, including “unwinding the Ticketmaster-Live Nation merger and breaking up the company.”“This may be the only way to truly protect consumers, artists, and venue operators and to restore competition in the ticketing market,” the senators wrote.Such action might have been unthinkable just a few years ago, amid a decades-long period of relatively lax antitrust enforcement that saw airlines and mobile providers (and yes, music companies) merging into ever-larger conglomerations. But the Biden-era Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission have embarked on an aggressive new effort to crack down on such mega-mergers, including successfully blocking book publisher Penguin Random House from buying up rival Simon & Schuster.Beyond the Justice Department probe, other legal threats also potentially loom for Live Nation. The attorneys general of Tennessee, North Carolina, Nevada and Pennsylvania have all launched investigations into whether state consumer protection and antitrust laws were violated, including a Tennessee state law that aims to fight the use of automated “bots” on ticketing websites.And don’t forget about class actions. Live Nation is already facing an existing case that accuses the company of “blatant, anti-consumer behavior,” and the rest of the plaintiffs bar could be eager to try similar cases in the wake of such a high-profile snafu. At least one group of Swift-loving lawyers is already brainstorming how to bring cases.Faced with all that, can Live Nation shake it off? Stay tuned…
Other top stories this week…
JOURNEY’S CREDIT CARD CLASH – Journey guitarist Neal Schon filed a lawsuit against bandmate Jonathan Cain over allegations that he’s blocking access to “critical” financial records for the band’s American Express account, through which “millions” in Journey money has allegedly flowed: “This action is brought to turn the lights on, so to speak, and obtain critical financial information Schon has been trying to obtain but has been denied.” The case is the third legal battle among Journey members in the past two years, but the first to divide Schon and Cain — the only core members remaining in the band from Journey’s heyday.I FEEL SUED – Primary Wave and the estate of James Brown were hit with a lawsuit claiming their $90 million catalog sale last year violated an agreement that the iconic singer had struck decades earlier with another company. The case was filed by David Pullman’s Pullman Group (best known for creating so-called Bowie Bonds in the 1990s) over allegations that the blockbuster sale breached a contract that Pullman company struck with Brown way back in 1999, which allegedly guaranteed the company the right to broker any such deal in the future.YOUNG THUG GANG TRIAL SET FOR JANUARY – A Georgia judge refused to delay the closely-watched criminal case against Young Thug, Gunna and others accused of participating in an Atlanta gang, meaning their trial is now locked in to start on January 9. Prosecutors wanted to move the trial back by nearly three months because a few defendants had not yet been appointed a lawyer. But with Young Thug, Gunna and many others stuck in jail until trial, defense lawyers strongly opposed the delay: “It is unjust that [Young Thug] rots in the county jail and … is being required to wait on the appointment of counsel for co-indictees.”DUA LIPA RIPS COPYRIGHT SUIT – Attorneys for Dua Lipa asked a federal judge to quickly toss out a lawsuit claiming she stole her smash hit song “Levitating” from a little-known reggae track called “Live Your Life.” Florida band Artikal Sound System sued the star for copyright infringement last year, arguing the songs were so similar it was “highly unlikely that ‘Levitating’ was created independently.” But in their response last week, Lipa’s attorneys said those allegations were full of “vague, boilerplate labels and conclusions” and “devoid of a shred of factual detail.”MARIAH CANT GET ‘CHRISTMAS’ TRADEMARKS – The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office rejected Mariah Carey’s application to register “Queen of Christmas” as a federal trademark, siding instead with Elizabeth Chan, another singer who says she’s used the same name for years. Repped pro bono by BigLaw attorneys, Chan had argued that no single singer or company should be able to lock up the title. “It is wrong for an individual to attempt to own and monopolize a nickname like ‘Queen of Christmas’ for the purposes of abject materialism,” Chan said in a statement after the ruling.R. KELLY MANAGER SENTENCED – Donnell Russell, R. Kelly’s friend and former manager, was sentenced to 20 months in prison after pleading guilty to charges that he stalked one of Kelly’s sexual abuse victims in an effort to keep her silent. Prosecutors said Russell used “reprehensible” tactics against the unnamed victim after she filed a civil lawsuit against the disgraced singer in 2018, including threatening messages to her mother and leaking explicit photos online.SLACKER ON HOOK FOR HUGE ROYALTY JUDGMENT – A federal judge refused to undo his own earlier ruling that Slacker owes nearly $10 million in unpaid music royalties to SoundExchange, despite the steamer’s warnings that the huge judgment could trigger financial ruin for the company. SoundExchange urged the judge to ignore those pleas and last week he obliged – ruling that the seven-figure judgment was simply the result of an agreement that Slacker itself had signed.
There’s some good news for the music business in Washington DC: House Democrats seem to have found their next caucus chair in Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, a champion of music creators who since 2013 has served as the U.S. representative for New York’s 8th congressional district. Jeffries, who represents parts of Brooklyn and Queens, co-sponsored the Music Modernization Act, the most important copyright law passed in decades, as well as the Copyright Alternative in Small-Claims Enforcement Act of 2020, a.k.a. the CASE Act. He’s also known as a big hip-hop fan, who once gave The Notorious B.I.G. a shout-out from the House floor on the 20th anniversary of his death.
A formal vote has not yet been taken. But the party seems to be coalescing around Jeffries, who was endorsed as a successor by outgoing Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). If chosen, Jeffries would become the first Black leader of a Congressional caucus, as well as the presumptive Speaker if the Democrats were to win back the House majority. And although it’s hard to say if serious copyright legislation will come in front of Congress, having a supporter of creators and copyright in such an important role could only help rightsholders.
“Mr. Jeffries has been a steadfast supporter of songwriters, and as an original cosponsor of both the Songwriter Equity Act and the Music Modernization Act, he has fought for fairness for creators throughout his career,” said NMPA president and CEO David Israelite. “His leadership in this powerful role will bode well for the future of songwriters.”
Jeffries was honored by the RIAA in September, along with hip-hop pioneers Grandmaster Flash and MC Lyte. (Billboard sponsored this event.)
“It’s hard to think of two potential leaders with more experience working in the trenches of music policy and shaping bipartisan consensus for the digital streaming era than Kevin McCarthy and Hakeem Jeffries,” said Mitch Glazier, chairman and CEO of the RIAA. “A House led by Speaker Kevin McCarthy and Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries would feature a dynamic duo for the music community.”
Before entering politics in 2007, Jeffries worked as a lawyer, first in New York for Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison – where he worked down the hall from NMPA general counsel Danielle Aguirre – then for Viacom. At Paul Weiss, he worked on some copyright cases, and he represented Lauryn Hill in a case brought by some of her collaborators. “He has a deep understanding of copyright law,” Israelite said. “He may know the subject better than anyone else in Congress.”
Jeffries may also be one of the bigger music fans in Congress. Besides giving Biggie a shoutout, he’s written about his favorite female rappers, and hosted an annual “Hip-Hop on the Hill” political fundraiser. “Watching hip-hop develop — with Grandmaster Flash, and then Run-DMC, and then the artists of the ‘80s and ‘90s — has been a fantastic journey,” he told Billboard in a 2018 interview about his history as a fan of the genre. “What’s been most compelling to me is how hip-hop has been a vehicle to tell the story of urban America and black America in such an artistic, poetic, and authentic fashion.”
Jeffries is involved with a number of issues, of course. He advocates police reform, and he co-sponsored the Formerly Incarcerated Reenter Society Transformed Safely Transitioning Every Person Act, a.k.a. the First Step Act, which reformed prison and sentencing laws. He voted to impeach Pres. Donald Trump, but he’s also known for working well with Republicans, including former Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.), with whom he co-sponsored the Music Modernization Act, as well as the First Step Act. (The two also put together a summer playlist.) Jeffries has also been a leading Democratic fund-raiser.
Some of this has put Jeffries at odds with some of his more radical colleagues, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.). Jeffries is a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, but his politics are more centrist, as well as more pragmatic. His ability to compromise could be important, since he will have to work with both the Republican House majority as well as the progressive members of his own party. He recently told CNN that “while we can have some noisy conversations at times about how we can make progress for the American people, what we have seen is that under the leadership of Speaker Pelosi, Steny Hoyer, Jim Clyburn, we have constantly been able to come together.”
Warner Music Group’s double-digit fourth quarter revenue growth served as the capstone in chief executive Stephen Cooper‘s long-term growth strategy, and is a signal more growth to come, Cooper said on Tuesday.
YouTube’s former chief business officer, Robert Kyncl, will replace Cooper as WMG’s new CEO on Jan. 1, though Kyncl will share the top duties with Cooper for his first month.
Cooper’s 12-year-tenure at WMG has been marked by an early embrace of digital streaming, major expansion into markets in Asia, the Middle East and Africa, and taking the company public roughly two-and-a-half years ago, among other things.
“I’m very proud of the progress we’ve made over the past 10 years,” Cooper said on a call with analysts Tuesday. “As I look out on the next 10 years, I believe we’re at the doorstep of a new golden age of music. As the ecosystem becomes more complex and exciting new business models emerge, our role as the connective tissue between artists and fans will only become more prominent and important.”
WMG reported quarterly revenues rose 16% at constant currency to $1.5 billion in the fiscal fourth quarter ended Sept. 30, with solid growth across all business lines, including a 39% and a 48% jump in digital and performance revenues respectively. Investors welcomed the news, pushing Warner’s stock up 15.2% to $31.08 as of 10:30 a.m. in New York.
Cooper said he sees the company’s future momentum coming from continued growth in the number and price of streaming subscriptions, penetrating deeper into new emerging markets and investing more in new digital technologies.
WMG now has partnerships with more than 200 streaming services and operates in 70 countries around the world. While executives decline to put a number on how much WMG may make from recent subscription price hikes by Apple Music and Deezer, they said they expect it to result in other streaming companies raising prices.
“I’ve consistently told you that streaming revenue would continue to have significant runway, that we would have price increases and ongoing subscriber growth, and that emerging platforms would continue to expand,” Cooper said. “We’re now seeing all these come to fruition.”
WMG’s annualized revenue from emerging streaming platforms, include deals like the recent one reached with Meta, topped $370 million this quarter, Cooper said.
The fourth quarter saw big releases Lizzo, whose album Special was her first to hit No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart, as well strong carry-over sucess from some of WMG’s superstars like Ed Sheeran, Dua Lipa and Silk Sonic.
The company’s pipeline remains strong, Cooper said, with first quarter releases expected from Paramore, Aya Nakamura, Cardi B, Roddy Ricch and others.
However, Cooper said he expects the outsized monetary impact of hit singles and albums to continue to decrease in the coming years as the company works with talent in more geographic markets and diversifies its revenue streams.
“As we’ve broadened and deepened our artist roster and prioritized a global approach to domestic music, our revenue composition has evolved,” Cooper said. “A decade ago, our top 5 artists generated over 15% of our recorded music physical and digital revenue. In 2022, they generated just over 5%.”
One new geographic market where Cooper said WMG plans to expand is in Eastern Europe. In recent months, WMG invested in the Polish concert and festival promoter BIG Idea, the Serbian record company Mascom Records, and participated in launching OUT OF ORDER, a new label for Eastern European artists.
Warner Music Group, helped by digital revenue growth across recorded music and publishing, reported quarterly revenues rose 16% at constant currency (9% as reported) to $1.5 billion in the fiscal fourth quarter ended Sept. 30, the company announced Tuesday (Nov. 22). Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, amortization and depreciation (EBITDA) grew by 16% to $276 million.
In his final quarterly earnings after 12 years as Warner Music’s chief executive, Steve Cooper said, “Against the backdrop of a challenging macro environment, we once again proved music’s resilience, with new commercial opportunities emerging all the time. We’re very well positioned for long-term creative success, and continued top and bottom line growth. We’re excited to have Robert Kyncl joining next year as WMG’s new CEO, as we enter the next dynamic phase of our evolution.”
WMG’s share price edged slightly lower in pre-market trading, down 0.88% to $26.98 on Tuesday at 8:19 a.m. New York time. Warner Music executives will discuss the company’s quarterly and full year results on a call with analysts at 8:30 a.m. ET.
Digital revenue grew 12.3% at constant currency or 6.8% as reported to $989 million, including a $38 million settlement related to certain copyright infringement cases. Total streaming revenue increased by 8.9% at constant currency (3.5% as reported) due primarily to driven by music publishing streaming revenue, which rose by 37.0% at constant currency (or 29.8% as reported).
Recorded music streaming revenue increased by 4.7% at constant currency, but decreased by 0.4% as reported. Digital’s share of total revenue comprised 66.1%, compared to 67.3% in the prior-year quarter, due to the double-digit growth of recorded music artist services and expanded-rights and licensing revenue.
Music publishing revenue improved 32.3% at a constant currency (23.9% as reported) to $254 million on the strength of digital and performance revenue. Digital revenues jumped 39.5% at constant currency (32.5% as reported) to $159 million. Streaming revenue increased 37.0% in constant currency (29.8% as reported) helped by streaming services and new digital deals.
In WMG’s recorded music segment, revenues rose 13.1% at constant currency (6.1% as reported) to $1.25 billion. Expanded rights revenue improved 33% to $204 million at constant currency (21.4% as reported) due to an increase in concert promotion revenue following the disruption of the touring business in 2021.
Physical revenue of $123 million was up 6% at constant currency but down 3.1% as reported, primarily due to volatility in exchange rates that offset higher vinyl sales and strong sales in Japan. Digital revenues of $830 million rose 8.1% in constant currency (up 2.9% as reported), and now represents 66.7% of total recorded music revenue compared to 68.9% in the prior-year quarter.
Music publishing contributed nearly 17% of overall company revenues in the quarter, up slightly from the year-ago quarter when music publishing made up 15% of overall revenues. Recorded music revenue contributed 83% of overall revenues in the quarter, down slightly from the year-ago quarter when recorded music revenues comprised 85% of overall company revenues.
The popular Arab-language music and content streaming service Anghami became the latest music company to cut staff as growing global economic uncertainty forces companies to cut costs in order to maintain profitability.
The Abu Dhabi-based company said in a statement last week (Nov. 15) that it was reducing full-time employee headcount by 22%, or roughly 39 employees.
“Given the impact of challenging macroeconomic conditions, we had to take some cost disciplinary measures to improve our bottom-line performance,” Eddy Maroun, Anghami’s chief executive and co-founder, said in a statement announcing the company’s third quarter earnings.
Several music companies have let go of staff or cut investment budgets in recent months as they prepare for a possible economic downturn. This summer, Spotify said it would cut hiring by 25%, SoundCloud laid off 20% of its staff and BMI said it was cutting just under 10% of its total workforce, through a combination of letting 30 people go and leaving certain jobs unfilled.
Launched in 2012, Anghami is the most popular streaming and content company focused on Arabic-language music, with about 58% of the Middle East’s market share and around 20 million active users, according to company filings.
Since going public on the NASDAQ in February, Anghami’s stock has declined by more than 73% to close at $2.70 on Monday. The company’s low stock price and growing investor interest in music companies based in the Middle East and Africa has fueled market chatter about the company’s future. Earlier this month, the German magazine Frankly reported that Spotify was considering buying Anghami.
In an email to Billboard, Maroun said the cuts were necessary as the company worked to reduce operating expenses and focus on profitability. Maroun declined to answer a question about whether the company was preparing for a possible sale.
In its third quarter earnings, Anghami reported that its revenues grew by 29% to $31.7 million, up from $24.5 million in the year-ago quarter. The company’s gross profit rose 13% in the quarter ending Sept. 30 from the year-ago period, helped by a reduction in cloud computing costs by 19% and a 15% increase in music traffic in the quarter.
Additional reporting by Alexei Barrionuevo
Journey guitarist Neal Schon is suing bandmate Jonathan Cain over allegations that he’s blocking access to “critical” financial records — the latest in a string of legal clashes among members of the iconic ’80s rock band.
In a lawsuit filed last month in California state court, Schon accused Cain — the only other core band member remaining from Journey’s heyday — of refusing to give him access to records from an American Express account, through which he claims that “millions in Journey funds have flowed.”
As fifty-fifty co-owners of the band’s corporate entity, Schon says each of them has a right to inspect all financial records, but claims that Cain has “improperly restricted and blocked” him from seeing the Amex records for months.
“This action is brought to turn the lights on, so to speak, and obtain critical financial information Schon has been trying to obtain but has been denied,” his lawyers wrote in an Oct. 31 complaint. “Schon has tried to avoid legal action, repeatedly requesting that Cain grant him access to the AMEX account [but] Cain has not been forthcoming and cooperative, making this action necessary.”
The case is hardly the first legal battle among Journey members.
Back in 2020, Schon and Cain filed a lawsuit against former drummer Steven Smith and former bassist Ross Valory, accusing them of engaging in an “attempted corporate coup d’état” to improperly use the Journey band name. That case ended last year with an “amicable settlement” that saw Smith and Valory depart the band.
And in September, former lead singer Steve Perry took legal action to stop Schon and Cain from registering federal trademarks on the names of many of the band’s biggest hits, including “Anyway You Want It” and “Wheel In The Sky.” Perry, who left Journey in 1998, says his ex-mates cannot unilaterally use the song names because the trio signed a partnership agreement requiring unanimous consent. The case remains pending.
Unlike the earlier cases, the new lawsuit over the Amex account pits Schon and Cain against one another. Schon says each of them should have “unfettered access” to all financial records, but that Cain “set up the account so that only he is authorized to access the records and information.”
And from the wording of the complaint, it sounds like Schon’s gripes potentially go deeper than a single credit card.
“Cain is interfering with Journey, refusing to respond to booking opportunities, blocking payment to band members, crew, and vendors, refusing to execute necessary operating documents, and in other ways as well,” Schon’s lawyers wrote. “Cain has further refused to deal with critical, time-sensitive touring contracts for Journey’s 2023 tour and ensure payment for band members and crew, who Cain contends are ‘non-essential.’ Schon believes those band and crew who are crucial to the band’s success should be paid. Cain’s conduct is inexplicable.”
A rep for Cain did not immediately return a request for comment on Monday.
Read the entire complaint here:
BERLIN – Subscription streaming services have ushered in a recorded music business boom, but the medium’s focus on hit singles has boosted genres like hip-hop and Latin more than some others. Starting today, Universal Music Group’s Deutsche Grammophon is offering its own service, Stage+, which will offer music from its own archive and that of sibling label Decca Records, plus video programming and a new live performance every week — at a cost of $14.90, or €14.90, a month.
Universal Music has no plans to remove its classical recordings from mainstream music streaming services like Spotify and Apple Music. Rather, the idea is to offer a specialist service that can appeal to classical music fans and create a more favorable business structure for a genre that hasn’t been well-served by mainstream services. Since many artists and orchestras record some of the same compositions, it can be difficult for aficionados to find the recording they’re looking for — and the mainstream streaming services tend to curate music for a general audience.
“There’s the urge of consumers and artists to have everything in one place, with all the right data,” says Deutsche Grammophon president Dr. Clemens Trautmann. “You can punch in a work or a recording or an artist and you’ll see the next livestream, the archive, the albums, and if there’s a documentary, behind-the-scenes footage or interviews.”
So far, no big label has managed to build its own streaming service, and it’s hard to know how many consumers will be interested in one that only offers certain recordings. But Deutsche Grammophon, with its iconic yellow logo, has culturally significant repertoire going back more than a century, as well as significant stars like Lang Lang, Anne-Sophie Mutter and Max Richter. It also has enough brand equity to get streaming rights to major live events, and its first streamed performance will be Víkingur Ólafsson’s presentation of his album From Afar in the Harpa concert hall in Reykjavík, Iceland. (Some of the live performances featured on Stage+ will be time-delayed for various reasons.)
For Universal Music, Stage+ also offers business advantages. The price is higher than the current cost of mainstream services, although it includes high-fidelity audio as well as livestreamed events. The core classical repertoire is in the public domain, which means it will not have to pay publishing royalties on about three-quarters of the music it streams. The service can also operate in a way that makes sense for the genre, and it plans to divide up the royalty pool according to the time consumers spend listening to certain recordings, rather than paying a royalty on each track, which advantages shorter songs in a way that’s arguably unfair to genres with varied or longer track lengths, like jazz and classical music.
Stage+ faces competition — from livestreaming video services like Medici TV and Carnegie Hall+ on one hand and specialist streaming services like Berlin-based classical-focused Idagio on the other. And since so many households in the U.S. and Europe now subscribe to a mainstream streaming service, in many cases Stage+ will need to have enough appeal to succeed as a second service. Apple also seems to have plans that involve a classical music service; last summer it purchased the streaming service Primephonic, whose website says, “We are working on an amazing new classical music experience from Apple for next year.” (Apple did not respond to a request to comment.)
Trautmann says that Stage+ grew out of DG Stage, which was established during the pandemic and offered ticketed livestreams of performances by Deutsche Grammophon artists. A little over a year and a half ago, he started working to develop the service with Deutsche Grammophon vp of consumer business, Robert Zimmermann, under Frank Briegmann, Universal Music chairman and CEO, Central Europe, who also serves as chairman of Deutsche Grammophon.
“DG Stage is simple and very effective, but we realized that the artist community and consumers were looking for a service where everything our artists create can be presented holistically in one place and audiences can follow their journey,” says Trautmann, who is himself a Julliard-trained musician who plays classical clarinet.
It’s hard to imagine that Stage+ will ever have enough subscribers to rival the mainstream players, but its premium price could potentially allow it to make money with a number of subscribers in the low six figures. It also offers an interesting model for genres that don’t fare as well in the streaming world as pop music — especially if they have fans who can afford a premium price.
And although no major label currently runs a streaming service, there’s no reason that Stage+ couldn’t also offer music from other labels or rightsholders — and it could potentially offer them better deal terms as a more appealing cultural and commercial environment than Spotify and Apple Music. “We’d be open to enlarge the content offering, provided it’s the right match for our curated approach,” Trautmann says, although there are no immediate plans to do so. “It might be better coming from potential partners instead of us.”
Looking to grow its share of the fast-developing Middle East music market, Warner Music Group has signed Saudi singer Dalia Mubarak, one of the country’s biggest female stars and a leading voice among a new generation of progressive Arabic artists.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed. The signing — Warner Music’s first Saudi artist signing since it began investing in the Middle East region about four years ago — caps a breakthrough year for 31-year-old Mubarak, who earlier this month won Best Saudi Arabian Artist at the Distinctive International Arab Festivals Awards (DIAFA) in Dubai and was featured this summer on the cover of Vogue Arabia.
Since releasing her debut single, “Turn The Table,” in 2014, the singer’s career has flourished in line with the gradual opening up of Saudi society following the appointment of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in 2017, making him the de facto ruler of the oil-rich Gulf state. His reforms have helped modernize the country of 35 million people, where, up until a few years ago, concerts were banned and ultraconservative norms prevailed, including the segregation of unmarried men and women in public spaces.
Historically rife with piracy, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) market nearly doubled between 2019 and 2021, and it was the fastest-growing region in the world last year, with recorded music revenues up 35% to $89.5 million, according to IFPI. More than 95% of MENA revenues came from streaming, helping draw the interest of major record companies, which are increasingly looking to emerging markets to find new talent and, in turn, extend their labels’ global reach. MENA’s potential is vast, with a total population of about 430 million people, of which 55% are under the age of 30, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
The Mubarak signing follows a series of investments and acquisitions Warner Music has made recently in the Gulf region. Last year, the company acquired a minority stake — reportedly worth around $200 million — in Rotana Music, the Arab world’s leading independent record label, which is part of Rotana Group, owned by Saudi billionaire Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal.
In March, Warner completed the acquisition of Qanawat Music, a leading distributor across the Middle East and North Africa. WMG put roots down in the region in 2018 when it created Warner Music Middle East and opened an office in Beirut, Lebanon.
Mubarak, who mostly sings in Arabic and has previously released music on Rotana, says she fulfilled a childhood dream by signing with Warner Music because of the opportunities and exposure it provides not just in her home country, but internationally as well.
“Everyone is now looking to what’s going on in Saudi Arabia, how it’s changed, and I want to be part of that change and show the world that we have good artists,” Mubarak tells Billboard. “I want to be the bridge [between Saudi Arabia] and the international world.”
Mubarak’s music mixes contemporary R&B and Western-style pop with traditional Khaleeji music, incorporating Arabic instruments like duff drums and mirwas. She says the music, which promotes positive messages of female empowerment, reflects the progressive changes that have occurred in her home country.
The singer has built a large following in Saudi Arabia and the wider Arab diaspora with total YouTube views surpassing 350 million, according to Billboard’s calculations (subscribers to her official YouTube channel stand at just over 600,000). Her most popular song is 2020’s “Elly Yemshy 3ady,” which was the artist’s first single sung in the Egyptian dialect; it has generated more than 66 million views on YouTube.
The singer has just under 700,000 followers on Anghami, the most popular music streaming service in the Middle East with around 20 million active users, according to company filings. (Warner was unable to provide comprehensive streaming numbers for Mubarak.)
Mubarak has also performed at many of Saudi Arabia’s biggest music festivals, including 2019’s Jeddah World Fest, where she joined DJ Steve Aoki onstage at the event’s close. (The festival also featured performances from Janet Jackson, 50 Cent and Chris Brown, and saw Nicki Minaj make international headlines when she pulled out of a scheduled appearance in protest against the Kingdom’s treatment of women.)
Dalia Mubarak with Max Lousada and Simon Robson, Warner Music UK, Nov 2022.
Warner Music
Max Lousada, CEO of Warner Recorded Music, calls Mubarak a “trailblazer for change,” saying in a press release that she symbolizes “a new generation of female artists from the country who are rewriting the rules and winning fans across the region and beyond.”
The singer, who has an American husband, divides her time between the Saudi capital city Riyadh and Dubai. “Other singers in the past were not as lucky to have this freedom and these opportunities that I’m now grateful for,” she says.
Alfonso Perez-Soto, Warner Recorded Music’s president of emerging markets, tells Billboard that the label intends for Mubarak to be the first of many artists Warner signs from the MENA region as part of its overall long-term strategy. Previously, WMG’s focus has been on establishing itself in the region, “building the access to catalogs and distribution and gaining resources” so it is fully equipped to provide “the best tools” to help break and build lasting careers for Arabic artists like Mubarak.
Perez-Soto says the best of Warner Music’s worldwide resources are being made available to help Mubarak establish an international career. That includes teaming the artist up with English producers and songwriters for a short run of demo recording sessions in London earlier this month.
The plan, says Perez-Soto, is that they will “create product and songs that will be appealing to the Western market,” as well as cater to Mubarak’s existing local fanbase by drawing on the Middle East’s rich cultural heritage. Going forward, releases will vary between English-language songs and Arabic-focused repertoire.
Perez-Soto says he hopes giving Saudi artists like Mubarak a global platform will help bring about further change in a country that, while rapidly developing, still draws widespread condemnation for human rights abuses, including a ban on political protest and discrimination against women and marginalized groups.
“The situation is nowhere near close to perfect, but the country is making a very sincere effort [to change] in the right direction and we have to be part of enabling that effort and help that to happen,” says the Miami-based executive.
“There is no hate in music,” says Mubarak. “Music is something beautiful and it creates peace and hopefully we’re going to be part of that.” She wants to inspire other females in the Arab States, including her two young daughters, to follow in her footsteps. “I hope to be their voice,” she says, “to motivate them and make their dreams happen.”
Iggy Azalea has sold her master recording and publishing catalog to Domain Capital for an eight-figure sum, a source close to the deal told Billboard. The wide reaching deal includes 100% of Azalea’s share of her existing catalog, including No. 1 hit “Fancy” (featuring Charli XCX), “Black Widow” (featuring Rita Ora), and “Problem” (with Ariana Grande), and it includes “an additional trigger” for Azalea to earn future revenue on master recordings.
The rapper’s discography includes The New Classic, Surviving the Summer (EP), and In My Defense and The End of an Era. Though she has previously released music under deals with Virgin EMI and Island Records, Azalea has since founded her own label. Called Bad Dreams, it was formerly distributed by Empire but is now in the midst of closing a new distribution deal with a different firm, the source says.
The independent rapper owns 100% of her Bad Dreams label, and she will be able to fully own her masters and publishing on all forthcoming music, starting Q1 2023. On the publishing side, she has an administration deal with Sony Music Publishing.
These days, the Australia native is living in Miami and working on her next album and raising her son, Onyx, whom she welcomed in 2020. She plans to release a full project sometime next year.
Azalea’s deal was revealed just weeks after Domain Capital announced that it closed more than $700 million in commitments for a commingle entertainment fund. In their press release about the fund on Nov. 1, Domain Capital added that it had already deployed more than $170 million in film, television and music investments to date.
“We are excited to launch our first diversified private entertainment royalty fund,” said Anthony Tittanegro, executive managing director of Domain Capital Group in the release. “At a time of sustained entertainment industry growth supported by an ever-evolving landscape of distribution channels, we are focused on building a diversified asset-base to generate cash yield and help maintain our investors’ capital.” The firm declined Billboard’s request for comment.