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Attorneys for Sean “Diddy” Combs are firing back at allegations that he’s obstructing his sex trafficking case from behind bars, claiming prosecutors improperly searched his cell and violated his right to attorney-client privilege.
Days after the government claimed Combs was seeking to “subvert the integrity” of the case by contacting witnesses, his lawyers said it was the prosecution that had made serious missteps – including by seizing “notes to his lawyers” about potential trial strategies.
“This search and seizure are in violation of Mr. Combs’ [constitutional] rights,” writes Diddy’s lead attorney Marc Agnifilo. “The targeted seizure of a pre-trial detainee’s work product and privileged materials – created in preparation for trial – is outrageous government conduct amounting to a substantive due process violation.”
In the filing, Diddy’s attorneys ask Judge Arun Subramanian to hold an immediate hearing to investigate the search and seizures, saying they want to ask key questions about how the process unfolded.
“Who authorized a search of Mr. Combs’ sleeping area, personal effects and paperwork?” Agnifilo writes. “Who made the decision to not tell Mr. Combs’ counsel that the U.S. Attorney was in possession of his notes, including ‘possibly privileged materials’ until after the government put them in a filing to keep him incarcerated?”
Combs, also known as Puff Daddy and P. Diddy, was once one of the most powerful men in the music industry. But in September, he was indicted by federal prosecutors on charges of racketeering and sex trafficking over what they say was a sprawling criminal operation aimed at satisfying his need for “sexual gratification.” If convicted on all the charges, he faces a potential sentence of life in prison.
On Friday, prosecutors leveled serious new allegations. Responding to Combs’ latest effort to be released on bail, they said such an action would still pose a grave risk of obstruction of justice; in the process, they accused Diddy of trying to reach out to witnesses, leak favorable materials, and orchestrate “social media campaigns” to influence public opinion and taint the jury pool.
“Defendant has continued to engage in a relentless course of obstructive conduct designed to subvert the integrity of these proceedings,” the prosecution wrote in the filing.
In the filing, prosecutors noted that some of their evidence came in the form of notes recovered from Diddy’s cell during what they called “a pre-planned nationwide sweep of BOP facilities.” The sweep turned up “possibly privileged materials,” but prosecutors said the evidence had been screened by a so-called filter team to avoid any improper material.
Attorney–client privilege exists to protect the right of an accused person to secure an effective defense from their lawyers. It’s designed to allow a defendant to be honest with their legal team, without needing to worry that such material might later be used against them.
In Monday’s response, Combs’ lawyers said some of the materials taken from his cell were “absolutely privileged” and should not have been handed over to the government lawyers who are barred from seeing them. They included “privileged notes to his lawyers concerning defense witnesses and defense strategies.”
“This is a matter of grave concern that, most respectfully, must be addressed immediately,” Agnifilo writes. “Because the U.S. Attorney, and it seems the trial prosecutors, are currently in possession of privileged materials we request a full evidentiary hearing as soon as the Court can accommodate us.”
Sound Royalties has been a resource for the music industry for 10 years, advancing money to artists, songwriters, producers and other entities against their royalty income streams. And if there is one message that the company consistently emphasizes, it’s that Sound Royalties doesn’t use clients’ music rights as collateral, so it can never secure ownership of those rights.
In Sound Royalties’ parlance, instead of loans, the company primarily provides advances, and recipients of those funds are collectively referred to as “creatives.”
Sound Royalties also makes clear that it doesn’t charge interest; instead, advances come with fixed fees expressed in dollars. The company also doesn’t charge late fees, and a client’s credit rating doesn’t factor into any deals because the advance is repaid from one or more of a client’s income streams.
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Contrary to standard music industry practice, Sound Royalties doesn’t require 100% recoupment from the income streams until the advance is fully paid off.
Depending on the deal, the company may only take some of the royalties of an assigned income stream from one of the creative’s music companies — labels, distributors, publishers or collection rights organizations, which are collectively known as “payors,” according to Sound Royalties — and it will pass through the remainder of income to the client.
Since 2021, Sound Royalties has been owned by GoDigital Media Group and the investment firm MEP Capital.
Alex Heiche, with a background in software for high tech and in special finance firms, founded the company in 2014. As he explains, Sound Royalties is not “a label, publisher or distributor. We don’t replace them; we work in concert with them.
“So when creatives come to us, we provide the financing, but they stay with these excellent companies that they’ve chosen to work with,” he says. “And we’re not taking a percentage of future income. The advance is a fixed dollar amount for a fixed period of time. We’re obsessed with transparency.”
Company executives also emphasize their pursuit of a relationship-based business.
“Part of Alex’s original vision is we really try hard to create relationships,” says Sound Royalties president Michael Bizenov, who joined the company in 2018 after a career in consumer banking and mortgages. “We’re not here just to do transactions. They are important to us, yes, because it’s a way to grow a business. But we want to do it in a very healthy way.”
That’s also why in times of industry turmoil, like during the pandemic, Sound Royalties set up funding pools for cost-free advances to creatives in need.
Also, the company believes in helping creatives beyond financing deals.
“We [meet] with all levels of creative people, including those who may be starting their career,” Bizenov says. “So we’re very committed to doing financial-literacy seminars. We also are talking to the most sophisticated creatives and their business teams and helping them meet their financial goals.”
Clients of Sound Royalties include (clockwise from top left) Tank, DJ Khaled, Rich Robinson, Alejandra Guzmán, Brent Faiyaz, Sonia Leigh and Dylan LeBlanc.
Illustration by Andrei Cojocaru
In the beginning, how did industry companies react to the advances you were proposing?
Alex Heiche: Sound Royalties was launched with the vision to provide artist-friendly funding using creative-friendly funding solutions. So initially, we did advances from [income streams from performing rights organizations] ASCAP and BMI, and then we slowly evolved from there, adding SESAC, and then we started adding publisher, label and distributor transactions. In 2018, we did our first international transaction with PRS [for Music].
Michael Bizenov: Today, we’ve expanded to working in 18 countries and on three continents with over 160 payors around the globe that are sending payments to us to service their clients, and we’re onboarding new [payors] every month.
Did music companies first see you as adversarial to their relationships with their artists and songwriters?
Heiche: Payors see that we’re not taking their clients. We’re not getting in the way of their business. We don’t do distribution, nor publishing; we’re not a label or a collection society. We stay in our lane, providing financing. We’re there to facilitate something and ease the process, so we have good relationships on the payor side and on the creative side.
What’s the source of your funding?
Bizenov: We have bank lines [of credit]. Since early last year, we have more than doubled our access to bank financing. We also self-fund some things out of our profits. And we have access to two additional lines of private capital if we need it.
Did you have bank lines when you started out?
Heiche: No, it started off with funding [from] the balance sheet and growing from there. We pioneered this type of financing and advances. So it took time to build a track record to be able to walk banks through it.
What kind of income streams do you like to focus on when making advances?
Heiche: Creatives are earning a lot of different income streams, and we work with most of them. As the industry continues to evolve, we expanded beyond sound recording and composition [income] and started doing YouTube [income] financing for advances.
We are now even in entertainment production financing. We do tour financing. We even offer bridge financing for creatives looking for a very short-term solution as they’re maybe selling a catalog.
Do you put together custom deals for each client or offer a menu with options?
Heiche: The beauty of our model is it’s a bespoke, white glove customer service. Every creative and every company entity that comes to us for financing gets to speak with a live person that understands what their needs are and develops options for them to review.
You don’t require documentation like tax returns or W2 forms with an application. How else are your advances different from a bank loan?
Heiche: The advance is based strictly on their royalties and projections of those royalties. We provide a one-page summary sheet so they can see the fixed cost in a fixed dollar amount for a fixed period of time. If it takes longer, there are no late fees or penalties. The same if payment comes in sooner.
What are the minimum income streams and maximum advances that you work with?
Heiche: We try to help as much of the industry as we can, and that’s why the bar is as low as it is. Right now, the baseline for both is $5,000 per year per royalty stream. But we go over $10 million for advances.
You’ve said that building relationships is an important part of the Sound Royalties business plan. How does that help grow your business?
Bizenov: A big part of our business comes from referrals, and that’s something that we work hard on. “Customer service” is a mantra in our company because it’s the right thing to do and it also grows the business.
We love the referrals that we get from the managers, business managers, attorneys and companies that are out there. It’s very flattering to us and very reinforcing.
In making advances, how do you calculate risk?
Bizenov: There are probably about 12 or 14 inputs that go into our [analysis]. It’s the things that you would imagine: What is the depth of the catalog? Is 85% of the income coming from two songs — [which] is pretty risky — or is it something that’s more spread out? Is [a work] evergreen and out there for a lot of years so you can trace the performance, or is it something that’s relatively fresh? Based on that, we then come up with a risk analysis and a price.
Does your recoupment come from all streams, or do you choose to be paid back from one or two streams? And do you take 100% recoupment or only a portion?
Heiche: We can focus on specific streams that make the most sense and help a client achieve what they’re trying to accomplish [in terms of cash flow]. Does the client want to pay us back in one year or five years? If it’s five years, for example, we may take less of their income stream per year, or it’s one year we may take more. Either way, the rest [of the income] we pass through to the creative.
What is the average type of advance deal in terms of timeline and recoupment?
Bizenov: We’d rather see somebody do [deals] more conservatively and make sure they get a chance to get their cash flow. That is why we have a very high return rate of customers who come back to us for more than one deal.
As for deal terms, the average is three to five years. We can go longer and we can go shorter, but that’s where the median would lie.
What is the value of advances that Sound Royalties made last year?
Heiche: As a private company, there are some limitations on some data that we can give out.
Can you talk about growth?
Bizenov: Our monthly volume is growing by 50%. We’re pretty proud of our level of growth.
You have also alerted artists and the industry about royalties that weren’t paid to them. How does that play into your business model?
Heiche: When a creative comes through our door, our royalty specialists say, “OK, so you’re a songwriter. Who do you collect your writer’s share from? Who does your publishing or administration?” We just start to have that conversation.
And quite often we find that creatives aren’t collecting on all the income streams that they should be, so then we point them in the right direction. We’re constantly working with creatives ensuring that they understand the various income streams that they’re entitled to receive.
Bizenov: There are nuances. It’s fractionalized, for lack of a better term, because the incomes come from all different directions. So it’s easy for things to fall through the cracks sometimes.
You have said that providing clients with transparency is very important. How else do you show this?
Bizenov: The day before the funding is scheduled to take place, we have a separate department that gets on the phone with the end user and walks through the mechanics of the deal. That team is trained so that if they sense hesitation or lack of understanding, they stop the process to make sure that the creative understands every aspect of how it works, what’s coming, what’s owed.
Our biggest nightmare isn’t not getting a deal; it’s somebody out there saying, “Hey, [Sound Royalties] didn’t tell me everything.”
Are you saying your reputation is more important than doing deals?
Heiche: We’ve developed a reputation through the years of being the good guys, and that’s from things like this independent compliance department having a call with the creative walking through everything to ensure that there’s transparency. If people have great things to say about us, that’s because of our transparency.
This story appears in the Nov. 16, 2024, issue of Billboard.
Taylor Lindsey has been named as Chairman and CEO, Sony Music Nashville (SMN), beginning January 2025. She replaces Randy Goodman, who announced in September he would be retiring at the end of the year after running the company since 2015.
Additionally, Ken Robold, has been named president and chief operating officer of Sony Music Nashville.
Lindsey will oversee Sony Music Nashville, as well as leading Christian music company Provident Entertainment. She will remain based in Nashville and report to Rob Stringer, chairman of Sony Music Group.
“I’m very grateful to step into this role,” Lindsey said in a statement. “Along with Ken and the incredible SMN team, we are committed to fostering collaboration with our artists, creators and fans, and will create a vibrant community that not only honors our rich heritage in storytelling but also redefines the sound of country music for generations.”
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Lindsey has been head of A&R for SMN since 2021, most recently serving as vp. She has worked closely with Sony artists including Old Dominion, Luke Combs, Megan Moroney, Maren Morris and Mitchell Tenpenny, among others.
“I am very excited that we can promote a creative talent from within the company to this top position,” Stringer said in a statement. “I have witnessed Taylor become an all-round executive from an A&R background and she is ideally suited to plot the future for our Nashville team in a chapter where country music is clearly evolving and thriving as a key musical genre. I am also so pleased that simultaneously to Taylor’s appointment Ken will be in an important wider role helping her build a new era for Sony Music Nashville.”
Prior to joining SMN in 2013, Lindsey, who has been featured on Billboard’s Women in Music and Country Power Players lists, worked in A&R at BMG Music Publishing, where she represented Grammy-award winning songwriters such as Hillary Lindsey and Tony Lane.
Robold, who has also been on Billboard‘s Country Power Players list, joined SMN in 2015 as executive vp and COO. Previously, he was president of Zac Brown’s Southern Ground Artists and spent 22 years at Universal Music Group.
The news means that all three major labels in Nashville are headed or co-headed by women: Cindy Mabe is chair/CEO of Universal Music Group Nashville and Cris Lacy is co-chair/co-president of Warner Music Nashville alongside Gregg Nadel. It also means that all the heads of the three Nashville majors have changed hands over the past two years., with Lacy and then Ben Kline replacing chairman/CEO John Esposito at Warner at the end of 2022, while UMGN chairman/CEO Mike Dungan left his post in 2023, with Mabe officially taking over April 1, 2023.
SXSW London has shared details about the ticket sale for 2025’s upcoming inaugural event in the U.K. Taking place in east London’s Shoreditch neighborhood from Jun. 2-7, the upcoming event will be the first time that SXSW has taken place in Europe, in addition to its home in Austin, Texas, and expansion into Sydney, Australia.
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Passes for the entire event across the Conferences, Music and Screen Festivals will be available to purchase, as well as for individual separate programming strands. Tickets will go on sale on Nov. 21 and a 25% discount will be applied to those who purchase a pass from the general sale before Dec. 19. With the exclusive price offer, prices range from £488 for the individual programme strand passes, to £975 for platinum passes. For further ticket information, head to the SXSW London website.
SXSW London has also announced additional details about the venue partners throughout Shoreditch. These include Truman Brewery, Village Underground, Rich Mix, Shoreditch Town Hall, Shoreditch Church, Christ Church Spitalfields, Dream Factory (Chance St & Rivington St), Kachette, Bike Shed Moto Co, Shoreditch Studios / Over the Road, and Protein Studios.
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Billboard has been confirmed as the event’s first official partner, and will host a night of music during the festival with a globally-renowned artist performing at the event. The show will also be ticketed to the general public.
Mike Van, president of Billboard said, “We’re thrilled to partner with SXSW London for the inaugural 2025 event. This collaboration underscores our shared commitment to supporting and celebrating the global music community. Billboard will bring a night of live music celebrating world class artists, both established and on the rise, and will offer fans a truly unique experience within the festival.”
The festival will partner with local charities and community groups to provide 500 complimentary passes to ensure “the rich diversity” of the city is represented throughout the events and programming.
“We’re thrilled to share how many incredible venues are working with us already for SXSW London’s Shoreditch takeover next June,” said Katy Arnander, director of programming for SXSW London. “Shoreditch is renowned as a vibrant centre for creativity and technological innovation, as well as for its diversity, energetic youth culture, global cuisine and nightlife. We’re excited to be working closely with local stakeholders to ensure the festival creates a positive impact for the community it will take place in.”
In October, SXSW London announced that it would begin the process of accepting session proposals from the public across the various programming strands. The festival says that “thousands of session proposals have already been submitted from over 50 countries across the world.” The submission portal will remain open until Nov. 29 at the festival’s website.
Back in April 2021, it was announced that SXSW had signed a “lifeline” deal with P-MRC, a joint venture between Penske Media Corporation and MRC, making P-MRC a stakeholder and long-term partner with the Austin festival. P-MRC is the parent company of Billboard.
Spotify is on such a hot streak that the streaming company nearly reached a $100 billion market capitalization this week. After the company’s third-quarter earnings showed cost-cutting has led to record profitability, shares peaked at a new all-time high of $489.69 on Thursday (Nov. 14), briefly putting its market capitalization above $98 billion. However, the stock fell on Friday (Nov. 15) to a final closing price of $458.32, valuing the company at $92.04 billion. While the stock was still up 14.5%, that marked a bit of a letdown from its previous high.
During the height of the pandemic, Spotify benefitted from a rush into streaming stocks as consumers spent more time with audio and visual media. Investors were also attracted to its push into podcasts, which provided an opportunity to improve upon the margins of its core music service. But investors eventually grew tired of Spotify’s growth-over-profitability mantra, sending the company’s share price from $387 in February 2021 to under $70 in November 2021. But a focus on cost-cutting and expansion into audiobooks helped bring investors back; Spotify shares gained 138% in 2023 and have already increased 144% in 2024.
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After delivering solid results and showing investors a pathway to greater profitability, Guggenheim increased its price target for Spotify to $500 from $420 and raised its estimate for 2025 operating profit to 2.5 billion euros ($2.63 billion) from 2.1 billion euros ($2.21 billion). Analysts cited management’s confidence in usage growth and ability to raise prices and further improve margins. Morgan Stanley raised Spotify to $460 from $430, also citing the company’s ability to further raise prices and management’s “commitment to financial discipline and driving profitability.” At JPMorgan, analysts upped Spotify to $530 from $425 for the aforementioned reasons, in addition to the stock’s coming inclusion in the MSCI World Index on Nov. 25.
A bevy of analysts also increased their price targets for Live Nation following the company’s earnings report on Monday (Nov. 11), which showed that the promoter achieved a record adjusted operating income in the third quarter. Among them: Rosenblatt Securities ($146 from $123), Goldman Sachs ($148 from $132), Benchmark ($145 from $108), Evercore ISI ($150 from $110), Oppenheimer ($155 from $120) and Wolfe Research ($152 from $125). Live Nation shares finished the week at $129.00, up 4.9%, and reached a new intraday high of $130.83 on Friday.
Spotify’s big gain was the primary reason the Billboard Global Music Index grew 5.8% to 2,162.50 despite just six of its 20 stocks finishing the week in positive territory. The float-adjusted, unweighted index measures the aggregate market values of the 20 member companies; Spotify is the most valuable company on the index and is more than twice as valuable as the next company, Universal Music Group (UMG). The week’s other five gainers are among the index’s largest companies: Live Nation, CTS Eventim, JYP Entertainment, HYBE and SM Entertainment all have market capitalizations exceeding $1 billion.
Stock markets hit a post-election hangover this week that stalled the gains seen after Donald Trump won the presidential election on Nov. 5. In the United States, the Nasdaq fell 3.1% and the S&P 500 dropped 2.1%. The United Kingdom’s FTSE 100 lost just 0.1%. South Korea’s KOSPI composite index fell 5.6%. China’s Shanghai Composite Index lost 3.5%.
Despite the KOSPI’s decline, K-pop stocks — which have recovered ground in the second half of the year and now have a collective year-to-date deficit of 20.2% — were up across the board. JYP Entertainment gained 8.2%, HYBE improved 3.2%, SM Entertainment added 2.8% and YG Entertainment rose 2.7%.
On the live front, Sphere Entertainment Co. fell 8.6% after its latest earnings showed a slowdown in revenue at its Sphere division, with Macquarie lowering the company’s price target to $45 from $47. And at MSG Entertainment (MSGE), shares dropped 6.8% to $40.00 after Bernstein reduced its MSGE price target to $44 from $45 earlier in the week.
Over at radio, Cumulus Media fell 19.3% to $0.71 after it reportedly conducted layoffs at stations in Central Pennsylvania, Indianapolis, Detroit and San Francisco as part of broader job cuts ahead of the holiday season — all on the heels of recent layoffs at competitor iHeartRadio. Elsewhere music streamer LiveOne dropped 12.4% to $0.78 this week.
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11/15/2024
The information-packed day concluded with a Superstar Q&A with Billboard cover star Olivia Rodrigo.
11/15/2024
With all apologies to Charli XCX, the 2024 concert season should have been dubbed “VIP summer” for the amount of upselling done by U.S. amphitheaters.
At Live Nation amphitheaters, revenue from VIP clubs was up 19% and VIP ticket premium revenue for major festivals was up more than 20% in the third quarter. Earlier this year, VIP/premium offerings represented 9% of Live Nation’s overall amphitheater business but “should be 30% to 35%,” CEO Michael Rapino told investors in February.
Amphitheaters where Live Nation controls the food and beverage experiences have the potential to deliver more fan spending. Converting an area of grass into a VIP club provides 20% to 30% returns on investment, Rapino explained. At Northwell at Jones Beach Theater, for example, Live Nation took the 15,000-seat venue from no premium offerings to three premium tiers. Of the 40 U.S. amphitheaters in its portfolio, the company could “Jonesify” half of them, Rapino said during an investor call on Wednesday (Nov. 13).
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Diving headfirst into VIP pricing is sure to help Live Nation’s bottom line. The company believes premium offerings can add $200 million in adjusted operating income per year, according to its investor presentation. This year, VIP net per-fan spending will have grown at 20% annually since 2019, well ahead of overall net fan spending growth of 8% annually.
From exclusive lounges to fan meet-and-greets with artists, the concert business has been better than other music industry segments at filtering customers according to their willingness to pay. VIP status became standard practice at music festivals to separate the people who can afford a $400 ticket to camp in a grass field and those who can afford deluxe accommodations, food and beverage, and transportation. The year-old Sphere in Las Vegas takes customer segmentation to a new level: Tickets are relatively expensive for a single concert without considering travel and accommodation — which Live Nation bundles with Sphere tickets through Vibee, a destination experience company it founded in 2023.
It may be ahead of other music companies, but Live Nation is merely following practices familiar to companies such as airlines, which charge more for early boarding, and theme parks, where paying a premium allows you to spend less time standing in line for rides. Insurance companies offer multiple tiers of services that include add-ons such as “accident forgiveness.” Everywhere you look, there’s an expensive option that’s out of reach for most consumers but well worth the value to others.
The wave of upselling now extends to VIP tiers in music streaming. Last week, Tencent Music Entertainment (TME) announced it has 10 million Super VIP subscribers accounting for 8.4% of its 119 million subscribers. Super VIP, launched in the first quarter of 2022, provides such perks as better sound quality, priority access to music content and live event tickets. With a cost five times the normal subscription tier, Super VIP subscriptions helped TME’s average revenue per user increase 5% from the prior-year period. That success with VIP pricing is likely a harbinger of things to come. A single tier may not deliver the kind of profitability investors now demand.
“I think Spotify and the labels, long ago, realized this ‘one price for everybody’ thing gets these companies off the ground, but ultimately it’s not sustainable,” says pricing strategy consultant Rafi Mohammed, who espouses a strategy he calls “good-better-best” and encourages companies to create more valuable tiers of products and services for subsets of customers who are willing to pay extra. “If you’re a company and you’re not doing it, you’re making a mistake,” he says. “There are always going to be higher-end people who are willing to pay more for a more enhanced experience.”
With the current music streaming model relatively unchanged for two decades, music companies are increasingly engaging in the kind of customer segmentation taught in business schools. Companies that want to deliver strong, sustained growth are looking at ways to provide more valuable — and more expensive — experiences to those customers willing to pay for them.
Record labels are itching for a high-priced streaming subscription tier that would produce greater royalties. Spotify’s VIP tier — for lack of a better term — seems all but inevitable at this point. In September, Universal Music Group (UMG) COO (then CFO) Boyd Muir said the company was in “advanced talks” with the streamer for a high-priced tier that offers a better user experience than standard subscription plans. Spotify CEO Daniel Ek lifted the veil on a pending VIP plan in July, saying it would “probably” be priced at $17 or $18 per month and provide subscribers with “a lot more control, a lot higher quality across the board, and some other things that I’m not ready to talk about yet.”
UMG has said that internal market research shows 23% of subscribers would be willing to pay more for a VIP experience. But Will Page, Spotify’s former chief economist, isn’t sure Spotify is ready for a VIP tier. “It needs to walk before it can run towards a VIP platform,” he says.
Since the days of pre-Spotify subscription services such as Rhapsody, the basis $9.99 (in the U.S.) price was raised only recently but hasn’t kept pace with inflation. Spotify launched in the U.S. in 2011 and didn’t raise the individual premium price to $10.99 until 2023. Had the price kept pace with inflation, that $9.99 tier would have cost $13.50 by the time the price hike took effect. While video-on-demand streaming platforms such as Netflix have consistently raised prices over the years, music platforms like Spotify refrained, keeping their prices unchanged for fear higher prices would stunt their growth. “I would love to see the industry earn its stripes in showing pricing power before it goes to base two, which is market screening power,” says Page.
In the meantime, the music business has other ways to cater to VIPs, including a new slate of “superfan” platforms and vinyl records. Vinyl mimics a VIP strategy by upselling fans to an expensive physical item over low-value online streaming. And just as film studios use a so-called “windowing” strategy by releasing movies to theaters before streaming platforms, artists and labels are increasingly selling vinyl LPs ahead of their streaming street dates — a strategy that’s been largely absent in music since 2016. To Page, artists and labels are missing a big opportunity by not using vinyl to create a VIP release window.
“In America alone, vinyl is going to be a billion-dollar business,” says Page, “and the people who can sell it are the types of artists who would appeal to a VIP strategy.”
Over the past decade-plus, few artists have become as much of a creative, cultural and economic force in the entertainment industry at large as Tyler, the Creator. Emerging from the hip-hop-meets-everything collective Odd Future, he has continued to innovate and expand the boundaries of his career each year, whether it be in fashion, festivals or with the type of music he puts out into the world — with plenty of recognition, and accolades, coming his way as a result.
But these past two weeks have topped even that. With the release of his latest album, CHROMAKOPIA — which dropped on Oct. 28, a Monday, bucking the industry norm of Friday — Tyler earned the biggest debut week of his career, with 299,500 equivalent album units earned — even more impressive given that it was achieved in just four days of the tracking week. Now, he’s landed a second straight week atop the Billboard 200, with another 160,000 equivalent album units — his first time spending back-to-back weeks at No. 1 on the albums chart in his career. And that success helps Columbia Records’ vp of marketing Victoria White-Mason earn the title of Billboard’s Executive of the Week.
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Here, White-Mason discusses the strategy that went into the release — including the much-discussed Monday debut — and how Tyler has been able to grow himself as an artist and a businessman so effectively through the years. “It’s clear that Tyler is truly an artist in every sense of the word, and he extends his taste level and ingenuity into all the verticals he touches,” White-Mason says. “Whether it’s fashion, business or film, he’s going to bring perspective that is shaped by curiosity and an enduring sense of wonder.”
This week, Tyler, the Creator’s CHROMAKOPIA spent its second week at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 after debuting at the spot last week, making it his third chart-topping album. What key decision did you make to help make that happen?
My job as marketing lead was to amplify, scale and make tangible the world of CHROMAKOPIA, which started with the CHROMAKOPIA trucking activation that launched alongside the album announcement. We knew that these shipping containers would be a centerpiece of the overall creative and it sparked the idea to utilize them as moving billboards originating in Tyler, Texas, with pitstops in multiple markets.
The activation was an ambitious endeavor made possible by an immense amount of collaboration across our teams — from complex routing and logistics to daily social touchpoints alongside the truck’s movements and planning experiential elements for fans along the way. The payoff was clear almost immediately upon launch, as the trucks became a movement builder for us.
Most notably, Tyler initially released the album on a Monday, instead of the industry standard Friday, meaning he missed out on three days of the chart week in his debut week. How did that affect your rollout strategy? And how important was the first day in your planning?
With a career-best debut, the numbers indicate that Tyler didn’t miss out on much! His intention for a Monday release was for listeners to start their week with CHROMAKOPIA, on their commute to work or school. By encouraging you to listen as a part of your natural routine at the start of the week, the hope is that you become an active listener in the process.
Of course, shortening the release week is not a natural instinctive idea in today’s market, but it is hard to overstate how remarkable a job Tyler did to create that awareness through visual trailers, touring announcements, live events and more.
At 299,500 equivalent album units, the first week was the biggest of Tyler’s career and the sixth-biggest debut of the year so far. How did you set this up differently from his other projects?
Tyler has always been a first-rate world builder, constantly innovating and transforming, and consistently besting himself in the process. With CHROMAKOPIA, I think we have an album and a campaign that feels almost cumulative in nature. It’s bursting with vulnerability, maturation, peak creative prowess and a pristine level of cohesiveness throughout it all.
CHROMAKOPIA’s success is not an anomaly, it’s the result of all the foundational work he’s done to get to this point. That said, we had a perfect storm of a tapped-in, fully engaged artist, an equally tapped-in and engaged fan base, and an overwhelming desire from fans to be fed.
With 66,000 vinyl sales in its first week, the album was also the third-biggest hip-hop vinyl album since Luminate began tracking sales in 1991. How did vinyl — and physical product in general, given his six CD boxed sets — play a role in this album campaign?
There’s an obvious and immense demand for physical product for this artist and we were fortunate to be able to make it available immediately thanks to the tireless efforts of our Commerce and Release Planning teams. The partnership between Golf Wang, Ceremony of Roses and Columbia Records is as strong as ever. We took all our learned experience to date from his previous releases and strategized the best way to make the strongest impact. Tyler’s standard of exceptional quality and creative cohesiveness were pivotal in helping to create the demand.
How has Tyler’s career grown and developed outside of just the recorded music to the point where you guys were able to set these benchmarks in just four days of release?
Tyler, the Creator is a genius and a generational talent. I don’t say this lightly, or with the slightest bit of hyperbole, and I think it’s starting to be recognized en masse. His ability to envision and, more importantly, manifest the worlds and characters that live inside his mind is truly unparalleled. It’s clear that Tyler is truly an artist in every sense of the word, and he extends his taste level and ingenuity into all the verticals he touches. Whether it’s fashion, business, or film, he’s going to bring perspective that is shaped by curiosity and an enduring sense of wonder.
The album has already spent a second week at No. 1 now. How do you keep the momentum going from here?
Before I had the opportunity to work with Tyler, I came across an interview he did where he talked about the importance of promoting your work. He told aspiring artists to be proud of the work they made and to never stop being a passionate advocate for your art. Tyler’s conviction and candor always stuck with me and now, years later, it is truly inspiring to witness his commitment to his craft firsthand.
CHROMAKOPIA’s momentum will continue to be sustained by that commitment. Look at Tyler’s activity in the 11 days since release and you’ll see that he is promoting the work authentically through his connection to his fans. What he’s encouraging is an ongoing conversation around the feelings that this music evokes and the connection that it helps create. On top of that, you have a massive world tour that will continue to expand the world of CHROMAKOPIA.
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), the oil-rich country’s sovereign wealth fund, has sold its entire stake in Live Nation, according to an SEC filing dated Thursday (Nov. 14). In April 2020, the $925-billion PIF acquired approximately 12.5 million shares that amounted to a 5.7% stake in Live Nation, making it the fourth-largest shareholder behind […]
Lil Durk has pleaded not guilty to federal charges over an alleged plot to kill rival rapper Quando Rondo in a 2022 shooting.
At a hearing Thursday in Los Angeles federal court, the Chicago rapper (Durk Banks) was arraigned on conspiracy, murder-for-hire and firearms charges. He pleaded not guilty to all three, federal prosecutors confirmed to Billboard.
The court appearance came three weeks after the Chicago rapper (Durk Banks) was arrested and charged with orchestrating the 2022 attack at a Los Angeles gas station, which left Rondo (Tyquian Bowman) unscathed but saw his friend Lul Pab (Saviay’a Robinson) killed in the crossfire.
If convicted on all three charges, Durk faces a potential sentence of life in prison. A trial is tentatively set for January, though it could be pushed back for a variety of reasons.
Documents filed Thursday also reveal that Durk has hired Drew Findling, a prominent Atlanta criminal defense attorney with an extensive history representing rappers, including Gucci Mane, the members of Migos and Cardi B. Findling did not immediately return a request for comment on Friday.
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In their case against Durk, prosecutors claim that his “Only The Family” crew was not merely a well-publicized group of Chicago rappers, but a “hybrid organization” that also functioned as a criminal gang to carry out violent acts “at the direction” of Durk. They say one of those acts was the 2022 attempted killing of Rondo, allegedly carried out in retaliation for the 2020 killing of rapper King Von (Dayvon Bennett), a close friend of Durk’s.
“Banks put a monetary bounty out for an individual with whom Banks was feuding named T.B.,” prosecutors wrote in the charges last month, referring to Rondo by his initials. “Banks ordered T.B.’s murder and the hitmen used Banks and OTF-related finances to carry out the murder.”
In addition to Durk, prosecutors have also charged those who they say actually carried out the attack, including alleged OTF members Kavon London Grant, Deandre Dontrell Wilson and Asa Houston, as well as Keith Jones and David Brian Lindsey, two other alleged Chicago gang members.
In charging documents, prosecutors allege that the assailants booked flights to Los Angeles using a credit card that was clearly connected to Durk. The government says the card was allegedly issued under a bank account that listed Durk’s one-time manager as an owner, and that another credit card was issued under the same account to Durk’s father.
Among other claims, the documents cite a text allegedly sent by Durk to another co-conspirator in the lead up to the shooting: “Don’t book no flights under no names involved wit me.”
In a superseding indictment unveiled last week, prosecutors also cited Durk’s lyrics – claiming he had directly referenced the Rondo shooting in a 2022 track called “Wonderful Wayne & Jackie Boy.” They claim the lyrics tie Durk to the killing, and that he was seeking to “commercialize” Lul Pab’s death by “rapping about his revenge.”
As he awaits trial, Durk is incarcerated at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Los Angeles, a federal prison frequently used to house defendants before and during trial. He will appear again before the judge next month to decide whether he will be released on bail as he prepares for trial.